What drives support for authoritarian populist parties in Eastern and Central Europe?

Abstract

Using data from the European Social Survey (2002–2018), we examine the rise of the far right in nine east-central European states in the last half of their third post-communist decade: Bulgaria, Croatia, Czechia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Slovenia, and Slovakia. For many in the region in 2018 religion remained a cornerstone of national identity even as the nation struggled with the institutional demands of democracy in the aftermath of a global economic recession and the 2015 migration crisis. While far-right parties had many paths to success, our results suggest that respondents affiliated with a religious denomination were more likely to vote for the authoritarian populist party and the most religious were even more likely. Religion served as a tool of illiberalism. Because the appeal of populist parties that combine exclusionary anti-immigrant and anti-diversity rhetoric with generous benefits for citizens may transcend regional historical and political boundaries, the role of religiosity in these findings merits further consideration. Autocratic leaders in some states used Church support for traditional culture and social welfare payments to families and tax rebates to secure electoral victories for themselves and guide party establishments and the civil society away from judicial independence and a free press that could expose corruption. It is not inconceivable that authoritarian populism propped up by ethno-nationalism and social welfare benefits could gain sufficient scope, direction, and durability to undermine the European Union and serve as a beacon of intolerance.

Keywords

Authoritarian Central and Eastern Europe cultural backlash economic insecurity populism religion welfare chauvinism

Introduction

‘Join forces already, Orban tells Meloni and LePen’ read Politico’s headline describing the united right-wing coalition in the EU Parliament pitched by Marine LePen (Politico, 2024). National, regional, and generational influences in the appeal of authoritarian populist parties¹ are the focus of significant research because of the threat they pose to democracy and civil liberties through growing xenophobia, anti-Semitism, and illiberal actions (cf. Kyle and Gultchin, 2018; Mudde and Rovira Kaltwasser, 2018; Muis et al., 2021; Schroeder, 2020; Stanley, 2017; Sussman, 2019). These parties challenge key pillars of the European Union by offering an alternative model to disaffected voters in the west. Stefanovic and Evans (2019) found that far-right parties in four eastern European states prevailed in elections through ‘Multiple Winning Formulae’ balancing concerns about non-European and non-Christian minority groups, welfare chauvinism, and democracy. The flexible playbook of far-right parties is sufficiently adaptable to transform party systems as it has in Europe (cf. Vachudova, 2021).

In reviewing the 32-nation study contained in Norris and Inglehart’s (2019) Cultural Backlash, Armin Schafer (2021) warns that since the political experiences of birth cohorts may not be the same across countries, populism may differ by nation or region and these differences merit detailed investigation. Our study provides a test of the cultural backlash/economic insecurity model in 2018 in a geographic and cultural area that includes many of the newest EU member states. We examine the nine eastern and central European states included in the Norris and Inglehart (2019) 32-nation study for which updated data were available. Rather than looking for an ‘East-West divide on democracy’ (Sedelmeier, 2024:1), we limit our investigation regionally and focus on the role of religion and welfare chauvinism in support for authoritarian populist parties. We also look individually within states taking account of distinctions among them (cf. Sedelmeier, 2024) in the triggers of support for the far-right party.

Because the newest EU member states so recently met rule-of-law and other democratic criteria for membership in the European Union, and because once admitted each state influences adherence to these standards, understanding the nature of support for authoritarian populist parties in eastern and central European states has urgent implications. Bulgaria (joined the European Union (EU) in 2007), Croatia (2013), the Czech Republic (2004), Hungary (2004), Latvia (2004), Lithuania (2004), Poland (2004), Slovenia (2004), and Slovakia (2004) are the focus of our analysis using European Social Survey data rounds 1–9 predating the 2022 Russian war on Ukraine.²

Literature review and hypotheses

Norris and Inglehart (2019; Inglehart and Norris, 2016) recently developed a multivariate model of voter preference for radical right-wing populist parties and tested it with voters in 32 countries including Scandinavian, Mediterranean, Western European, and post-communist nations. Their findings suggest that the authoritarian party supporter is older, male, less well-educated and of white European background. Authoritarian values, political mistrust, and right ideological self-placement also predicted the right-wing populist vote and explained the generational divide (Norris and Inglehart, 2019). A follow-up study by Doerschler and Jackson (2019) focused the original Inglehart and Norris (2016) multivariate model on 13 western European states and included in the equation two additional independent variables explicitly articulated in right-wing party slogans: sense of being in a group that is discriminated against, and fear of crime. Cultural variance in the triggers of support for authoritarian parties was suggested by these results as was the role of a sense of personal grievance on the part of majority group members (Doerschler and Jackson, 2019).

Doerschler and Jackson (2019) found that among majority group members in western Europe, voting for right-wing parties decreased with age and religiosity, and support for authoritarian values had no impact on the vote. These differences between the outcomes in western Europe and those reported by Inglehart and Norris (2016) in their broader geographical analyses may be a consequence of decades of policy development in western European states leading citizens away from authoritarian and majority-centered government programs and practices toward the respect for diversity that is central to liberal democracies. We expect the results of the present investigation of east-central European states to reflect a different history which includes authoritarian state rule, isolation from the west, ethno-cultural conservatism, and struggle for national independence from communist domination.

Political party instability (Dimitrova, 2018; Greskovitz, 2015; Greven, 2016; Stanley, 2017), religion as a cornerstone of national identity and tool of illiberalism (Pew Research Center, 2017; Pirro, 2014), inconsistent commitment to democracy (Pew Research Center, 2017: 141), and support for a strong Russia (Pew Research Center, 2017: 12) are prominent aspects of the political terrain in eastern and central European states. The recent rise of the Confederation Party in Poland provides an illustration of continued party instability in the nation. Confederation was formed in 2018 as a coalition of three small parties (New Hope, National Movement, and Confederation of the Polish Crown). Since then, Confederation has gained sufficient popularity to put themselves forward as a possible coalition partner in a future minority government. Poland’s Law and Justice Party already occupies the anti-immigrant, homophobic, Eurosceptic space. The Confederation Party fills another niche, criticizing the ruling party’s big-government social and ecological programs as well as its COVID mitigation measures. At Confederation’s founding, the three smaller parties that formed it ‘signed a declaration of allegiance to the Catholic Church, promising to “submit our private and public life to the reign of Christ, King of Poland”’ (Economist, 2023). Confederation’s coalition members are critical of democracy in Poland, and promote extreme anti-abortion, pro-gun ownership, and homophobic messages. Younger and first-time voters are particularly attracted to Confederation. Its appeals draw on continuing themes of socio-political life in east-central Europe.

Pew Research Center (2017: 141) data for 2017, for example, suggest uneven support for democracy in east-central Europe. The seven states included in both the Pew Research Center study and ours show considerable variation in the percentage of respondents who agree that ‘Democracy is preferable to any other kind of government’: Lithuania (64%), Croatia (54%), the Czech Republic (49%), Hungary (48%), Poland (47%), Bulgaria (39%), and Latvia (34%). The 2019 Pew Research Center (2019: 43) survey asking whether respondents are ‘dissatisfied with the way democracy is working in their country’ contains further revealing results for six of the nine states included in both our sample and Pew Research Center’s: Poland (31% dissatisfied), Lithuania (36%), the Czech Republic (39%), Slovakia (45%), Hungary (50%), and Bulgaria (71%). In their varying levels of dissatisfaction, eastern European respondents look much like their western European counterparts, where, for example, 58% of respondents indicate that they are ‘not satisfied’ with democracy in France, while only 36% are dissatisfied in Germany. The rule of law has been undermined significantly in both Poland and Hungary by, among other changes, recent laws (implemented during the years of Law and Justice majority rule, 2015–2023) allowing for replacement of sitting judges and greater state control of the media. Yet Pew Research Center respondents in some eastern and western European states have similar levels of dissatisfaction with the way democracy is working in their country.

These results suggest that different standards for democracy are held in each region. The EU Commission, for example, moved in 2017 toward Article 7 sanctions against Poland for ‘failing to uphold democracy at home’ (Freedom House, 2018: 5). There has so far ‘been no parliamentary vote on the issue’ for Poland (BBC News, 2018; see also both Brzozowski, 2019 and Cameron, 2018). In 2018, Article 7 sanctions against Hungary were approved by the European Parliament for ‘eroding democracy and failing to uphold fundamental European Union values’ (Deutsche Welle, 2018). When Portugal assumed the EU presidency in 2021, a debate was scheduled on Article 7 and the rule of law in both countries, amid recognition that Hungary and Poland would support each other thereby preventing unanimity in the General Affairs Council regarding application of sanctions (Euractiv, 2021). The European Commission called for a 7.5 billion Euro cut in European funds to Hungary in response to its rule-of-law violations (Notes from Poland, 2022; Tidey, 2022; cf. BBC News, 2022; Stevis-Gridneff et al., 2022).

Despite documented weakening of democratic supports in Hungary, the percentage of Hungarians who are satisfied with the way democracy is working in their country (45%) was 4 percentage points higher than the figure for France (41%) according to Pew Research Center (2019: 43). Differences in the electorate’s standards for democratic governance may also explain the relatively mainstream vote share (40% and over) for authoritarian populist parties in Hungary and Poland in contrast to the much weaker vote share for populist parties in western European states (12% or less on average) before the 2018 European Social Survey data collection (cf. Akkerman et al., 2016; Doerschler and Jackson, 2019).

Support for right-wing populism in eastern and central Europe can also be found in respect for the Russian authoritarian state. Pew Research Center (2017: 127) found that, ‘Many in east-central Europe agree that “a strong Russia is necessary as a counterbalance to the West”’. This sentiment was most pronounced in Orthodox majority countries like Bulgaria (56% of respondents agreed with this statement) and Greece (70% agreed). In the Czech Republic, where the majority is religiously unaffiliated, 49% agreed with the importance of a strong Russia. Catholic-majority countries varied somewhat: In Croatia 50% agreed, Hungary 44%, Poland 34%. But in all of these countries except Greece and Bulgaria, the percentage of those who said that ‘It’s in our country’s interest to work closely with U.S. and Western powers’ far outweighed the percentage who favored a strong Russia. In Hungary, for example, 63% of respondents saw working with the United States and Western powers as in their country’s interest and the figures were 71% in Poland, 68% in Croatia, and 67% in the Czech Republic. Since collection of these Pew Research Center data predated the Trump administration, the results are not an artifact of the rightward turn in the United States. In east-central Europe belief in the need for a strong Russia coexists with a desire to work closely with the west. This seeming contradiction reflects the region’s complicated historical and cultural connections with Russia and, in the case of majority orthodox countries like Greece and Bulgaria, religious ties.

The cultural scaffolding of eastern and central Europe is supportive of welfare chauvinism, religiosity, and the anti-immigrant exclusionary populism or neo-nationalism that is characteristic of modern European right-wing parties (cf. Eger and Valdez, 2015, 2019). Nonetheless, Stanley (2017: 17) noted that east-central European states ‘had turned themselves into functioning – if not flawless – liberal democratic states’ 20 years post-communism though democratic backsliding emerged after EU accession was completed. Right-wing radical populism in east-central Europe combined ‘authoritarian, traditionalist, and nativist attitudes with opposition to capitalism and European integration’ (Stanley, 2017: 17) as in western Europe. But a new party subtype was also apparent in east-central Europe – the centrist populist party focused on corruption and with a broad range of approaches to other issues (Stanley, 2017: 18).

Kulin et al. (2021: 1126) found, for example, that ‘in many Eastern European countries . . . nationalist ideology is associated with less [climate change] skepticism’ while the relationship is positive in western European states. While Stanley initially described radical right populism in the east-central European region as relatively weak, he noted the contradictions provided by Fidesz in Hungary and PiS in Poland where mainstream parties moved to the radical right and, in Hungary, attained ‘sufficient power to make changes to the political system’ (Stanley, 2017: 18) that will not be easily undone. In a later article, Pirro and Stanley (2022: 86) warn that ‘for the first time since the end of authoritarian rule, there has been a marked deterioration in the quality of democracy in a number of Central and East European Countries’ because as they have increasingly gained control of government, authoritarian populist parties have pursued policies that forge, bend, and break democratic safeguards following the playbooks they have seen to be recently effective in neighboring countries. We examine the extent to which welfare chauvinism and religiosity facilitated this backsliding.

Welfare chauvinism

Malka et al. (2020) underscore authoritarian populist support for significant economic protections for citizens coinciding with the predictable right-wing demand for denial of benefits to immigrants. These authors point out that

. . . left economic attitudes might be a part of an ideological package that coheres with anti-democratic sentiment. Communism . . . combined authoritarian governance with a radically egalitarian ideology, an attitude combination that still prevails among citizens who lived through Communism for substantial parts of their lives (Pop-Eleches and Tucker, 2019). (Malka et al., 2020: 810)

Culturally conservative voters might align with authoritarian leaders who put forward an economically protectionist agenda, choosing order over freedom and security over liberal democracy. Malka et al. (2020) found this pattern among voters in western European states, and it reflects the new era of nationalism in western Europe described by Eger and Valdez (2015, 2019). They argue that the new party subtype in western Europe combining economic protectionism with anti-immigrant policies undermines the usefulness of the populist radical right party label. Parties on the right have incorporated welfare chauvinism ‘with its nativist appeal’ into their welfare and labor market platforms (Bonal and Zollinger, 2018) throughout Europe. The neo-nationalist policy initiatives characteristic of eastern and central European right-wing parties similarly are not fiscally conservative and provide increased benefits for citizens, say to reward births in ‘native’ families. Voters for these parties may be attracted by policies that offer similar forms of welfare chauvinism.

The salience of a cultural background that supports both welfare chauvinism and anti-immigration policies may be particularly acute in eastern and central European states where fear of demographic collapse was exacerbated by large-scale emigration after 1989. Krastev and Holmes (The Guardian, 2019b) describe the stark reality of this region’s depopulation from 1989 to 2017:

Latvia hemorrhaged 27% of its population, Lithuania 22.5%, and Bulgaria almost 21%. In Romania, 3.4 million people, a vast majority of them younger than 40, left the country after it joined the EU in 2007 . . . More central and eastern Europeans left their countries for western Europe as a result of the 2008-9 financial crises than all the refugees that came there as the result of the war in Syria . . . . awakening fears of national disappearance . . . (The Guardian, 2019b)

Concern about the possibility of national disappearance in the face of depopulation, low-birth rates and aging populations, may have increased perceptions of the urgency of anti-immigration politics in the region after the 2015–2016 refugee crisis, even though few outsiders sought to settle there. Acceptance of the creation and targeting of an ‘enemies’ list by authoritarian leaders may therefore have been more likely than it was in western Europe.

H1. We expect preference for welfare chauvinism to positively predict respondents’ support for nationalist populist parties. But we temper that expectation with the understanding that some degree of welfare chauvinism is widely popular throughout Europe and may not be unique to authoritarian populist voters.

Religiosity

Traditional religious organizations have taken on a primary role in minimizing cultural and demographic change in some east-central states. Recent activities of Father Rydzyk and Radio Marya in ‘deeply Catholic’ (Santora and Berendt, 2019) Poland, for example, are underscored in a New York Times (Santora and Berendt, 2019) article where the influence of priests in ‘shaping political life’ (Santora and Berendt, 2019) is compared to that of ‘the martyrs of World War II’ (Santora and Berendt, 2019) and ‘the heroes who led the fight against communist rule’ (Santora and Berendt, 2019; see also Zubrzycki, 2006). Father Rydzyk’s influence is greatest among isolated older voters in rural areas. He provides a bleak picture of the consequences of declining faith where the Roman Catholic Church is under siege, politics are controlled by gays and universities by Marxists.

Stanley (2022: 118) underscores the role of the Church in Poland as a key mechanism by which PiS ‘is attempting to apply its general strategy of “elite replacement” in a modified way to civil society’. Since the state does not have direct control over the leadership and message of independent organizations in the civil society, elected party leaders extend the ‘right-wing populist framework’ by funding intermediary organizations that promote ‘right-wing cultural narratives’ (Stanley, 2022: 118) to establish a ‘true (counter-)elite’ that represents the people (Stanley, 2022: 119). PiS and its party president, Kaczynski, argue that the ‘old-new elite . . . alliance of post-communist and liberal post-Solidarity forces’ prioritized western interests ‘in betrayal of authentic Polish interests and values’ (Stanley, 2022: 119). Stanley (2022: 120) further notes that ‘colonization’ of civil society organizations not under direct government control is, as Kotwas and Kubik (2019) claim, part of the ‘“symbolic thickening of public culture” in Poland . . . to put ideological flesh on the bones of PiS’s “thin” populist political narrative. . . . pre-existing nativist and national-religious tendencies in some sections of Polish society’ as well as ‘opposition to . . . advocacy of women’s and LGBT rights’ provided fertile ground for ‘thickened’ narratives that exclude minority groups from membership in the national community (Stanley, 2022: 120). According to Stanley (2022), ‘Father Tadeusz Rydzyk and his ultra-conservative Catholic media network . . . . have disseminated a “national-Catholic’ ideology” . . . . mostly positive coverage’ (p. 122) of the party, and have been generously rewarded by government support through state funding for Rydzyk’s ‘multiple foundations, companies, and journalism school . . . ’. PiS publications and public media under party control have also promoted the ‘anti-gender, anti-LGBT, and “national-Catholic” narratives disseminated by Rydzyk’s media’ (Stanley, 2022: 123). Conservative fears of ‘secularization, European integration, and liberalization of Polish society’ (Stanley, 2022: 123) contribute to Church willingness to assert itself in this public cultural ‘thickening’ effort. Church efforts in this regard have been acknowledged to be crucial to the electoral success of the Law and Justice party (PiS). PiS leader Kaczynski himself attributed the party’s 2015 victory to Father Rydzyk’s support (cf. Stanley 2022: 123).

Following 8 years as an opposition party, in 2015, PiS (Law and Justice Party) won an absolute majority with 45% of the vote in Poland’s election for European Parliament, the first party to do so since the 1989 fall of communism (Chapman, 2019). In the lead up to Poland’s October 2019, national election Jaroslaw Kaczynski, the Law and Justice Party (PiS) leader, kept the church close as he opened the campaign season. In his words, ‘Christianity is part of our national identity. The church was and is a preacher and possessor of the only system of values fully known in Poland . . . ’ (Santora and Berendt, 2019). But Radio Maryja and Father Rydzyk have earned criticism for their intolerance, xenophobic and homophobic slurs, their anti-Semitic tropes and for charging that the EU is ‘the new Soviet Union’ (Santora and Berendt, 2019). PiS won 44% of the national vote in 2019, though its support in both the national senate and lower house declined (The Guardian, 2019a). In the 2020, Polish presidential election the Law and Justice Party (PiS) candidate Duda was reelected with 51% of the vote (BBC News, 2020; Santora, 2020).

Greven (2016) has warned that Poland’s PiS government

is moving toward illiberal authoritarianism . . . no longer recognizes the ruling of the constitutional court and has weakened the media . . . [and likewise in] Hungary the governing party began moving towards illiberal authoritarianism in 2010 . . .

with a new constitution and limitations on the media.

Lamour describes a similar role for Christianity in Hungary, where Orban has made ‘an affective investment deployed through two discursive ideal types: the politicization of religion and the sacralization of politics’ (Lamour, 2021b; see also Zuquete, 2017). Orban’s promotion of laws banning display of homosexuality has been described as a radical social policy effort to protect ‘what he says are traditional Christian values from Western liberalism’ (Than and Szakacs, 2021). Hungary’s Fidesz was founded in 1988 as a ‘mainstream liberal alliance’ (Greven, 2016) but transitioned after electoral defeat to take on right-wing extremist Jobbik party policies when the allure of an anti-immigrant and Eurosceptic platform was burnished by increases in migration from Syria and other conflict zones. Recently, both PiS in Poland and Fidesz in Hungary routinely garnered over 40% of the vote, indicating that they are supported by some in the mainstream. In Poland, many of those votes are seen to be attracted less by the nationalist platform of PiS, and more by what the New York Times describes as its platform of

redistribution . . . of goods and services and money . . . [and the] animating idea . . . that the peaceful transition to democracy was fundamentally flawed and benefited an elite class that included former Communists. (Santora, 2019)

The 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine may have blurred the hard edge of nationalism in Poland where the war’s refugees (who were mostly white and Christian) were welcomed with residential and employment opportunities (cf. Wamsley, 2022).

Poland and Hungary illustrate the importance of harnessing religion and the media in moving toward authoritarianism and the dismantling of the courts, universities, and regulations on which democracy rests. Bulgaria provides another example, in that the founder (Volen Siderov) of the far-right party Ataka argued that the Bulgarian Orthodox Church should be institutionalized as the official religion of the country, participate in all important official government decisions, and be taught in primary schools (cf. Civil Liberties Union for Europe, 2015; European Commission on Racism and Intolerance, 2014; Feffer, 2013).

The communist suppression of religion may explain its reemergence now. Efforts to define a state linked to the nation’s pre-communist past yet distinct from its subservience to east bloc identity can build on the nation’s traditional religion and widespread clericalism (cf. Pirro, 2014: 612). The new centrality of Christianity, whether Catholic or Orthodox, may also be part of the overall backlash against democracy and capitalism. This backlash initially found political expression in support for ex-communist parties, part of the Cold War dynamic juxtaposing communism and democracy (cf. Ziblatt, 1998). But the ideological focus of the backlash seems to have swung radically from far left to far right such that far-left parties barely register, especially in contrast to the far right. Freedom House (2018) documents the current smearing of journalists, non-governmental organizations, and other voluntary groups as agents of foreign influence in all but four of its list of 17 Central European and Balkan states. Even while attacks on the rule of law have become ubiquitous, the region’s far-right parties have established themselves as champions of the traditional religion and those left behind in the face of increased immigration and other significant markers of globalization such as EU membership.

The authoritarian populism that is characteristic of Europe emphasizes both nationalism and liberal social welfare benefits for citizens and may be more likely to take root where religious affiliation is widely shared and central to national identity. In contrast to the far left, the far right promises to preserve and protect the traditional national culture and address the inequalities created by capitalism. Religion is an important platform from which right-wing Christian nationalism can be launched and nourished. Pew Research Center (2017: 12) examined the ‘percent who say being Orthodox/Catholic is very or somewhat important to truly share their national identity’. The median results of surveyed countries indicated that in majority Orthodox countries, 70% of those surveyed agreed with the statement, and similarly in Catholic-majority countries, the median level of agreement was 57%. Specifically, for the states in our study, in Bulgaria, a majority-Orthodox country, 66% of respondents indicated the centrality of being Orthodox to nationality in the country. In four Catholic-majority countries included both in the Pew Research Center study and ours – Poland (64%), Croatia (58%), Lithuania (56%), and Hungary (43%) – the importance of religion to national identity was noted by sizable groups of those surveyed as specified above in parentheses.

H2. We expect both membership in a religious denomination and degree of religiosity to be positive predictors of respondents’ vote and affinity for the nationalist populist party in eastern and central European states.

Moving from this brief review of distinct cultural, political, and economic aspects of east-central Europe before the 2022 Russian war on Ukraine, we turn to tests of our hypotheses predicting the influence of religiosity and support for welfare chauvinism on voting for the authoritarian populist party and on feeling closest to it.

Data and methodology

Using European Social Survey data³ rounds 1–9 (2000–2018), we examine the sociodemographic and attitudinal determinants of support for authoritarian populist parties in the nine eastern and central European states included in the Norris and Inglehart (2019) 32-nation study for which data are available: Bulgaria, Croatia, the Czech Republic, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Slovenia, and Slovakia. We are not investigating regional distinctions among EU states in the reasons for their support for far-right parties. Rather, we examine the sources of far right support in the eastern and central states above. Our logistic regression statistical techniques have been selected toward that end as appropriate to the dichotomous dependent variables described below. The states we examine have been EU members for less than 20 years, with seven of them meeting the accession requirements and joining in 2004, and Bulgaria (2007) and Croatia (2013) joining later. Eighteen parties within these states were initially classified as ‘populist’ in the first study by Inglehart and Norris (2016), and as ‘authoritarian’ in the second, which used a more complex three-dimensional party classification and data for ESS rounds 1–7, ending in 2014 (Inglehart and Norris, 2016; Norris and Inglehart, 2019: 217, 230–236). Table 1 lists the parties by country and provides the percent vote share for them among respondents to the European Social Survey. Supplemental Appendix A specifies question wording and coding for each of the variables used in the study. Both dependent variables have dichotomous coding (voted for far right or other; feel close to far-right party or other) making logistic regression appropriate for our multivariate analysis. We conducted reliability tests using Cronbach’s alpha and factor analysis to assess the statistical relationship of items included in the construction of each of the scales used (the Anti-Immigrant Scale, the Mistrust Global Governance Scale, and the Mistrust National Governance Scale) and note these results below.⁴

Table 1.

Percent vote share for populist parties in Eastern Europe (European Social Survey Rounds 1–9, 2002–2018).

Bulgaria	2002	2004	2006	2008	2010	2012	2014	2016	2018	Total
Attack (Ataka)	N/A	N/A	9.8	8.6	4.0	2.1	N/A	N/A	6.0	6.3
Bulgarian National Movement (VMRO-BND)	N/A	N/A	–	–	–	0.5	N/A	N/A	–
National Front for the Salvation of Bulgaria (NFSB)	N/A	N/A	–	–	–	1.0	N/A	N/A	–
Croatia
Croatian Peasants Party (HSS)	N/A	N/A	N/A	5.0	4.7	N/A	N/A	N/A	–	47.4
Croatian Democratic Alliance of Slavonia and Baranja (HDSSB)	N/A	N/A	N/A	1.0	1.7	N/A	N/A	N/A	1.4
Croatian Party of Rights (HSP)	N/A	N/A	N/A	3.2	4.1	N/A	N/A	N/A	–
Croatian Democratic Union (HDZ)	N/A	N/A	N/A	43.6	43.3	N/A	N/A	N/A	35.5
Czech Republic
Dawn of Direct Democracy (USVIT)	–	–	N/A	–	–	–	3.9	3.3	–	4.2
Freedom and Direct Democracy (SPD)	–	–	–	–	–	–	–	–	5.3	4.2
Hungary
Jobbik Movement for a Better Hungary (JOBBIK)	–	–	0.7	0.7	11.5	7.3	18.6	11.5	13.0	65.5
Fidesz Hungarian Civic Union (Fidesz)	–	–	47.1	52.7	63.5	63.2	48.7	66.6	55.7	65.5
Latvia
National Alliance (NA)	N/A	N/A	7.0	9.2	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A	13.8	10.4
Lithuania
The Way of Courage (DK)	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A	–	0.8	0.8	–	0.2	0.5
Poland
Law and Justice (PiS)	5.6	8.2	43.9	31.8	34.0	31.6	33.5	43.7	44.6	32.3
Congress of the New Right (KNP)	–	–	–	–	–	1.3	2.2	–	–	32.3
Slovenia
Slovenian Democratic Party (SDS)	13.4	36.8	33.9	26.1	30.5	24.7	15.7	21.4	24.2	30.4
New Slovenia – Christian People’s Party (NSI)	6.6	6.3	6.1	2.3	3.9	4.2	5.9	6.6	6.1	30.4
Slovakia
Slovak National Party (SNS)	N/A	–	10.7	8.8	3.3	–	N/A	N/A	8.7	14.2
Christian Democratic Movement (KDH)	N/A	8.5	7.9	9.4	12.2	12.5	N/A	N/A	–	14.2
Total	6.4	8.2	38.1	31.9	35.6	33.1	33.3	42.4	34.7	32.1

N/A indicates that ESS data were not collected for that year/country while – indicates that the particular party did not register a valid percentage among survey respondents.

The east-central European states in our study include six majority Catholic states – Slovenia, Poland, Croatia, Lithuania, Slovakia, and Hungary; one majority Orthodox country – Bulgaria; one religiously mixed country – Latvia; and one majority-unaffiliated country – the Czech Republic. Respondents in our ESS sample who report that they are religiously affiliated are most likely to be Catholic in all countries except Bulgaria (79% Eastern Orthodox) with sizable proportions of Protestants in Hungary (25%), Latvia (30%), and Slovakia (9%). In Latvia, 27% of religiously affiliated respondents in our sample report that they are Eastern Orthodox. (Supplemental Appendix B provides for each country the ‘religion or denomination’ of our ESS sample respondents who report that they are religiously affiliated.) Together, the nine states reflect religious and cultural variations in historical and cultural affinity to Russia. These countries also vary in the availability of religious leaders who can be drafted to increase support for nationalist candidates and agendas and to help define and target ‘enemies’ such as homosexuals.

In addition to the percent vote share for the authoritarian populist party noted in Table 1, we provide in Table 2 the percentage feeling closest to these parties in each state to assess the level of congruence between voters’ views and the direction of their vote. Voters who benefit from the ‘Family 500+’ Program in Poland (Cragg, 2019; European Commission, 2018), for example, might want to assure continuation of its tax-free income supports for families and children. As the governing party, Law and Justice (PiS) might thereby earn their votes despite highly publicized concerns about its efforts to dismantle the rule of law and promote both anti-Semitism and homophobia. These voters would not ‘feel closest’ to the authoritarian party, even while they voted for it. Voting might have a strategic significance, an objective rationale, that is distinct from emotional connection to the wider aims of a political party. As one recipient of Family 500+ income benefits in Poland put it,

Now we don’t have to think twice about every expenditure . . . There are some crazy people in PiS . . . but still, these last couple of years show they actually did something, and our situation is better. (Sussman, 2019)

Table 2.

Percentage feeling closest to a populist party (European Social Survey Rounds 1–9, 2002–2018).

Bulgaria	2002	2004	2006	2008	2010	2012	2014	2016	2018	Total
Attack (Ataka)	N/A	N/A	13.2	9.8	3.7	3.2	N/A	N/A	2.1	7.5
Bulgarian National Movement (VMRO-BND)	N/A	N/A	–	0.9	0.3	0.8	N/A	N/A	1.2
National Front for the Salvation of Bulgaria (NFSB)	N/A	N/A	–	–	–	–	N/A	N/A	–
Croatia
Croatian Peasants Party (HSS)	N/A	N/A	N/A	3.8	4.0	N/A	N/A	N/A	1.5	46.4
Croatian Democratic Alliance of Slavonia and Baranja (HDSSB)	N/A	N/A	N/A	0.8	3.0	N/A	N/A	N/A	–
Croatian Party of Rights (HSP)	N/A	N/A	N/A	3.1	5.9	N/A	N/A	N/A	–
Croatian Democratic Union (HDZ)	N/A	N/A	N/A	46.2	37.6	N/A	N/A	N/A	36.2
Czech Republic
Dawn of Direct Democracy (USVIT)	–	–	N/A	–	–	–	3.0	4.5	–	4.2
Freedom and Direct Democracy (SPD)	–	–	–	–	–	–	–	–	6.1	4.2
Hungary
Jobbik Movement for a Better Hungary (JOBBIK)	–	–	0.3	2.8	12.1	11.9	22.5	14.1	10.6	66.5
Fidesz Hungarian Civic Union (Fidesz)	–	–	51.4	60.4	63.4	53.2	42.5	62.4	58.7	66.5
Latvia
National Alliance (NA)	N/A	N/A	5.6	7.7	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A	19.3	11.4
Lithuania
The Way of Courage (DK)	N/A	N/A	N/A	N/A	–	1.4	0.0	–	1.1	0.7
Poland
Law and Justice (PiS)	9.7	13.7	33.2	24.1	30.2	34.6	43.6	51.7	54.2	34.7
Congress of the New Right (KNP)	–	–	–	–	–	3.5	2.8	–	–	34.7
Slovenia
Slovenian Democratic Party (SDS)	17.3	35.1	29.7	33.3	25.0	31.8	20.0	22.8	25.2	32.9
New Slovenia – Christian People’s Party (NSI)	11.3	8.4	8.4	3.0	4.5	6.5	–	–	9.6	32.9
Slovakia
Slovak National Party (SNS)	N/A	–	10.7	10.3	3.8	–	N/A	N/A	–	14.4
Christian Democratic Movement (KDH)	N/A	10.3	9.3	7.2	11.0	11.1	N/A	N/A	9.6	14.4
Total	10.8	14.9	31.9	29.2	34.8	31.2	40.3	46.8	38.85	33.2

N/A indicates that ESS data were not collected for that year/country while – indicates that the particular party did not register a valid percentage among survey respondents.

Pascal Siemsen’s examination of Polish voting behavior in the 2015 parliamentary election assessed whether the promotion of the Family 500+ Program attracted voters independently of nativist and populist attitudes. His results supported the assumption that the program was ‘likely to have played a role in the electoral success of PiS’ (Siemsen, 2020: 97). Siemsen (2020: 96) suggests that voters supporting redistribution policies were likely attracted by this generous child benefit financed by taxes. Hungary, in a similar effort likely to garner voter affinity, kicked off its 2022 parliamentary election campaign with a 2.2-billion-dollar income tax refund to families and plans for increasing the minimum wage (Than and Szakacs, 2021).

Analysis

Logistic regression results of support for authoritarian populist parties in east-central Europe

Tables 3 and 4 provide the logistic regression examinations of the predictors of both dependent variables. These tables are based on the entire ESS sample of respondents for which data are available in our nine east-central states of focus.⁵ In Table 3, we try to explain respondents’ vote for the authoritarian populist party with the national elections data included in European Social Survey Rounds 1–9 (2002–2018); and in Table 4, we examine the influences on feeling closest to the populist party. In keeping with the theoretical discussion earlier regarding the importance of Church and welfare chauvinism as tools propping up autocratic party leaders, two regression models are presented in each table: the first (Model A) with individual-level sociodemographic, economic, and personal grievance predictors; the second (Model B) adds a measure of religiosity⁶ and support for welfare chauvinism.

Table 3.

Vote for a populist party.

Sociodemographic and economic variables	Model A			Model B1
Sociodemographic and economic variables	B	SE	Sig.	B	SE	Sig.
Age (years)	–.004	.001	***	–.002	.002
Gender (male)	–.034	.026		.115	.055	*
Education	–.221	.014	***	–.130	.029	***
Income	–.019	.007	**	–.032	.015	*
Unskilled worker	.079	.040	*	–.087	.079
Unemployed for 12 months	–.092	.038	*	–.207	.081	*
Live in urban area	–.091	.011	***	–.036	.023
Live on social benefits	.157	.087		.567	.179	**
Subjective economic insecurity	–.121	.018	***	.018	.038
Feeling of belonging to discriminated group	.061	.058		–.083	.123
Feeling of safety walking alone in dark	.236	.019	***	.287	.040	***
Values and Ideology
Anti–immigration scale	.009	.001	***	.010	.001	***
Mistrust global governance	.007	.001	***	.012	.001	***
Mistrust national governance	–.008	.001	***	–.012	.001	***
Authoritarian values	.006	.001	***	.003	.002
Right-wing ideological self–placement	.375	.006	***	.362	.012	***
Opposition to homosexuality	.126	.011	***	.149	.022	***
Religiosity	–	–		.121	.009	***
Welfare chauvinism	–	–		.050	.93
Constant	–3.502	.145	***	–4.781	.308	***
Nagelkerke R²	.235			.287
% correctly predicted	77.1			75.7
N	39672			8939

Data: ESS (2002–2018) 1 Variable IMSCLBN, renamed Welfare Chauvinism, is only available in rounds 4 (2008) and 8 (2016).

p < .05; **p < .01; ***p < .001.

Table 4.

Feeling close to a populist party.

Sociodemographic and economic variables	Model A			Model B1
Sociodemographic and economic variables	B	SE	Sig.	B	SE	Sig.
Age (years)	–.005	.001		–.005	.002	*
Gender (male)	–.019	.034		.054	.073
Education	–.187	.018	***	–.005	.038
Income	–.023	.009	*	–.036	.021
Unskilled worker	.101	.052		.009	.105
Unemployed for 12 months	–.055	.050		-.111	.106
Live in urban area	–.113	.014	***	-.085	.031	**
Live on social benefits	.056	.121		.536	.264	*
Subjective economic insecurity	–.127	.023	***	.072	.050
Feeling of belonging to discriminated group	.014	.072		-.132	.153
Feeling of safety walking alone in dark	.223	.024	***	.321	.053	***
Values and ideology
Anti-immigration scale	.013	.001	***	.014	.002	***
Mistrust global governance	.007	.001	***	.014	.002	***
Mistrust national governance	–.010	.001	***	-.013	.002	***
Authoritarian values	.004	.001	***	.001	.002
Right-wing ideological self-placement	.426	.007	***	.437	.016	***
Opposition to homosexuality	.153	.014	***	.160	.029	***
Religiosity	–	–		.118	.012	***
Welfare chauvinism	–	–		.208	.111
Constant	–3.789	.184	***	–5.674	.408	***
Nagelkerke R²	.322			.391
% correctly predicted	77.5			78.1
N	24,919			5615

Data: ESS (2002–2018) 1 Variable IMSCLBN, renamed Welfare Chauvinism, is only available in rounds 4 (2008) and 8 (2016).

p < .05; **p < .01; ***p < .001.

The results in Model B of Table 3 suggest that authoritarian populist party voters in eastern Europe are not as well-educated as others and are more likely to live on social benefits. They are also more likely to feel safe when walking alone in their neighborhood after dark, even though fear of crime is a major talking point of right-wing parties. Similarly, for east-central European voters sense of being in a group that is discriminated against is not a significant predictor for or against the authoritarian populist party in the multivariate findings, likely because demographic and lifestyle diversity have been suppressed historically and are still not the focus of government sponsored protections. The results do suggest that Eastern and central Europeans who hold anti-immigration attitudes and mistrust global governance are more likely to be supporters of authoritarian parties. They are also more likely to trust national governance. National governments in eastern and central European states may have burnished their appeal to voters with significant income supports, like Family 500+ in Poland. Muis et al., (2021: 22), for example, suggest that there has been ‘genuine attitudinal change’ toward greater trust in national government among Fidesz voters in Hungary and PiS voters in Poland as their party gained power. Table 3 of our results further suggests that holding right-wing values, opposition to homosexuality and greater religiosity predict the right-wing vote in this region. These results provide mixed support for our hypotheses: Religiosity positively affects voting for the authoritarian populist party in the multivariate test for eastern and central Europe as predicted. But while support for welfare chauvinism is also a positive predictor of the populist vote, it does not quite reach statistical significance. Both the widespread acceptance of some degree of welfare chauvinism throughout Europe and the fact that data for this variable were only gathered in two of the nine ESS rounds in our study may help explain this finding.

Table 4 provides predictors for ‘feeling close’ to the authoritarian populist party. Model B within Table 4 underscores the prominence of right ideological self-placement and religiosity in encouraging affinity with the right-wing party. Reliance on social benefits is also a significant positive predictor of affinity. As we found for vote choice, sense of being discriminated against is not a predictor of support for the right-wing party, and those who feel safe from crime, rather than those who do not, are more likely to feel close to the right-wing party. Mistrust of global governance does predict the right-wing vote, suggesting again, as with the vote choice predictors, that authoritarian populist voters in this region look outward for threats. Right-wing voters in east-central states are likely to trust national governance,⁷ which may already be in the hands of the authoritarian populist party. Some voters may see these parties as providing protection from immigration and the regulatory authority of the EU. As in Table 3, support for welfare chauvinism is not a statistically significant driver of affinity with the authoritarian populist party. And in both Tables 3 and 4, the statistical significance of holding authoritarian values itself washes out when religiosity is added to the multivariate log linear regression suggesting again for eastern and central Europe the impact of religious orientation in respondents’ political preferences and voting behavior.

Calculation of the predicted probabilities for these results allows us to compare the relative impact of individual characteristics on both measures of support for far-right parties in the full east-central European sample with multicultural controls in place. The comparison profile in Table 5 indicates that ideological self-placement toward the right and high religiosity are the personal characteristics most predictive of voting for the authoritarian populist party and feeling closest to it. The impact of welfare chauvinism is considerably weaker. Those expressing high religiosity are about twice as likely as those with low religiosity to support the nationalist populist party when all other factors are controlled. The likelihood of voting for the nationalist party is roughly five times higher among respondents expressing ideological views of the right as compared to those on the left when other variables in the model are controlled. These results underscore that some voters are predisposed to accept the message of political candidates and church leaders advocating right-wing anti-immigrant policies.⁸ Promoting images of threat attached to those who do not share the national-religious culture while expanding the types of social welfare benefits for citizens that are popular throughout the EU garners the support of these voters.

Table 5.

Probability of supporting FR parties across different subgroups (%).

	Intended vote	Feeling close
Comparison profile ^a	32.27	38.93
Gender
Male	–	–
Female	29.65	37.36
Age
25	33.65	42.71
75	30.62	34.44
Education
Less than lower secondary	37.94	39.42
Lower secondary completed	35.06	39.18
Upper Secondary completed	–	–
Post-secondary non-tertiary completed	29.62	38.69
Tertiary education completed	27.09	38.45
Income
8/10	29.66	35.05
2/10	33.41	40.6
Unemployed
Yes	–	–
No	36.90	41.38
Place of residence
Farm or home in country	34.90	45.35
Country village	34.24	43.72
Town or small village	33.58	42.11
Suburbs or outskirts of big city	32.93	40.51
Big city	–	–
Feeling of belonging to discriminated group
Yes	–	–
No	34.29	42.94
Ideological self-placement
Left	12.30	12.56
Middle	–	–
Right	61.84	73.88
Religiosity
Low religiosity	22.21	27.52
Medium religiosity	–	–
High religiosity	44.31	51.70
Welfare chauvinism
Immediately upon arrival	29.63	29.55
After living in country for a year, whether or not worked	30.94	34.09
Only after they have worked and paid taxes for at least a year	–	–
Once they have become a citizen	33.65	44.00
They should never get the same right	35.05	49.21

Data: ESS (2008, 2016).

The comparison profile includes the following characteristics: average age (47.34), male, completed secondary education (coded 3/5), average income (3.77), unskilled, unemployed, living in big city, living on social benefits, living comfortably or coping with current income, feeling of being discriminated against, feeling of safety walking alone at night (coded 3/4), average values of all four indexes, middle religiosity (coded 2/3), middle ideology (coded 2/3), neither agree or disagree that homosexuals are free to live life as they wish (coded 3/5), immigrants should receive welfare benefits only after they have worked and paid taxes for at least a year (coded 3/5).

Tables 6 and 7 enable further investigation of the effect of religiosity on support for authoritarian populist parties in individual countries. Table 6 lists by country the beta coefficients for religiosity and the percentage highly religious (coded 8–10 on the 0–10 religiosity scale) who support the far right. Religiosity can serve as an important driver regardless of how strong the far right is or how religious the country is. Table 7 offers a more complex picture. It provides beta coefficients with standard errors isolating the effects of different religious or not-religious groups against each other. The results suggest that Catholics are more likely to support the neo-nationalist party (far right in the table) than Eastern Orthodox, secularists, or all non-Catholics. But Protestants are more likely to support the far right than any other group. This finding seems counterintuitive because the countries with the largest support for the far right are those with Catholicism as the predominate religion (e.g. Poland, Hungary, and Croatia). But even within primarily Catholic countries, Protestants are most likely to vote for the far-right party. The explanatory mechanism for this finding is not apparent in the data, but in future studies, it would make sense to explore whether the neo-nationalist vote signifies national allegiance and membership to Protestant voters in largely Catholic societies even more so than it does to Catholics who can rely on their religion as indicative of their full membership in the largely Catholic nation.

Table 6.

Effects of religiosity on support for the far right.

	Vote for far right		Feeling close to FR party
	B	% highly religious	B	% highly religious
Bulgaria	–.003	5.7	.015	6.9
Croatia	.156***	64.9	.085***	69.7
Czechia	.002	4.0	.077*	5.9
Hungary	.066***	75.4	.089***	77.2
Latvia	.046	15.1	.042	19.6
Poland	.130***	43.9	.120***	48.1
Slovenia	.139***	51.3	.167***	57.4
Slovakia	.200***	22.9	.156***	23.0

B = logistic Beta coefficient for religiosity. % high religious is the percentage of those who self-identified as being highly religious (coded 8–10 on 0–10 religiosity scale) who vote for or feel close to FR party.

Note: Only 14 and 16 respondents in the Lithuanian sample respectively expressed likelihood of voting for a far-right party or feeling close to a far-right party. Because of the low N, we excluded Lithuania from this analysis.

p < .05; **p < .01; ***p < .001.

Table 7.

Breakdown in denominational support for the far right.

Vote for a far-right party
	Protestant	Eastern orthodox	Not religious	All others
Roman Catholic	–.397 (.059)***	1.960 (.082)***	.441 (.032)***	.607 (.028)***
Protestant	–	2.416 (.106)***	.785 (.063)***	.669 (.057)***
Orthodox	–	–	–1.582 (.087)***	1.805 (.080)***
Not religious	–	–	–	–.300 (.031)***
Close to far-right party
	Protestant	Eastern orthodox	Not religious	All others
Roman Catholic	–.468 (.075)***	1.878 (.091)***	.465 (.042)***	.661 (.036)***
Protestant	–	2.449 (123)***	.877 (.081)***	.781 (.071)***
Orthodox	–	–	–1.500 (.099)***	–1.714 (.088)***
Not religious	–	–	–	–.290 (.080)***

Figures are logistic Beta coefficients comparing a denomination in the row with that in the column. For example, Roman Catholics are significantly less likely to vote far right than Protestants.

p < .05; **p < .01; ***p < .001.

Conclusion

We focused our analysis on nine East Central European states included in the Norris and Inglehart (2019, Inglehart and Norris, 2016) 32-nation study for which updated European Social Survey data were available. At the time of the data collection (2018), these states were in the last half of their third post-communist decade and had recently met the criteria for EU membership by demonstrating their adherence to democratic standards including those central to the rule-of-law. We examined the role of religion and welfare chauvinism on support for authoritarian populist parties in these nine states because far-right parties move the political and legal systems of states they control away from standards for freedom of the press, judicial independence, and the protection of minorities required of EU member states and evaluated regularly through the EU Justice Scoreboard (2020) review.

Our findings suggest that respondents affiliated with a religious denomination were more likely to vote for the far-right party and the most religious were even more likely.⁹ In regard to our first hypothesis, we find only modest evidence from the predicted probabilities that greater welfare chauvinism increases support for the far right though the overall effect is not significant. In contrast, our analyses lend considerable support to the second hypothesis that greater religiosity significantly increases support for far-right parties.

Examination of the effects of religiosity on support for the far right in the individual countries of our study (Table 6) suggests the importance on affinity to the far right of being highly religious regardless of either the strength of the far right in the country or the national majority denomination. There is likely more to learn about both the interaction between individual religious denomination and the majority denomination of the nation (Table 7), and the extent to which a vote for the far-right neo-nationalist party is an expression of national allegiance available to those who are not affiliated with the state’s religious majority.

The multivariate logistic regression results reported here also support previous research demonstrating that far-right parties in the region have multiple routes to success with platforms prioritizing concerns about non-European and non-Christian minority groups, welfare chauvinism, and democracy (cf. Stefanovic and Evans, 2019). Our findings further suggest that Eastern and Central Europeans who hold anti-immigration attitudes and mistrust global governance are more likely to support the far-right party. A favorable attitude toward national governance predicts the right-wing vote too, possibly because of the generous income supports modern east-central European far-right parties like Fidesz and PiS make available to citizens with the family and religious orientations deemed inherent to the national culture. As flexible political entrepreneurs (cf. Vachudova, 2021: 472), far-right parties have many sources of appeal to voters who rely on social benefits, are hostile to immigrants, favor right-wing value orientation, and have high religiosity.

The historical centrality of religion to national identity in the newest EU states is reflected in our results and may have facilitated respect for tradition. It was a post-industrial Europe that eastern and central states joined in the 21st century: A Europe of free movement, to be sure, but one without visible economic opportunities for the average worker. The economic situation did little to undermine the ‘ethno-nationalist vision of collective identity’ (Lamour, 2021a) in the countries of this region despite the rule-of-law and other democratic transitions they had recently established as new members of the EU. Detailed comparative historical examination of individual east-central European countries is needed to clarify the role of religiosity in explaining why sizable proportions of voters in some of these states support Eurosceptic parties with leaders who limit freedom of the press, curtail judicial independence, and reduce protections for minorities. But the significance of religiosity on voter support for far-right parties in our results helps to explain the parties’ emphasis on traditional images of the family and gender roles as central to national identity.

Supplemental Material

sj-xlsx-1-iss-10.1177_02685809241276882 – Supplemental material for What drives support for authoritarian populist parties in Eastern and Central Europe?

Supplemental material, sj-xlsx-1-iss-10.1177_02685809241276882 for What drives support for authoritarian populist parties in Eastern and Central Europe? by Pamela Irving Jackson and Peter Doerschler in International Sociology

Supplemental Material

sj-xlsx-2-iss-10.1177_02685809241276882 – Supplemental material for What drives support for authoritarian populist parties in Eastern and Central Europe?

Supplemental material, sj-xlsx-2-iss-10.1177_02685809241276882 for What drives support for authoritarian populist parties in Eastern and Central Europe? by Pamela Irving Jackson and Peter Doerschler in International Sociology

Footnotes

Declaration of conflicting interests

The authors declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

Funding

The authors received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.

ORCID iD

Pamela Irving Jackson

Supplemental material

Supplemental material for this article is available online.

Notes

Author biographies

Dr. Pamela Irving Jackson, Professor of Sociology at Rhode Island College, holds M.A. and Ph.D. degrees from Brown University and a B.A. with honors from Regis College. Her research and teaching focus on issues of social control and minority status, including comparative analysis of the integration of Muslims in western societies for which she received Fulbright grants in 2002 and 2006. Her work has been published in several journals, including the American Sociological Review, Criminology, Justice Quarterly, Journal of International Migration and Integration, Democracy and Security, as well as in her Choice Outstanding book, Minority Group Threat, Crime and Policing: Social Context and Social Control and her 2012 book with Peter Doerschler, Benchmarking Muslim Well-Being in Europe: Reducing Disparities and Polarizations. She has served on the editorial board of the American Sociological Review and is a recipient of the American Society of Criminology’s Mentor of the Year Award.

Dr. Pete Doerschler teaches courses in comparative politics, political ideologies and research methods. For the past two years, he’s served as the Director of the Honors College at Bloomsburg. His research has appeared in a number of scholarly journals, including Social Science Quarterly, Electoral Politics, German Politics, and the Journal of International Migration and Integration.

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