Ideas or Strategy? The Impact of Populist Incumbents on Liberal Democracy

Kirk A. Hawkins, Saskia P. Ruth-Lovell, Grant A. Mitchell, Department of Political Science, Brigham Young University, Department of Political Science, Radboud University, The Netherlands, Department of Political Science, University of California, Los Angeles

Comparative Political Studies

Published online on July 08, 2026

Abstract

Comparative Political Studies, Ahead of Print.
Scholarship on populism has long identified a negative association between populism in power and the decline of democracy-sustaining institutions. However, researchers’ understanding of the theoretical links between these two phenomena differ and scholars ...