Do Right-wing Populists Prioritize Domestic Policy over Foreign Policy?

• In Event: The Public and Conflict Dynamics

Abstract

Right-wing populist parties often promise to prioritize domestic interests over foreign policy. This paper examines whether and how established right-wing populism impacts a leader's decision on foreign intervention. Extant studies of audience cost theory identify that credibility backed by domestic public opinion shapes a leader's decision whether to escalate or back down in international armed disputes (e.g., Fearon 1994; Tomz 2007). The underlying mechanism is that a democratic leader should consider public opinion to stay at the office. However, those studies do not account for the role of political parties. As a party represents popular will in the parliament and directly impact a leader's decision, public opinion is not an only credible signal of the popular will. In this vein, the literature is incomplete as it fails to account for political institutions that take an important role to estimate the likelihood of foreign intervention. With a particular interest in radical right populist parties' attitude towards foreign intervention, this paper studies potential policy shifts of global security policy when the right-populist is established. Using a large-N study, I will test the hypothesis that foreign military intervention is less likely when RRPPs join the government. I will employ International Military Intervention (1946-1988) dataset created by Pearson and Baumann (1993) and supplemental work (1989-2005) by Kisangani and Pickering (2009) to identify foreign military intervention. In addition to unilateral intervention, I include multilateral intervention such as UN/NATO operations.

Author

• Miku Matsunaga, The University of Tokyo