Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-gbm5v Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-25T18:32:58.390Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

The Language of Right-Wing Populist Leaders: Not So Simple

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 August 2020

Duncan McDonnell Open the ORCID record for Duncan McDonnell [Opens in a new window]  and
Stefano Ondelli Open the ORCID record for Stefano Ondelli [Opens in a new window]
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Political scientists have long asserted that populists use simpler language than their mainstream rivals to appeal to ordinary people and distance themselves from elites. However, there is little comparative evidence in support of that claim. In this study, we investigate the linguistic simplicity of four right-wing populists compared to their principal opponents in the United States, France, United Kingdom, and Italy. We do so by analysing a corpus of approximately one million words from leaders’ speeches, using a series of linguistics measures for evaluating simplicity. Contrary to expectations, we find that Donald Trump was only slightly simpler than Hillary Clinton, while Nigel Farage in the UK and Marine Le Pen in France were more complex than their main rivals, and Italy’s Matteo Salvini was simpler on some measures but not others. We conclude that the simple language claim is not borne out and that other aspects of the received wisdom about populism should be re-examined.

Type
Special Section: Revisiting Populism
Information
Perspectives on Politics , Volume 20 , Issue 3 , September 2022 , pp. 828 - 841
Copyright
© The Author(s), 2020. Published by Cambridge University Press on behalf of the American Political Science Association

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Footnotes

A list of permanent links to Supplemental Materials provided by the authors precedes the References section.

*Data replication sets are available in Harvard Dataverse at: https://doi.org/10.7910/DVN/N5PYXZ

They would like to thank the following colleagues who provided valuable advice and assistance during the development of this research project and article: Paris Aslanidis, Paul Kenny, Dominique Labbé, Conor Little, Ferran Martinez i Coma, Gianpietro Mazzoleni, George Mikros, Frank Mols, Lee Morgenbesser, Paolo Nadalutti, Floriana Sciumbata, Luca Tringali, Arjuna Tuzzi, Marco Valbruzzi, and Annika Werner. They are also very grateful to the interpreting and translation students at the University of Trieste who helped with the data collection.

References

Albertazzi, Daniele, and McDonnell, Duncan. 2015. Populists in Power. London: Routledge.Google Scholar
Antonelli, Giuseppe. 2007. L’italiano nella società della comunicazione. Bologna: Il Mulino.Google Scholar
Benoit, Kenneth, Munger, Kevin, and Spirling, Arthur. 2019. “Measuring and Explaining Political Sophistication through Textual Complexity.” American Journal of Political Science 63(2): 491-508.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Betz, Hans-Georg. 2016. “The Revenge of the Ploucs: The Revival of Radical Populism under Marine Le Pen in France.” In European Populism in the Shadow of the Great Recession, ed. Kriesi, Hanspeter and Pappas, Takis S., 75-89. Essex: ECPR Press.Google Scholar
Bischof, Daniel, and Senninger, Roman. 2018. “Simple politics for the people? Complexity in campaign messages and political knowledge.” European Journal of Political Research 57(2): 473-495.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Block, Elena, and Negrine, Ralph. 2017. “The Populist Communication Style: Toward a Critical Framework.” International Journal of Communication 11:178-97.Google Scholar
Bos, Linda, van der Brug, Wouter, and de Vreese, Claes. 2011. “How the Media Shape Perceptions of Right-Wing Populist Leaders.” Political Communication 28(2): 182-206.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Brundidge, Jennifer, Reid, Scott A., Choi, Sujin, and Muddiman, Ashley. 2014. “The ‘Deliberative Digital Divide:’ Opinion Leadership and Integrative Complexity in the US Political Blogosphere.” Political Psychology 35(6): 741-55.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Budge, Ian. 1987. “The Internal Analysis of Election Programs.”In Ideology, Strategy, and Party Change: Spatial Analysis of Post-War Election Programmes in 19 Democracies, ed. Budge, Ian, Robertson, David, and Hearl, Derek, 15-38. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Canovan, Margaret. 1981. Populism. New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovic.Google Scholar
Canovan, Margaret. 1999. “Trust the People! Populism and the Two Faces of Democracy.” Political Studies 47(1): 2-16.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Chall, Jeanne Sternlicht, and Dale, Edgar. 1995. Readability Revisited: The New Dale-Chall Readability Formula. Cambridge, MA: Brookline Books.Google Scholar
Cortelazzo, Michele A. 1985. “Dal parlato al (tra)scritto: i resoconti stenografici dei discorsi parlamentari.” In Gesprochenes Italienisch in Geschichte und Gegenwart, ed. Holtus, Günter and Radtke, Edgar, 86-118. Tübingen: Narr.Google Scholar
Cortelazzo, Michele A., and Tuzzi, Arjuna, ed. 2008. Messaggi dal Colle. I discorsi di fine anno dei presidenti della Repubblica. Venice: Marsilio,Google Scholar
Dale, Edgar, and Chall, Jeanne S.. 1948. “A Formula for Predicting Readability.” Educational Research Bulletin 27:11–20.Google Scholar
De Mauro, Tullio. 1997. Guida all’uso delle parole. Rome: Editori riuniti.Google Scholar
Decadri, Silvia, and Boussalis, Constantine. 2019. “Populism, Party Membership, and Language Complexity in the Italian Chamber of Deputies.” Journal of Elections, Public Opinion and Parties. DOI: 10.1080/17457289.2019.1593182.Google Scholar
Finchelstein, Federico. 2017. From Fascism to Populism in History. Oakland: University of California Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Granger, Silviane, and Wynne, Martin. 1999. “Optimising Measures of Lexical Variation in EFL Learner Corpora.” In Corpora Galore, ed. Kirk, John M., 249-257. Amsterdam and Atlanta: Rodopi.Google Scholar
Hawkins, Kirk. 2009. “Is Chávez Populist? Measuring Populist Discourse in Comparative Perspective.” Comparative Political Studies 42(8): 1040-1067.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hawkins, Kirk, and Littvay, Levente. 2019. Contemporary US Populism in Comparative Perspective. New York: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ilie, Cornelia. 2015. “Parliamentary Discourse.” In The International Encyclopedia of Language and Social Interaction, ed. Tracy, Karen, Ilie, Cornelia, and Sandel, Todd, 1113. Hoboken, NJ: Wiley-Blackwell.Google Scholar
Kandel, Liliane, and Moles, Abraham. 1958. “Application de l’indice de Flesch à la langue française.” Cahiers Études de Radio-Télévision 19: 253–74.Google Scholar
Kayam, Orly. 2018. “The Readability and Simplicity of Donald Trump’s Language.” Political Studies Review 16 (1): 73-88.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kincaid, J. Robert P., Peter Richard Lawrence Rogers, Fishburne, and Brad, S Chissom. 1975. “Derivation of New Readability Formulas (Automated Readability Index, Fog Count, and Flesch Reading Ease Formula) for Navy Enlisted Personnel.” Research Branch Report 8–75. Institute for Simulation and Training, 56. (https://stars.library.ucf.edu/istlibrary/56/).Google Scholar
Lim, Elvin T. 2008. The Anti-Intellectual Presidency: The Decline of Presidential Rhetoric from George Washington to George W. Bush. Oxford: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lucisano, Pietro, and Piemontese, Maria Emanuela. 1988. “GULPEASE: una formula per la predizione della difficoltà dei testi in lingua italiana.” Scuola e città 39(3): 110-24.Google Scholar
McDonnell, Duncan, and Ondelli, Stefano. 2020. "Replication Data for: The Language of Right-wing Populist Leaders: Not So Simple." Harvard Dataverse. https://doi.org/10.7910/DVN/N5PYXZ.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Moffitt, Benjamin, and Tormey, Simon. 2014. “Rethinking Populism: Politics, Mediatisation and Political Style.” Political Studies 62(2): 381-97CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Moffitt, Benjamin. 2016. The Global Rise of Populism: Performance, Political Style, and Representation. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press.Google Scholar
Mudde, Cas. 2007. Populist Radical Right Parties in Europe. New York: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mudde, Cas. 2016. “The Study of Populist Radical Right Parties: Towards a Fourth Wave.” C-Rex Working Paper Series, no. 1. Center for Research on Extremism, University of Oslo.Google Scholar
Mudde, Cas. 2017. The Far Right in America. London: Routledge.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mudde, Cas. 2019. The Far Right Today. Cambridge: Polity Press.Google Scholar
Müller, Jan-Werner. 2016. What Is Populism? Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press.Google Scholar
Oliver, J. Eric, and Rahn, Wendy M.. 2016. “Rise of the Trumpenvolk: Populism in the 2016 election.” ANNALS of the American Academy of Political and Social Science 667: 89-206.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ondelli, Stefano. 2016. “Esempi recenti della retorica populista in Italia: da Forza Italia al Movimento 5 Stelle.” In L’italiano della politica e la politica per l’italiano: atti dell’XI Convegno ASLI, ed. Librandi, Rita and Piro, Rosa, 323-337. Florence: Cesati.Google Scholar
Stefano, Ondelli, and Nadalutti, Paolo. 2017. “Distanza intertestuale e lingua fonte: premesse teoriche, compilazione di un corpus e procedure di analisi.” In Testi, corpora, confronti interlinguistici: approcci qualitativi e quantitativi, ed. Palumbo, Giuseppe, 27-42. Trieste: EUT.Google Scholar
Rooduijn, Matthijs. 2014. “The Nucleus of Populism: In Search of the Lowest Common Denominator.” Government and Opposition 49(4): 573-99.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Rooduijn, Matthijs, Kessel, Stijn Van, Froio, Caterina, Pirro, Andrea, Lange, Sarah De, Halikiopoulou, Daphne, Lewis, Paul, Mudde, Cas, and Taggart, Paul. 2019. The PopuList: An Overview of Populist, Far Right, Far Left and Eurosceptic Parties in Europe. (https://popu-list.org/).Google Scholar
Schoonvelde, Martijn, Brosius, Anna, Schumacher, Gijs, and Bakker, Bert N.. 2019. “Liberals Lecture, Conservatives Communicate: Analyzing Complexity and Ideology in 381,609 Political Speeches.” PLoS ONE 14(2): e0208450. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0208450CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Suedfeld, Peter, Bluck, Susan, Ballard, Elizabeth J., and Baker-Brown, Gloria. 1990. “Canadian Federal Elections: Motive Profiles and Integrative Complexity in Political Speeches and Popular Media.” Canadian Journal of Behavioural Science / Revue canadienne des sciences du comportement 22(1): 26–36.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Taggart, Paul. 2002. “Populism and the Pathology of Representative Politics.” In Democracies and the Populist Challenge, ed. Mény, Yves and Surel, Yves, 62-80. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Tetlock, Philip E. 1983. “Cognitive Style and Political Ideology.” Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 45(1): 118-26.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Tetlock, Philip E. 1984. “Cognitive Style and Political Belief System in the British House of Commons.” Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 46(2): 365-75.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Van Dijk, Teun A. 2004. “Text and Context of Parliamentary Debates.” In Cross-Cultural Perspectives on Parliamentary Discourse, ed. Bayley, Paul, 339-372. Amsterdam: Benjamins.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Viser, Matt. 2015. “For Presidential Hopefuls, Simpler Language Resonates.” Boston Globe, October 20.Google Scholar
Wang, Yaqin, and Liu, Haitao. 2018. “Is Trump Always Rambling like a Fourth-Grade Student? An Analysis of Stylistic Features of Donald Trump’s Political Discourse during the 2016 Election.” Discourse and Society 29(3): 299–323.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Weyland, Kurt. 2001. “Clarifying a Contested Concept: Populism in the Study of Latin American Politics.” Comparative Politics 34(1): 1–22.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Zaslove, Andrej. 2008. “Here to Stay? Populism as a New Party Type.” European Review 16(3): 319-36.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Supplementary material: Link

McDonnell and Ondelli Dataset

Dataset

https://doi.org/10.7910/DVN/N5PYXZ
Link
Supplementary material: File

McDonnell and Ondelli supplementary material

Appendix A
Download McDonnell and Ondelli supplementary material(File)
File 85.9 KB
Supplementary material: File

McDonnell and Ondelli supplementary material

Appendix B
Download McDonnell and Ondelli supplementary material(File)
File 65.9 KB