scholarly journals Reviewing the relationship between social policy and the contemporary populist radical right: welfare chauvinism, welfare nation state and social citizenship

2018 ◽  
Vol 34 (3) ◽  
pp. 172-187 ◽  
Author(s):  
Markus Ketola ◽  
Johan Nordensvard
Keyword(s):  
Social Policy ◽  
Radical Right ◽  
Social Rights ◽  
Policy Agenda ◽  
Social Citizenship ◽  
Populist Radical Right ◽  
Recent Emergence ◽  
Political Approach ◽  
Policy Problems ◽  
The Relationship

AbstractWhilst populism has a long-standing relationship with social policy, the recent emergence of radical right populism as a considerable political force across Europe and beyond compels us to think further about this relationship. The aim of this review essay is to bring together literature on populism, welfare chauvinism and social citizenship in order to highlight the role social policy plays in the rhetoric and political approach of the populist radical right. This essay reviews, how, by developing artificial distinctions between culturally homogeneous ‘people’ and corrupt ‘elite’, the populist radical right generates interpretations of social citizenship that confers social rights based on of cultural or ethnic belonging, rather than as a matter of right. By simplifying the nature of complex social policy problems, radical right populism further problematises the mainstream social policy agenda. Consequently, radical right populism will continue to present a significant challenge to progressive and inclusive social policy.

Social policy and populism: welfare nationalism as the new narrative of social citizenship

2018 ◽  
pp. 161-180
Author(s):  
Markus Ketola ◽  
Johan Nordensvard
Keyword(s):  
Social Policy ◽  
Political Elite ◽  
Social Rights ◽  
Social Citizenship ◽  
Far Right ◽  
Social Democratic ◽  
Discursive Strategies ◽  
The People ◽  
Policy Narratives ◽  
The Relationship

This chapter investigates the relationship between far-right populism and social policy. The chapter argues that an approach anchored in framing and policy narratives will yield new understandings of how far-right populist discourses have come to challenge social democratic and neoliberal welfare narratives. The new narrative challenges and denigrates the economic and political elite as self-serving and corrupt, claiming to represent the interest of the ‘people’ instead. In defining ‘people’, the interests of certain societal groups are prioritised on the bases of culture or ethnicity. Importantly for social policy, this chapter argues, in this universal social rights and social citizenship are reframed in ethno-nationalist and welfare chauvinist terms. The chapter draws upon the case of Sweden in order to briefly exemplify the discursive strategies at play.

scholarly journals Social Citizenship, Social Policy and Refugee Integration: a Case of Policy Divergence in Scotland?

2017 ◽  
Vol 47 (1) ◽  
pp. 161-178 ◽  
Author(s):  
GARETH MULVEY
Keyword(s):  
Social Policy ◽  
Asylum Seekers ◽  
Social Rights ◽  
Refugee Policy ◽  
Social Citizenship ◽  
Refugee Integration ◽  
Scottish Government ◽  
Refugees And Asylum Seekers ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
Asylum Seekers And Refugees

AbstractThe relationship between Holyrood and Westminster is an evolving one where there is some evidence of policy divergence. Underpinning policy approaches are different views of social citizenship, with the Holyrood approach maintaining elements of the post-1945 welfare settlement. The place of refugees and asylum seekers within these differing approaches is currently underexplored. This article looks at the Scottish and UK Governments’ views of social rights and how they apply to asylum seekers and refugees. It suggests that despite refugee ‘policy’ being at least partly reserved, the Scottish Government has been able to take a different approach from that of Westminster, an approach underpinned by these differing welfare outlooks.

scholarly journals Populist radical right parties, welfare policy and population health in Europe

2019 ◽  
Vol 29 (Supplement_4) ◽  
Author(s):  
C Rinaldi ◽  
M P M Bekker
Keyword(s):  
Public Health ◽  
Welfare State ◽  
Population Health ◽  
State Policy ◽  
Political System ◽  
Radical Right ◽  
The Political ◽  
Policy Agenda ◽  
The Public ◽  
The Relationship

Abstract Background The political system is an important influencing factor for population health but is often neglected in the public health literature. This scoping review uses insights from political science to explore the possible public health consequences of the rise of populist radical right (PRR) parties in Europe, with welfare state policy as a proxy. The aim is to generate hypotheses about the relationship between the PRR, political systems and public health. Methods A literature search on PubMed, ScienceDirect and Google Scholar resulted in 110 original research articles addressing 1) the relationship between the political system and welfare state policy/population health outcomes or 2) the relationship between PRR parties and welfare state policy/population health outcomes in Europe. Results The influence of political parties on population health seems to be mediated by welfare state policies. Early symptoms point towards possible negative effects of the PRR on public health, by taking a welfare chauvinist position. Despite limited literature, there are preliminary indications that the effect of PRR parties on health and welfare policy depends on vote-seeking or office-seeking strategies and may be mediated by the political system in which they act. Compromises with coalition partners, electoral institutions and the type of healthcare system can either restrain or exacerbate the effects of the PRR policy agenda. EU laws and regulations can to some extent restrict the nativist policy agenda of PRR parties. Conclusions The relationship between the PRR and welfare state policy seems to be mediated by the political system, meaning that the public health consequences will differ by country. Considering the increased popularity of populist parties in Europe and the possibly harmful consequences for public health, there is a need for further research on the link between the PRR and public health.

scholarly journals Those were the days: welfare nostalgia and the populist radical right in the Netherlands, Austria and Sweden

2020 ◽  
pp. 1-14
Author(s):  
Sven Schreurs
Keyword(s):  
Social Policy ◽  
The Netherlands ◽  
Welfare State ◽  
Radical Right ◽  
Demand Side ◽  
Populist Radical Right ◽  
The Welfare State

Abstract In academia and beyond, it has become commonplace to regard populist parties – in particular, those on the radical right – as the archetypical embodiment of politics of nostalgia. Demand-side studies suggest that nostalgic sentiments motivate populist radical-right (PRR) voting and welfare chauvinist attitudes, yet systematic analyses of the nostalgic discourse that these parties promote have not been forthcoming. This paper seeks to fill that lacuna by analysing how the Freedom Party of Austria, the Dutch Party for Freedom and the Sweden Democrats framed the historical fate of the welfare state in their electoral discourse between 2008 and 2018. It demonstrates that their commitment to welfare chauvinism finds expression in a common repertoire of “welfare nostalgia,” manifested in the different modes of “reaction,” “conservation” and “modernisation.” Giving substance to a widespread intuition about PRR nostalgia, the paper breaks ground for further research into nostalgic ideas about social policy.

scholarly journals Taking the Relationship Between Populism and Healthcare Seriously: A Call for Empirical Analysis Rather Than Moral Condemnation Comment on "A Scoping Review of Populist Radical Right Parties’ Influence on Welfare Policy and its Implications for Population Health in Europe"

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Martijn Felder ◽  
Iris Wallenburg ◽  
Syb Kuijper ◽  
Roland Bal
Keyword(s):  
Scoping Review ◽  
Radical Right ◽  
Political Systems ◽  
Review Of The Literature ◽  
Welfare Policies ◽  
Populist Radical Right ◽  
Radical Right Parties ◽  
Firm Basis ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
Do So

In this commentary, we reflect on Rinaldi and Bekker’s scoping review of the literature on populist radical right (PRR) parties and welfare policies. We argue that their review provides political scientists and healthcare scholars with a firm basis to further explore the relationships between populism and welfare policies in different political systems. In line with the authors, we furthermore (re)emphasize the need for additional empirical inquiries into the relationship between populism and healthcare. But instead of expanding the research agenda suggested – for instance by adding categories or niches in which this relationship can be observed – we would like to challenge some of the premises of the studies conducted and reviewed thus far. We do so by identifying two concerns and by illustrating these concerns with two examples from the Netherlands.

“Defend your right!” How the populist radical right uses references to rights and freedoms to discursively construct identities

2021 ◽  
pp. 2336825X2110529
Author(s):  
Alexander Alekseev
Keyword(s):  
Radical Right ◽  
Social Rights ◽  
Economic Rights ◽  
Social Actors ◽  
Populist Radical Right ◽  
The People ◽  
Marine Le Pen ◽  
The Individual ◽  
The Right ◽  
Discourse Historical Approach

The article explores how the European populist radical right uses references to rights and freedoms in its political discourse. By relying on the findings of the existing research and applying the discourse-historical approach to electoral speeches by Marine Le Pen and Jarosław Kaczyński, the leaders of two very dissimilar EU PRR parties, the Rassemblement National and the Prawo i Sprawiedliwość, the article abductively develops a functional typology of references to rights and freedoms commonly used in discourses of European PRR parties: it suggests that PRR discourses in Europe feature references to the right to sovereignty, citizens’ rights, social rights, and economic rights. Such references are used as a coherent discursive strategy to construct social actors following the PRR ideological core of nativism, authoritarianism, and populism. As the PRR identifies itself with the people, defined along nativist and populist lines, rights are always attributed to it. The PRR represents itself as the defender of the people and its rights, while the elites and the aliens are predicated to threaten the people and its rights. References to rights in PRR discourses intrinsically link the individual with the collective, which allows to construct and promote a populist model of ethnic democracy.

scholarly journals Navigating the market of welfare services: The choice of upper secondary school in Sweden

2014 ◽  
Vol 5 ◽  
Author(s):  
Torbjörn Hjort ◽  
Alexandru Panican
Keyword(s):  
The Body ◽  
Social Rights ◽  
Actual Process ◽  
Social Citizenship ◽  
Ethnic Segregation ◽  
Freedom Of Choice ◽  
Welfare Services ◽  
Upper Secondary ◽  
The Relationship

Due to increased market orientation and deregulation, welfare services in Sweden have taken on the form of market-based services. The body of research on deregulation and privatization is quite substantial regarding the implications of this kind of development. However, studies of the actual process of how choices are made are less common. This article discusses the implications of greater freedom of choice for Swedish citizens in diverse socioeconomic situations, focusing on factors that limit opportunities for choice. Deregulation and the increasing number of alternatives affect the relationship between the citizen and the welfare state in several ways. The Swedish school system is used here as an example of an empirical field. The analytical focus of the article consists of two different kinds of restrictions on choice: structure-based and agency-based. One conclusion is that both affluent and underprivileged citizens have limited choices. Another conclusion is that social citizenship, when freedom of choice is stimulated, can reproduce and even increase social and ethnic segregation. An additional potential consequence is that, when we consider social rights in their tangible form, the development of greater freedom of choice is focused increasingly on the consumer’s range of choices and less on the quality of the service offered.

Marshall revisited: EU social policy from a social-rights perspective

2020 ◽  
Vol 30 (4) ◽  
pp. 421-435
Author(s):  
Stefanie Börner
Keyword(s):  
Social Policy ◽  
Social Rights ◽  
Social Policies ◽  
Social Citizenship ◽  
The European Union ◽  
European Level ◽  
Social Commitment ◽  
Economic Framework ◽  
Starting Point ◽  
The Social

The common legal and economic framework of the European Union (EU) has turned the vast socio-economic differences within Europe into virulent problems of social inequality – issues that it attempts to tackle within its limited resources. The article takes the EU’s self-expressed social commitment as a starting point and analyses its approaches to social policy from a social-rights perspective. It first discusses why Marshall’s social-citizenship concept provides a useful analytical tool to assess the social policies enacted so far at the European level and then presents an institutional analysis of the EU’s four major social-policy activities: harmonising, funding, coordination and cooperation. This analysis focuses on the horizontal and vertical relationships and the addressees of these policies to determine how these policies measure up against social-rights standards. The findings point to the poor development of transnational social citizenship given the special nature of EU social policies. The only social rights that exist at the European level are in the field of social-security coordination. And even those are marked by a double selectivity that excludes citizens who are not transnationally active and those who are but lack the necessary means to provide for themselves.

scholarly journals The Populist Radical Right and the Media in the Benelux: Friend or Foe?

2018 ◽  
Vol 24 (2) ◽  
pp. 189-209 ◽  
Author(s):  
Léonie de Jonge
Keyword(s):  
The Netherlands ◽  
Radical Right ◽  
Exact Nature ◽  
Right Wing ◽  
Populist Radical Right ◽  
The Media ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
Instrumental Role

Although most scholars acknowledge that the media play an instrumental role in furthering or limiting the spread of populism, the exact nature of the relationship between right-wing populist parties (RWPPs) and the media remains poorly understood. This article analyzes the various ways in which the media choose to deal with RWPPs in the Benelux region (i.e., Belgium, the Netherlands, and Luxembourg). Using evidence from interviews with media practitioners ( n = 46), the findings suggest that in the absence of a credible right-wing populist challenger, media practitioners in Luxembourg and Wallonia adhere to strict demarcation, whereas the Dutch and Flemish media have become gradually more accommodative to RWPPs. This study makes two contributions to the field. First, it systematically theorizes the different ways in which the media can approach the populist radical right. Second, it provides illustrative, comparative evidence about the rationale for why some media provide space for RWPPs while others deny it, thereby illuminating the under-researched topic of societal responses to the populist radical right.

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