Populist radical right parties and discursive opportunities during Covid-19. Blame attribution in times of crisis

Abstract

This study examines how populist radical right parties (PRRP) adapt to the discursive opportunities delivered by the Covid-19 pandemic. Conducting manual content analyses of discourses on Twitter in six Western European countries between February and October 2020 we show that PRRP frame the pandemic as a domestic political crisis attacking primarily national political elites. While PRRP occasionally link their initial support for measures against the pandemic to blame attribution towards immigrants accusing them of spreading the virus, nativist messages almost disappear when PRRP became less supportive of restrictions. Instead, in countries less affected by the pandemic (Austria, Germany) as well as in Spain, PRRP compensate the lack of nativist messages by using anti-elitist demonizing discourses against the national government accusing it of abolishing democracy and undermining freedom. The study shows how PRRP electorally “survive” periods with scarce nativist discursive opportunities by emphasizing on anti-elitist discourses.

The Demand and Supply of Pandemic Populism: A Global Overview

“…After the initial phase, the behaviour of populist parties aligned with their broader ideological profile. Right-wing populists attempted to link the crisis to a nativist agenda, even though the specific nature of the crisis provided incentives to emphasize populism rather than nativism, by labelling government responses as authoritarian and antidemocratic (see also Schwörer and Fernández-García 2022;Wondreys and Mudde 2022). Right-wing populists also prioritized economic concerns over health, emphasizing the damage produced by restrictions on the national economy.…”

“…The reason for this trend relies on the peculiar nature of the pandemic crisis (Bobba and Hubé 2021), which provided incentives to emphasize populism rather than nativism itself (Schwörer and Fernández-García 2022). As Jakub Wondreys and Cas Mudde (2022: 89) underline, PRR parties 'integrated the government response to COVID-19 into their populist discourse'.…”

Climate Sceptics or Climate Nationalists? Understanding and Explaining Populist Radical Right Parties’ Positions towards Climate Change (1990–2022)

“…Similar anecdotal evidence was reported during the Covid-19 pandemic. The AfD in Germany first demanded strict measures to prevent the spread of the virus, but started to question pandemic-related measures and even denied the severity of the disease when the government finally decided to act (Fiedler, 2020; Schwörer and Fernández-García, 2022). While the AfD was the only German party rejecting face masks, the populist radical right Sweden Democrats solely advocated for wearing them, supporting the World Health Organization (WHO) recommendation when the rest of the Swedish parties did not recommend it (SVT Nyheter, 2020).…”

Approaching the Unknown. The COVID-19 pandemic, political parties and digital adaptations: party élites' perceptions in Italy and Spain

“…So far, the academic literature on the impact of COVID-19 has focused mainly on the legislative arena and in particular on political institutions and actors (Bar-Siman-Tov, 2020;Malloy, 2020;Reniu and Messeguer Sánchez, 2020;Brack et al, 2021). The scholar research has also discussed how several party families, mostly from the radical right family, adapted their discourses or communication strategies during the pandemic (Falkenbach and Greer, 2020;Schwörer and Fernández-García, 2022;Wondreys and Mudde, 2022). However, nor the extent to which political parties have adapted their organization to the COVID-19 related necessities, nor the perceptions of the party élites or members to such transformations have been properly analyzed by comparative studies.…”