Populism in the News
Headlines across the media
March 2023
09 March: The Gordian Knot Of The Balkans: What Is The Kosovo Issue? (Visegrad Insight)
February 2023
23 February: Right to resist: How war changed Ukraine’s feminist movement (Open Democracy)
January 2023
30 January: Polish health minister ‘appalled’ girl, 14, struggled to get abortion after rape (The Guardian)
23 January: The feminist movement in Eastern Europe: struggles in a changing landscape (Open Democracy)
November 2022
10 November: How Chinese Investment Props Up Orbán and Erodes Democracy (Visegrad Insight)
October 2022
31 October: Across the Balkans, women are taking to the streets in anger (Open Democracy)
21 October: Will Polish police repeat crackdown on anti-abortion protests two years on? (Open Democracy)
September 2022
25 September: War and disinformation: pro-Russian narratives thrive in Hungary as Ukraine fights off aggression (Kafkadesk)
14 September: EuroPride march to go ahead despite government ban, organisers say (Open Democracy)
09 September: Poland’s ruling party counts on anti-EU stance to boost election chances (The Guardian)
August 2022
July 2022
29 July: Slovak Disinformation Scene at the End of the Year 2021 (Visegrad Insight)
07 July: The Strengthened Code of Practice on Disinformation (Visegrad Insight)
06 July: What overturning Roe v Wade could mean for abortion in Europe (Open Democracy)
June 2022
14 June: Slovenia’s New Government Rejects ‘Orbán’s Visegrad’ (Visegrad Insight)
May 2022
24 May: Hungarian Passports are a Trap for Ukrainian Roma (Visegrad Insight)
13 May: Orban Is Losing Friends as Poland Gives Him the Cold Shoulder (Bloomberg)
05 May: Milos Zeman: Is Czech president’s remorse genuine over his pro-Russian stance? (Euronews)
April 2022
29 April: Bosnian politician who wanted LGBTIQ people ‘isolated’ loses landmark case (Visegrad Insight)
28 April: Russia’s Digital Battleground: Polish Society (Visegrad Insight)
24 April: Is Hungary’s Viktor Orbán the US Christian Right’s new Vladimir Putin? (Open Democracy)
March 2022
18 March: Slovakia Is Divided as Never Before (Visegrad Insight)
15 March: The Fringe Left and Not-So-Fringe Right (Visegrad Insight)
09 March: Scandal and upheaval hits the ‘anti-gender’ movement in Poland (Open Democracy)
08 March: German court rules far-right AfD party a suspected threat to democracy (Guardian)
04 March: Will Hungary Ignore the Definitive Moment in Europe? (VIsegrad Insight)
February 2022
02 February: The Orbán Regime Intimidates Roma Community to Win the Elections (Visegrad Insight)
January 2022
28 January 2022: Why do women join radical-Right parties? (Open Democracy)
25 January 2022: Romania’s Manufactured Exit Campaign Rise in Social Media (Visegrad Insight)
14 January 2022: Meet the conservative who could unseat Viktor Orbán (Open Democracy)
December 2021
15 December: The political economy of populism in Europe (Chatham House)
13 December: Populism is Always Gendered (Institut Montaigne)
November 2021
12 November: Turning propaganda into public service broadcasting in Poland (Notes from Poland)
01 November: The far Right has moved from climate denial to obstructing climate action (Open Democracy)
October 2021
21 October: Everyone Stands to Lose from the EU-Poland Rule-of-Law Dispute (World Politics Review)
18 October: The Centre-Right Antidote For EU Populism (Visegrad Insight)
13 October: Czechs Defeat a Populist, Offering a Road Map for Toppling Strongmen (New York Times)
08 October: Czech Elections Waiting For A Defining Moment (Visegrad Insight)
September 2021
30 September: Poland all but confirms Amnesty’s claims of illegal refugee pushbacks (Emerging Europe)
16 September: Germany Election Playbook: Laschet ist ein Hamburger — Scholz’s liberal love — Röttgen on a roll (Politico)
10 September: The Polish Deal — a New Face or Just Different Makeup? (Visegrad Insight)
02 September: A Few More Years for Mr Andrej Babiš (Visegrad Insight)
August 2021
17 August: Harmful Political Theatre (Visegrad Insight)
11 August: No Holiday for the Media and Democracy in Poland (Visegrad Insight)
01 August: The Guardian view on Fortress Europe: a continent losing its moral compass (Guardian)
July 2021
26 July: Far-right accused of aiding German floods clear-up to win support (Guardian)
13 July: Resentment and populism: A philosophical inquiry (European Center for Populism Studies)
12 July: Bifurcating Paths: Far-right Critics of the EU have Less in Common Than They Pose (Visegrad Insight)
08 July: NfP podcast: Stanley Bill on the sources of PiS’s success (Notes from Poland)
03 July: ‘We Can!’ – a new Green-Left coalition takes over Croatia’s capital (Open Democracy)
01 July: Poland’s LGBTQ protests are glimmers of hope in an illiberal dystopia (Guardian)
June 2021
18 June: What does the Global Corruption Barometer tell us about Poland? (Notes from Poland)
14 June: Open letter: we need a new university for eastern Europe (Open Democracy)
11 June: The Euros haven’t started, but Hungary’s Viktor Orbán is already a winner (Open Democracy)
03 June: Free Hong Kong Road: Budapest renames streets to frustrate Chinese campus plan (Guardian)
02 June: How has the coronavirus pandemic crisis affected Polish politics? (Notes from Poland)
01 June: Viktor Orbán Beefs Up Support in Neighbouring Slovakia (Visegrad Insight)
May 2021
25 May: Is pandemic isolation pushing people towards extremism? (Centre for Analysis of the Radical Right)
18 May: Seán Hanley on the rise of illiberalism in Czechia (Illiberalism)
18 May: How Are Religious Emotions Instrumentalized in the Supply of and Demand for Populism? (ECPS)
18 May: How Europe can protect independent media in Hungary and Poland (Politico)
14 May: First Aid for Polish Democracy (EU Scream)
April 2021
28 April: Tilting the Playing Field in Hungary and Poland through Informal Power (GMF)
28 April: Poland has seen region’s fastest democratic decline, finds Freedom House (Notes from Poland)
20 April: Populism and Covid-19 in Europe: What we learned from the first wave of the pandemic (LSE Blogs)
14 April: ‘Worrying picture’: Journalists in Europe face increasing risk, press freedom group warns (Guardian)
12 April: Court suspends Polish state oil giant’s media takeover (Notes from Poland)
06 April: Ten Factors that Encourage Extremism (Centre for Analysis of the Radical Right)
01 April: From street to state: How radical nationalists gained power in Poland (Open Democracy)
March 2021
31 March: Poland: Escalating Threats to Women Activists (Human Rights Watch)
31 March: Germany’s COVID sceptics fuelled by Russian media and far-Right conspiracies (Open Democracy)
26 March: European far-Right populism and ISIS: Two sides of the same coin? (Open Democracy)
11 March: EU fears death of free media in eastern Europe (EU Observer)
10 March: Germany’s far-right AfD lawmakers visit Moscow (Deutsche Welle)
02 March: Coercive Clientelism Is on the Rise in Kaczyński’s Poland (Visegrad Insight)
February 2021
18 February: As Norway’s far Right declines in popularity, a new populist force rises (Open Democracy)
16 February: The cost of populism: Evidence from history (Voxeu)
12 February: Polish government “attacking independent media”, finds International Press Institute report
10 February: Dutch court escalates rule of law battle with Poland (Politico)
01 February: Global transformation: the precariat overcoming populism (Open Democracy)
January 2021
28 January: ‘Declaration of War’: Protesters in Poland Vow to Fight Abortion Ban (New York Times)
27 January: Protests return to Polish streets as anti-abortion ruling finally goes into force (Notes from Poland)
18 January: Precarity, populism, and prospects for a green democratic transformation (Open Democracy)
12 January: Will Europe Part Ways With Populism in 2021? (World Politics Review)
11 January: The Populist Effects of COVID-19 (Visegrad Insight)
11 January: Is Left populism possible? (Open Democracy)
December 2020
26 December: Right-Wing Populism May Be Wounded, But It’s Certainly Not Dead (Jacobin)
17 December: Unlike Trump, Europe’s far-right leaders haven’t been damaged by the pandemic (The Guardian)
10 December: For Europe, losing Britain is bad. Keeping Hungary and Poland could be worse (The Guardian)
07 December: Polish state energy giant buys hundreds of local media outlets from German owner (Notes from Poland)
04 December: The Janus-faced Immigration Policy of Slovakia (Demos)
02 December: Marta Lempart on leading Poland’s abortion rights protests (Financial Times)
November 2020
25 November: EU’s foreign policy gender plan faces resistance from Poland and Hungary (Politico)
19 November: Rule of law causes cracks in Visegrad Four (Euractiv)
13 November: Leaders at a loss as coronavirus catches up with central Europe (Guardian)
10 November: Lost in Transit: How Hungary Scrapped Asylum (Balkan Insight)
09 November: In the EU’s east, the far right seeks to exploit the pandemic (Notes from Poland)
05 November: From Chicago to Kiev, women send solidarity to Poland after abortion ban (Open Democracy)
October 2020
30 October: The symbols of Poland’s abortion protests explained (Notes from Poland)
29 October: For Poland’s ruling party, waging war against women pays off (Politico)
25 October: The Observer view on Poland’s draconian abortion ban (The Guardian)
19 October: Why New Zealand rejected populist ideas other nations have embraced (The Guardian)
14 October: Abortion Without Borders: a bold, feminist reply to Poland’s draconian laws (Open Democracy)
September 2020
28 September: Poland and Hungary to create institute for assessing rule of law in EU countries (Notes from Poland)
25 September: Why loneliness fuels populism (Financial Times)
24 September: How the far right took over the mainstream (Open Democracy)
22 September: The EU Should Not Turn a Blind Eye to Hungary’s Media Capture (German Marshall Fund of the United States)
17 September: Michael Sandel: ‘The populist backlash has been a revolt against the tyranny of merit’ (Guardian)
14 September: Populism in Germany declines sharply, says Bertelsmann study (Deutsche Welle)
12 September: We need to reclaim populism from the right. It has a long, proud leftwing history (Guardian)
08 September: Poland’s civil society awakening – when stones turn political (Open Democracy)
06 September: Student Blockade Protests Viktor Orban’s Reach at a Top Arts University (The New York Times)
04 September: How coronavirus has brought together conspiracy theorists and the far right (Guardian)
01 September: Poland is moving further towards autocracy (Open Democracy)
August 2020
31 August: The right’s culture war is no longer a sideshow to our politics – it is our politics (Guardian)
28 August: How democracies die: the case of Hungary (Prospect Magazine)
23 August: From Washington to Minsk, democracy is under siege … and losing the battle (Guardian)
17 August: Summer of discontent in eastern Europe (EU Observer)
13 August: Mass Arrest of LGBT People Marks Turning Point for Poland (Balkan Insight)
09 August: The Facts Just Aren’t Getting Through (The Atlantic)
06 August: Bulgarian PM says he is ready to resign but wants government to stay (Euroactiv)
06 August: Rainbow flag protesters charged by Polish police (EU Observer)
July 2020
30 July 2020: Populism Is Not A Bug But A Feature Of Globalization (Noema)
30 July 2020: How to laugh away the far-right: lessons from Germany (Open Democracy)
24 July 2020: Who paved the way for the populists? (UnHerd)
23 July 2020: The path from Covid-19 to a new social contract (Financial Times)
16 July 2020: Bild, Merkel and the culture wars: the inside story of Germany’s biggest tabloid (Guardian)
14 July 2020: Poland: trouble ahead (Open Democracy)
13 July 2020: Poland’s right-wing Law and Justice party clings on to the presidency (The Economist)
09 July 2020: Polish state media puts squeeze on presidential challenger (Financial Times)
07 July 2020: Elections in Croatia: Conservatives retain the parliamentary majority (Open Democracy)
05 July 2020: Knife-edge Polish presidential race could slow the march of populism (Guardian)
June 2020
25 June 2020: What future for the EU after COVID-19? (Open Democracy)
25 June 2020: For a bitter taste of Polish populism, just watch the evening news (Guardian)
25 June 2020: As he bids for re-election, Poland’s president still struggles to carve out an identity (Notes from Poland)
17 June 2020: Poland’s anti-LGBT campaign explained: 10 questions and answers (Notes from Poland)
15 June 2020: How to dismantle a democracy: the case of Bulgaria (Open Democracy)
04 June 2020: How Viktor Orbán turned the Treaty of Trianon into a dangerous political weapon (New Statesman)
03 June 2020: Give them liberty, or give them Covid-19 (New Statesman)
May 2020
20 May 2020: A power struggle within Poland’s Supreme Court as it seeks to pick new chief justice (Notes from Poland)
14 May 2020: How coronavirus is reshaping Europe in dangerous ways (Guardian)
13 May 2020: Democracy on Pause in Pandemic Poland (Foreign Affairs)
07 May 2020: Neoliberalism is over – welcome to the era of neo-illiberalism (Open Democracy)
April 2020
27 April 2020: Europe’s far right knows how to waste a good crisis (Politico)
18 April 2020: Beware a new wave of populism, born out of coronavirus-induced economic inequity (The Guardian)
14 April 2020: How Greece is beating coronavirus despite a decade of debt (The Guardian)
12 April 2020: Coronavirus is now contaminating Europe’s democracy (The Guardian)
03 April 2020: Creeping Authoritarianism Has Finally Prevailed (The Atlantic)
March 2020
31 March 2020: Populists Love the Pandemic (Project Syndicate)
31 March 2020: The Shocking “Coronavirus Coup” in Hungary Was a Wake-Up Call
18 March 2020: Coronavirus’ next victim: Populism (Politico)
14 March 2020: Populism is Meaningless (The Atlantic)
February 2020
14 February 2020: The trouble with anti-populism: why the champtions of civility keep losing (The Guardian)
November 2019
04 November 2019: How economic populism may determine the winner of this election (The Independent)
October 2019
24 October 2019: How liberalism became ‘the god that failed’ in eastern Europe (The Guardian)
August 2019
29 August 2019: Austrian elections: support for the far right collapses (The Guardian)
23 August 2019: Can too much bad TV lead to populism? (The Guardian)
July 2019
02 July 2019: In Liberal Estonia, Right-Wing Populists Are Making Their Mark (Freedom House)
June 2019
17 June 2019: Why Isn’t Trump a Real Populist? (New York Times)
08 June 2019: Ein demokratisches Frühlingslüftchen (Süddeutsche Zeitung)
May 2019
28 May 2019: The far right may not have cleaned up, but its influence now dominates Europe (The Guardian)
22 May 2019: Want to save Europe? Learn from Poland. Three lessons from our fight against illiberalism (New York Times)
14 May 2019: Orban’s brand of populism blinds him to reality (The Times)
08 May 2019: Broad coalitions key to fighting populism: Polish opposition (Reuters)
March 2019
06 March 2019: Revealed: the rise and rise of populist rhetoric (The Guardian)