Journal
EUROPEAN JOURNAL OF POLITICAL RESEARCH
Volume 60, Issue 2, Pages 497-505Publisher
WILEY
DOI: 10.1111/1475-6765.12401
Keywords
COVID-19; democracy; public opinion
Categories
Funding
- King's College London
- Universite de Montreal
- University of Toronto
- Universite Libre de Bruxelles
- Karlstads University
- University of Wien
- Sciences Po Paris
- University of California
- Riverside
- University College Dublin
- University of Helsinki
- Pompeu Fabra University
Ask authors/readers for more resources
This study examines the political impact of COVID-19 lockdowns and finds that they increase support for the ruling party, trust in government, and satisfaction with democracy, while not affecting traditional left-right attitudes.
Major crises can act as critical junctures or reinforce the political status quo, depending on how citizens view the performance of central institutions. We use an interrupted time series to study the political effect of the enforcement of a strict confinement policy in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. Specifically, we take advantage of a unique representative web-based survey that was fielded in March and April 2020 in Western Europe to compare the political support of those who took the survey right before and right after the start of the lockdown in their country. We find that lockdowns have increased vote intentions for the party of the Prime Minister/President, trust in government and satisfaction with democracy. Furthermore, we find that, while rallying individuals around current leaders and institutions, they have had no effect on traditional left-right attitudes.
Authors
I am an author on this paper
Click your name to claim this paper and add it to your profile.
Reviews
Recommended
No Data Available