The Populist’s Worldview: How Populist Citizens Perceive Mainstream Media and Public Opinion

• In Event: Understanding the Effects of Populist Messages

Abstract

Populist politicians often claim to represent majority opinions that are ignored by mainstream media and the established politics. This study investigates in how far followers of the populist ideology on the citizen level agree to these perceptions. In the attempt to identify the populist citizen, research so far has looked at sociodemographic factors, political leanings, psychological states as well as preferences for specific media messages in their relation to populist attitudes. Following the idea of a populist worldview (e.g., Hawkins, 2010) this paper adds to these prior studies by tracing the populist citizen’s perceptions of the mainstream media and public opinion. Survey data revealed that populist attitudes are related to incongruent mainstream media perceptions as well as to congruent public opinion perceptions. Implications of these specific populist perceptual patterns for democratic societies will be discussed.

Authors

• Anne Schulz, U of Zurich - IPMZ

• Werner Wirth, U of Zurich

• Martin Wettstein, University of Zurich; IPMZ – Institute of Mass Communication and Media Research

• Dominique Stefanie Wirz, U of Zurich

• Philipp Mueller, Johannes Gutenberg U Mainz