The Authoritarian Divide: Populism, Propaganda, and Polarization

THE AUTHORITARIAN DIVIDE

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THE AUTHORITARIAN

DIVIDE

POPULISM, PROPAGANDA, and POLARIZATION

ORÇUN SELÇUK

University of Notre Dame Press

Notre Dame, Indiana

Copyright © 2024 by the University of Notre Dame

University of Notre Dame Press

Notre Dame, Indiana 46556

undpress.nd.edu

All Rights Reserved

Published in the United States of America

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ISBN: 978-0-268-20807-3 (Hardback)

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To the memory of Necati Soydemir

Contents

List of Figures

List of Tables

Preface

Acknowledgments

List of Abbreviations

Introduction. The Puzzle: The Rise of Populism and Polarization around the World

ONE A Theory of Populism, Polarization, and Opposition

TWO Affective Leader Polarization in Turkey, Venezuela, and Ecuador

THREE Inclusionary and Exclusionary Populism in Turkey under Erdoğan

FOUR Inclusionary and Exclusionary Populism in Venezuela under Chávez

FIVE Inclusionary and Exclusionary Populism in Ecuador under Correa

SIX Opposition to Affective Leader Polarization in Turkey, Venezuela, and Ecuador

SEVEN Comparative Conclusions

Appendix 1. List of Erdoğan Speeches

Appendix 2. List of Aló Presidente Episodes

Appendix 3. List of Enlace Ciudadano Episodes

Notes

Reference List

Index

List of Figures

1.1. Summary of the Theoretical Framework

1.2. No Affective Leader Polarization

1.3. Popular Leader, No Affective Leader Polarization

1.4. Unpopular Leader, No Affective Leader Polarization

1.5. Affective Leader Polarization, Symmetric Equilibrium

1.6. Affective Leader Polarization, Favors the Leader

1.7. Affective Leader Polarization, Favors the Opposition

2.1. Political Polarization in Turkey, Venezuela, and Ecuador (1990–2020)

2.2. Polarization of Society in Turkey, Venezuela, and Ecuador (2000–2020)

2.3. Extent of Dislike and Like of Erdoğan in 2011 and 2018

2.4. Left–Right Ideological Self-Identification in Turkey in 2011 and 2018

2.5. Extent of Finding Erdoğan Sincere in 2013

2.6. Perceptions of President Erdoğan’s Growing Authoritarianism in 2018

2.7. Partisan Perceptions of President Erdoğan’s Growing Authoritarianism in 2018

2.8. Level of Trust in President Chávez (2000–2007)

2.9. Level of Trust in President Chávez (2007–2012)

2.10. Left–Right Ideological Self-Identification in Venezuela (2007–2012)

2.11. Additive Chavista Index in 2007

2.12. Level of Trust in President Correa (2008–2016)

2.13. Left–Right Ideological Self-Identification in Ecuador (2008–2016)

7.1. Affective Partisan and Leader Polarization in Turkey in 2018

7.2. Mobilization for Autocracy in Turkey, Venezuela, and Ecuador (1990–2020)

7.3. Liberal Democracy in Turkey, Venezuela, and Ecuador (1990–2020)

7.4. Clientelism in Turkey, Venezuela, and Ecuador (1990–2020)

List of Tables

I.1. Indicators of Symbolic Inclusion

I.2. Indicators of Symbolic Exclusion

I.3. Indicators of Political Inclusion

I.4. Indicators of Material Inclusion

2.1. Average Responses to Questions on Democracy and Material Exchanges

2.2. OLS Regression Results on Erdoğan’s Likability

2.3. Average Responses to Questions on Democracy and Material Exchanges

2.4. OLS Regression Results on Trust in Chávez

2.5. Average Responses to Questions on Democracy and Material Exchanges

2.6. Average Responses to Questions on Democracy and Material Exchanges

2.7. OLS Regression Results on Trust in Correa

3.1. Symbolic Inclusion versus Exclusion in Turkey

3.2. Political Inclusion versus Exclusion in Turkey

3.3. Material Inclusion versus Exclusion in Turkey

4.1. Symbolic Inclusion versus Exclusion in Venezuela

4.2. Political Inclusion versus Exclusion in Venezuela

4.3. Material Inclusion versus Exclusion in Venezuela

5.1. Symbolic Inclusion versus Exclusion in Ecuador

5.2. Political Inclusion versus Exclusion in Ecuador

5.3. Material Inclusion versus Exclusion in Ecuador

7.1. Degree of Populist Inclusion versus Exclusion in Turkey, Venezuela, and Ecuador

Preface

My interest in polarization goes back to September 12, 2010, the thirtieth anniversary of the military coup in Turkey, but more importantly the day of a constitutional referendum. I was a first-year master’s student at Boğaziçi University in Istanbul, and almost everyone I knew vehemently opposed the constitutional changes that Prime Minister Erdoğan put into a referendum. When the results of the referendum were announced on TV, many of us were surprised, to say the least. We tried to understand how 58 percent of the voters supported an incumbent prime minister’s attempt to weaken checks and balances. The reactions of my social circle to the 2011 parliamentary elections, both in person and on Facebook, were pretty much the same: How was it possible that half of the country would vote for the ruling party and the prime minister?

Five years later, I experienced something similar in the United States in 2016. I was a PhD student at Florida International University in Miami. As an international student, I was not able to vote in the U.S. elections, but I closely followed the campaign. When Trump unexpectedly won in 2016, this time, my American friends asked me the same question: How was it possible that 63 million people supported a candidate who was openly racist, sexist, and Islamophobic? Then I realized that I had moved from one bubble in Turkey to another one in the United States. Like many Turkish and U.S. citizens, I was living in echo chambers. Most of my Turkish and American friends disliked both Erdoğan and Trump, but it was clear that another group of people in those countries had the exact opposite feeling about these leaders. At least, the day after the 2016 elections, the students who were walking around the campus with the red Make America Great Again hats looked energized and empowered.

While I was trying to make sense of personally demoralizing election results in Turkey and the United States, in my doctorate studies I started to delve into Latin American politics, a region that very few people studied back in Turkey, but one that had many immediate connections to my new home. I remember taking a graduate seminar in South American politics and on the first day of class telling the professor that I am interested in studying polarization. His response was, We have a lot of that going on in the region, both historically and at the moment. He was not wrong. Studying Latin American politics helped me understand the primary cause of polarization: populist leaders. Learning about populist leaders from various ideologies made me realize that it was not necessarily the left and right labels that polarized Argentina, Peru, Venezuela, and Ecuador, but populism itself. Populist leaders are good at making their supporters feel proud of themselves, but their opponents feel distant and distasteful, what I call affective leader polarization in this book. During my time in Miami, I met several people who simply hated Chávez and Correa, but from the books and articles I was reading, I knew that another group of Venezuelans and Ecuadorians strongly identified as chavistas and correístas, just like the Erdoğanist and anti-Erdoğanist divide in Turkey. After I traveled to Quito and Caracas, I finally had the framework of my dissertation, which then evolved into this book.

I wrote The Authoritarian Divide to challenge readers and remind them that there are generally two different versions of populist leaders around the world. Left-wing leaders such as Chávez and Correa are often associated with inclusionary discourse and policies, but we need to remember that not all Venezuelans and Ecuadorians experienced those leaders that way. On the other hand, right-wing populists such as Erdoğan and Trump could be inclusionary and empowering to their base, but we, as academics who study autocratization, might personally feel excluded by their words and actions. The following pages are my attempt to unpack both the inclusionary and the exclusionary versions of populist leaders and to identify the responses of the opposition that often reinforce instead of mitigate affective leader polarization.

Acknowledgments

Writing a book is a long process. Although most of my research consisted of reading and writing in front of a computer screen, I would not have written this book without the support of my professors, colleagues, friends, and family members. I am grateful to everyone who contributed to this book from its initial stages until its publication. I am lucky to be surrounded by supportive people in Turkey, the United States, Venezuela, and Ecuador.

At Florida International University, I am thankful to Eduardo Gamarra, who supported me at all stages of the graduate program. After taking his South American Politics seminar, I delved into the cross-regional study of populism and eventually published my first article on the subject. As his teaching assistant and student, I had the privilege of listening to his lectures on Latin America, which made me even more interested in the region. Gamarra is the person who encouraged me to travel to Venezuela and Ecuador while I was still learning Spanish. I cannot think of any other mentor who could have given me intellectual autonomy and pushed for excellence at the same time. I am very grateful to him for turning me from a graduate student into a scholar.

I was lucky not only with my dissertation adviser but also with other faculty who served on my committee and taught in the graduate program. Barry Levitt and Tatiana Kostadinova deserve special mention. The courses I took from them were formative in my process of becoming a comparative politics scholar. Their published research on personalism and political parties heavily influenced my thinking on populism and polarization. At the School of International and Public Affairs, I am also thankful to Qing Lai, Adrian Ang, Kevin Evans, and Astrid Arrarás for their mentorship. Finally, I owe special gratitude to my Spanish instructors, Angélica Nelson, Licet García, José Villar, Juan Godoy, and María Gómez. Without their support, I would not have been able to conduct primary research for this book.

While I was working on my dissertation, I was able to travel to Turkey, Venezuela, and Ecuador. The financial support for those trips came from the Tinker Field Research Grant, SIPA Broad Fellowship, and ASMEA Research Grants. During those field research trips and conferences, I benefited from the support and feedback of the following individuals: Guillermo Aveledo, Rodolfo Magallanes, Margarita López Maya, Francisco José Alfaro Pareja, Manuel Llorens, Mireya Lozada, Sonia Medina, José Manuel Puente, Angel Álvarez, Miguel Ángel Martínez, Doris Carolina Ponce Lozada, Aime Tillett, Mary Alessandra Sánchez, Armando Romero, Diego Guerrero, María Pilar García-Guadilla, Maryhen Jiménez, Laura Gamboa, Diego Pérez Enríquez, Veronica Larrea, María Laura Patiño, Felipe Burbano, Pablo Andrade, John Polga-Hecimovich, César Montúfar, Paolo Moncagatta, Daniel Montalvo, Paula Armendáriz, Raúl Aldaz, Bekir Ağırdır, Eren Pultar, Aydın Erdem, Tarhan Erdem, Özer Sencar, Asım Karaömerlioğlu, Aydın Babuna, Behlül Özkan, Kerem Yıldırım, Berk Esen, Şebnem Gümüşcü, Sibel Oktay, Sultan Tepe, Karabekir Akkoyunlu, Kerem Öktem, Ayşe Kadıoğlu, Yunus Sözen, Selin Karana, Mehtap Söyler, Tuğçe Erçetin, Didem Seyis, Paul Levin, Kurt Weyland, Elizabeth Zechmeister, Rachel Meade, Metehan Tekinırk, Kirk Hawkins, Patricio Navia, Benjamín Holgado, Banu Eligür, and Zoila Ponce de León. In Caracas, Quito, and Istanbul, I had the privilege of conducting research at the libraries of Instituto de Estudios Superiores de Administración, Universidad Central de Venezuela (IESA), Facultad Latinoamericana de Ciencias Sociales Ecuador (FLACSO), Pontificia Universidad Católica del Ecuador (PUCE), Universidad Andina Simón Bolívar, and Boğaziçi University.

After becoming a faculty member at Luther College, I received the support of numerous people who helped me rewrite my dissertation as a book. In the Political Science Department, I am thankful for the support of Carly Foster, Michael Engelhardt, and Rachel Brummel. Between 2019 and 2023, I was lucky to work with highly talented undergraduate research assistants: Sophie Bierlein, Tallulah Campbell, Ella Heiks, Gracia Powell, Anghy Aragón, and Salomé Valdivieso Santillán. I am extremely lucky that Salomé and I arrived at Luther in the same year. I would not have been able to write a strong chapter on Ecuador if Salomé did not assist me with the analysis of the sabatinas. During my time at Luther, the Doris and Ragnvald Ylvisaker Endowment for Faculty Growth Award, the Anderson Faculty Development Fund, and the Koebrick Endowment for New Faculty supported my research. Outside of the Political Science Department, I benefited from the support and feedback of Victoria Christman, Todd Green, Nancy Gates Madsen, Germano Stresse, Wanda Deifelt, and David Bishop.

At the University of Notre Dame Press, I would like to thank Aníbal Pérez Liñan, editor of the Kellogg Institute Democracy and Development Series, for meeting with me at APSA 2022 and believing in this project from the very beginning. In addition, I thank my editor, Megan Levine, for helping me navigate all the steps of the publication process in a highly efficient manner. Megan found two great peer reviewers for this book, whose feedback greatly enhanced the theoretical framework of the book and for which I am thankful.

On a more personal level, I appreciate my family and friends, who rooted for my academic success and provided much-needed moral support throughout the process.

Among my family members, I would like to express my appreciation to my mother, Gülay Uçar, who never questioned my decision to pursue an academic career and offered her unconditional support throughout the entire process. I also owe Berkay Selçuk, Ümit Selçuk, Halil Uçar, Bülent Selçuk, Dania Cruz, and Cruz Cruz for having my back at all times despite the geographical distance. Several of my friends supported my journey. Those people include but are not limited to Dilara Hekimci, Onur Erpul, Kabil Demirkıran, Senem Çevik, Hunter Adak, Nevena Trajkov, Sercan Canbolat, İbrahim Sarpkaya, Hüseyin Kahraman, Şeniz Pamuk, Canan Balkan, Zeynep Kılıçoğlu, Muhammet Koçak, Aycan Katıtaş, Melissa Boissiere, Handan Karakaş, Ahmet Yıldız, Yusuf Sarfati, Adrianna Tam, Mark Guerci, Jill Phillips, Alexander Meszler, Joseph Kromholz, and Hongxiao Yu.

I married Alejandra Cruz a week after I defended my dissertation. She was with me during the whole process of turning my dissertation into a book. Without her patience, unconditional love, and positive energy, I would not have been able to complete this book in a timely manner. She has been a supportive wife all along, and I could not ask for a better partner in this exciting journey. Gracias por todo, mi amor. While I was still writing this book, one of my closest friends in Turkey suddenly passed away, which greatly affected me. Necati Soydemir and I had so many unforgettable memories in Istanbul, Miami, Thessaloniki, Belgrade, Bursa, and many other places. I dedicate this book to his memory. Her şey için teşekkürler, Neco Başkan. Seni çok özlüyoruz.

List of Abbreviations

INTRODUCTION

The Puzzle

The Rise of Populism and Polarization around the World

Observers around the world often label countries such as the United States, Hungary, Turkey, the Philippines, India, Thailand, Israel, Brazil, Venezuela, Bolivia, and Ecuador as polarized. When we take a closer look into the type of polarization in these countries, we do not usually see polarization along a left–right ideological continuum. Unlike during the Cold War era when polarization was mainly between the extreme left and the extreme right, the type of polarization in these countries is primarily between the supporters and opponents of Donald Trump, Viktor Orbán, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, Rodrigo Duterte, Narendra Modi, Thaksin Shinawatra, Benjamin Netanyahu, Jair Bolsonaro, Hugo Chávez, Evo Morales, and Rafael Correa. In this book, I call this global phenomenon affective leader polarization, which happens when the elite and/or public opinion cluster in the extremes according to their levels of affection toward dominant chief executives.

To explain why affective leader polarization occurs in a diverse group of cases, ranging from the United States to India, I propose to study the mechanisms of populist inclusion and exclusion. Different from the scholars of populism who assign the inclusionary or the exclusionary label to certain groups of cases (Filc 2010; Mudde and Rovira Kaltwasser 2013), I unpack how populist leaders, regardless of their regional context and ideological label, simultaneously include the members of their in-group and exclude their out-group. I argue that the binary logic of populism always leads to varying degrees of affective leader polarization. To develop and test this theoretical argument empirically, I focus on three well-known cases of populism and affective leader polarization: Turkey under Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, Venezuela under Hugo Chávez, and Ecuador under Rafael Correa.

In the aftermath of the 2014 local elections in Turkey, Dimitar Bechev summarized the state of Turkish politics: Erdoğan is a leader whom one either adores or intensely hates, with few remaining indifferent (Bechev 2014, 2). In a similar fashion, following a highly contested 2004 recall referendum in Venezuela, Roberto Briceño-León shared his observation that there were two Venezuelas: one that loves the President of the Republic [Chávez] and one which hates him (Briceño-León 2005, 21). A Reuters story that was published right after the 2010 police rebellion in Ecuador makes an almost identical observation: For many Ecuadoreans, there is no middle ground with the tough-talking Correa—you either love him or hate him (Reuters 2010). In this book, I conceptualize what Bechev, Briceño-León, and Reuters describe in the Turkish, Venezuelan, and Ecuadorian contexts as affective leader polarization.

In the decade before Erdoğan’s rise to power, the most salient type of polarization in Turkish politics was primarily between the seculars and the religious conservatives. During his first few years as prime minister, scholars of democratization mainly praised Erdoğan for adopting a pluralist approach and a nonpolarizing leadership style (Insel 2003; Dagi 2008). As Erdoğan and the Justice and Development Party (AKP) started to win consecutive elections and referendums, this outlook gradually changed. The 2010s coincided with Erdoğan’s increasing use of populism as a political strategy, which then polarized Turkish politics between his followers (Erdoğanists) and opponents (anti-Erdoğanists). During this period, high-stakes events, including the 2013 Gezi Park Protests and the 2016 coup attempt, further solidified polarization between the Erdoğanists and anti-Erdoğanists. Affective leader polarization and autocratization under the New Turkey brought together an ideologically diverse group of anti-Erdoğanist opposition parties that consisted of the seculars, Turkish nationalists, Kurdish nationalists, and even Islamists (Selçuk and Hekimci 2020). In the 2019 local elections, the anti-Erdoğanist opposition achieved some degree of success in large metropolitan areas but once again failed to defeat the populist leader nationwide in the 2023 presidential elections.

In contrast to Erdoğan, who adopted a populist strategy relatively late in his tenure, Chávez and Correa campaigned and governed as populists throughout their presidencies. In Venezuela, as soon as he came to power, Chávez rewrote the constitution and pursued a populist refoundational project called the Bolivarian Revolution. As he personally dominated Venezuelan politics during a series of elections and referendums, Chávez’s populist leadership quickly polarized the country between supporters (chavistas) and detractors (anti-chavistas) (Álvarez 2003). Affective leader polarization occupied the public space as both sides mobilized against each other during contentious political events, such as the 2002 coup attempt, the 2003 oil strike, and the 2004 recall referendum. The severity of affective leader polarization in Venezuela shaped everyday encounters, narratives, and living spaces (Mallen and García-Guadilla 2017). In an adversarial environment, the opponents of Chávez often played into the hands of populism in power and reinforced us versus them narratives. Under Chávez’s handpicked successor, Nicolás Maduro, the opposition won the 2015 parliamentary elections, but could not prevent further movement in an authoritarian direction and the emergence of a humanitarian crisis.

In Ecuador, Correa followed Chávez’s populist playbook and led the Citizens’ Revolution in the middle of an unprecedented oil boom. Like his Venezuelan role model, Correa rewrote the constitution and personally dominated Ecuadorian politics. As long as Correa could redistribute abundant oil revenues to the population, the opponents of the populist president remained weak and regionally fragmented (de la Torre and Ortiz Lemos 2016). Soon after the decline of oil prices in 2014, polarization between his followers (correístas) and opponents (anti-correístas) started to occupy more space in Ecuadorian politics. Although the opponents of the president began to organize nationally, his movement (correísmo) remained the most sizable group in the electorate. In the post-Correa period, affective leader polarization continued to shape the dynamics of elections and referendums (Castellanos Santamaría, Dandoy, and Umpierrez de Reguero 2021). In the 2021 presidential elections, Guillermo Lasso consolidated the support of anti-correístas in the second round and defeated Correa’s proxy candidate, Andrés Arauz. Among the three cases, Ecuador is the only one where a populist leader’s movement was defeated at the ballot box and the opponents had the chance to govern the country. Without a majority in the National Assembly, however, in May 2023, President Lasso failed to implement his agenda and called snap elections (muerte cruzada) to avoid impeachment. In the 2023 elections, correísmo once again came out as the largest bloc in Ecuadorian politics.

By analyzing the relationship between populism and polarization, this book aims to make a timely contribution to the literature. Rather than normatively categorizing populist actors as inclusionary or exclusionary, I empirically unpack how populism polarizes in the Turkish, Venezuelan, and Ecuadorian national contexts. Therefore, one of the key contributions of the book is recognizing that populist leaders in Europe and Latin America, on the left and right of the ideological spectrum, can be polarizing because they include and exclude different groups at the same time. Going beyond just studying the incumbent populist leaders in power, I also underline the agency of opposition actors, who can reinforce or mitigate the severity of affective leader polarization. The combination of qualitative and quantitative methodologies helps the reader further assess populism in power and the responses to it around the world. In the next section, I summarize the main argument of the book and my contributions to the literature. The third section presents my methodological approach to studying populism and affective leader polarization in Turkey, Venezuela, and Ecuador. I conclude by providing an overview of the book.

THE MAIN ARGUMENT AND CONTRIBUTIONS

I put forward three main arguments. First, in the age where the personalization of politics is becoming more prevalent, many countries around the world experience affective leader polarization over dominant chief executives more than ideological or partisan polarization. Second, to understand how people polarize over presidents and prime ministers, we must look at how populist leaders strategically include their followers and exclude their opponents. Third, opposition actors could reinforce or mitigate affective leader polarization depending on how they respond to the exclusionary aspects of populism in power. Let me briefly expand each argument and its contributions to the literature. I provide a more detailed account of the theoretical framework in chapter 1.

Scholars of comparative politics have traditionally conceptualized polarization along a left–right ideological continuum. According to this approach, polarization occurs as a result of the rise of extremist actors on both sides of the ideological spectrum (Downs 1957; Sartori 1966). In the European and Latin American contexts, ideological polarization was associated with the collapse of the center and the breakdown of democracy. Typical examples include Germany in 1933, Brazil in 1964, Greece in 1967, and Chile in 1973 (Linz and Stepan 1978; Bermeo 2003). In recent years, a growing number of scholars have started to challenge the ideological polarization paradigm, and have instead underscored the role of polarizing social identities. In U.S. politics literature, the study of affective polarization between the Democrats and Republicans became an emerging area of research (Iyengar, Sood, and Lelkes 2012; Mason 2015; Hetherington and Rudolph 2015). The study of affect, not ideology, soon spread into the subfield of comparative politics. In the last few years, formerly U.S.-centric discussions on affective polarization and negative partisanship became a global enterprise (McCoy, Rahman, and Somer 2018; Gidron, Adams, and Horne 2020; Wagner 2021; Haime and Cantú 2022).

Informed by the literature on identity-based polarization and the personalization of politics, I define affective leader polarization as a situation or a process in which the people polarize over their levels of affection toward dominant chief executives. Unlike most scholars who study affective polarization at the party level (i.e., Democrats vs. Republicans), I look at the construction of in-group and out-group identities linked to a personalistic leader (i.e., Trump supporters vs. opponents). When affective leader polarization is present in a country, the followers of the leader express extremely positive feelings and attitudes (i.e., like, trust, love, admiration, and respect) toward him,¹ whereas the other group feels the exact opposite (i.e., dislike, distrust, hatred, disgust, and disrespect).

In addition to conceptualizing affective leader polarization, this book also contributes to the populism literature. I view populism as a political strategy through which a personalistic leader seeks or exercises government power based on direct, unmediated, uninstitutionalized support from large number of mostly unorganized followers (Weyland 2001, 14). I mainly use the politico-strategic definition of populism because it focuses on populist leaders’ attempt to dominate their country and exercise power in a pragmatist fashion instead of committing to a coherent political ideology. This choice is not a rejection of the ideational approach, which tends to rely on Mudde’s definition of populism as "an ideology that considers society to be ultimately separated into two homogeneous and antagonistic groups, ‘the pure people’ versus ‘the corrupt elite,’ and which argues that politics should be an expression of the volonté générale (general will) of the people (Mudde 2004, 543). My main critique of Mudde’s definition is that the focus on corrupt elites applies more to populist actors in opposition than populists in power, who gradually become the elite" as they win consecutive reelections. For the purposes of this book, whether one uses the politico-strategic or the ideational approach, Chávez, Correa, and Erdoğan will always be categorized as populists.

My main contribution to the study of populism is to refine the dominant thinking that Latin American or left-wing populism is inclusionary, whereas European or right-wing populism is exclusionary (Filc 2010; Mudde and Kaltwasser 2013; Moffitt 2015; Markou 2017). Since I do not have a normative preference for left-wing or right-wing populists, I argue from an empirical point of view that populism is always inclusionary and exclusionary but toward opposing groups. In other words, regardless of their ideological label or geographical location, populist leaders in power include the members of their in-group and exclude their out-group. As a result of this simultaneous inclusion and exclusion, I maintain that populist leaders polarize their countries into two antagonistic camps. The citizens who are on the receiving end of symbolic, political, and material inclusion express highly positive feelings toward the leader (i.e., peronistas, chavistas, and Trump supporters); the excluded ones feel the exact opposite way (i.e., anti-peronistas, anti-chavistas, and the anti-Trump camp). In the Latin American cases, if left-wing populism were only inclusionary, we would not observe affective leader polarization in countries such as Venezuela, Ecuador, and Bolivia. In that case, everyone would love Chávez, Correa, and Morales. Likewise, only focusing on the exclusionary side of right-wing populists fails to explain why so many people adore leaders such as Fujimori, Orbán, Bolsonaro, Modi, Trump, Netanyahu, and Erdoğan. Associating right-wing populist leaders only with exclusion is misleading and is not empirically true because millions of citizens genuinely feel included by their discourse and actions.

The book’s third theoretical contribution is to study the opposition actors in the context of affective leader polarization. Since the book deals with incumbent populist leaders, it is important to understand the role of the opposition parties, movements, and other actors in developing strategies and attempting to coordinate against a common adversary. Unlike Western European cases, where populist parties themselves are generally part of the opposition, in Turkey, Venezuela, and Ecuador, populist leaders governed their respective countries for at least a decade. Therefore, these three cases provide a unique perspective from which to study the evolution of opposition politics. With this focus, I aim to contribute to the emerging literature on opposing populism but also on authoritarianism in general (Gamboa 2017; Wuthrich and Ingleby 2020; Cleary and Öztürk 2022; Somer, McCoy, and Luke 2021). My cross-regional comparison of the opposition is an important contribution to this emerging literature since most studies focus on such dynamics in a single country or region. In that way, the book expands on my previous work on Turkish opposition in a broader context (Selçuk, Hekimci, and Erpul 2019; Selçuk and Hekimci 2020).

From an empirical standpoint, my goal is to provide a novel perspective to study Turkish, Venezuelan, and Ecuadorian politics. Turkey’s experience with populism differs from populist far-right parties in Europe, which rarely get the chance to govern the country. Apart from the Hungarian and Polish cases in Eastern Europe, there are not many cases of populism in power in Turkey’s neighborhood. Because of Turkey’s unique location in the Middle East and Southern Europe, it is not a coincidence that many studies on populism in Turkey are single-case studies (Baykan 2018; Yabancı 2020; Elçi 2022). In that sense, comparing Turkey with Latin American experiences of populism in power is promising. In addition to my previous work on populism (Selçuk 2016), Aytaç and Öniş (2014) compared right-wing populism in Turkey with left-wing populism in Argentina. In his doctoral dissertation, Sözen (2010) conducted a comparative study of Kemalism and Peronism. This cross-regional case selection also allows me to further test my theory in multiple cultural and historical contexts. Since Venezuela and Ecuador are often compared with each other or with other countries in the Andean region (Weyland 2013; Mazzuca 2013; de la Torre 2017), adding a non–Latin American case helps me control for the socialist label, a resource-based economy, and a colonial legacy when making claims about the inclusionary and exclusionary mechanisms of populism in the context of affective leader polarization. Overall, my cross-regional case selection utilizes the most-similar (Venezuela and Ecuador) and most-different (Turkey) systems designs at the same time.

METHODOLOGY

I study populist leaders in power and their opponents using multiple methodologies. To measure the extent of polarization at the public opinion level, I use a variety of data sources. For Turkey, I rely on the publicly available Comparative Studies of Electoral Systems (CSES) (2011 and 2018) and the World Values Survey (WVS) (2018) data. I also use survey data that I personally obtained from a reputable public opinion research company in Turkey, KONDA