The article only mentions the case of Malta but at least Greece has a similar scheme..

👇 Link to the article: doi.org/10.1111/pops...

Also check out a previous article revealing a similar pattern for conspiracy beliefs and (anti-)democratic attitudes: doi.org/10.1111/bjso... which was not advertised due to social media limbo in the post-Musk X era. 🙃
#Populism #Democracy #Autocracy

🧭 We hope this work not only advances academic discussions in the study of populism, but also informs efforts to counter the autocratization trend that we currently see.

Big thanks to a great team of collaborators Sam Slewe & Jan-Willem van Prooijen, and Kostas Papaioannou who spearheaded the work.

✅ In all, conflating populism & autocracy is short-sighted. Citizen disillusionment does not inevitably lead them toward authoritarianism. Democratic actors could try to "fill the gap" through meaningful reforms, (enhancing social justice or political power & introducing direct-democratic practices)

🧠Psychologically, two distinct populist elements explain this duality: a desire for social justice ("returning power to the people"), fuels support for democratic alternatives; feelings of powerlessness ("the elites, not the people, have the power"), open the door to more autocratic preferences.

On the one hand, people with strong populist views tend to reject representative democracy —the system most countries use today.

Yet, the same individuals support more alternative systems, both autocratic regimes and direct democracy. Disillusionment with the status-quo seems to be the culprit.

Pretty ironic the EC feels like it needs to "stress test" and "talk to X" after the events of the last days, weeks, months..Is more evidence needed for direct and intentional interference by the very chief/CEO of X?