OEF Presents the First Comparative Report on Populism in the Baltics

Focusing on populist strategies that parties employed to manipulate public support at the last general elections in the three countries, the first-of-its-kind comparative report reveals there is no homogenous ’Baltic populism’ to speak of.

The experience of the Baltic countries demonstrates that populist strategies have mainly been used by ’newcomers’ and ’faders’, albeit with little or no electoral success. Both at the 2011 Latvian and 2008 Lithuanian elections, new parties managed to garner support using populist rhetoric but their success turned out to be short-lived. In Estonia, however, populism was instead turned to as a last resort by already established parties at the risk of remaining below the 5 percent election threshold.

The level of populism was particularly low in terms of political rhetoric. „Rather than accusing the current elite of ignoring the will of the people, parties used proactive ’vote for me!’ political marketing strategies,“ explained Mari-Liis Jakobson, the coordinator of the study. Much more populist rhetoric and demonizing could be noticed in the hassle between individual political parties and their leaders.

OEF’s Executive Director Mall Hellam hoped the study would enrich public debates with a more analytical understanding of populism. “Until now, populism has too often been used simply as a verbal club to whack one’s political enemies with,” Hellam said.

The report is available at the Open Estonia Foundation’s website (in English): http://www.oef.org.ee/fileadmin/media/valjaanded/uuringud/Populism_research_report.pdf.

The Open Estonia Foundation is an independent non-profit foundation founded in 1990, whose aim is to help build open society and a vibrant civil society in Estonia and elsewhere.