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UK study explores new wave of populist mobilization through interviews and participant observation

Dr. Ozge Ozduzen and co-authors Dr. Bogdan Lanosev and Dr. Billur Aslan Ozgul have collaborated on a study recently in European Politics and Society. The paper titled "'They don't care about you, me or anyone else': populist storytelling in anti-lockdown protests" explores populism and populist social movements based on go-along interviews and participant observation during anti-lockdown protests in three cities in the U.K.

Their study reveals how elements emerge organically from within the populist storytelling of a new wave of populist mobilization, anti-lockdown protests, alongside identifying key narratives that collectively increase the "tellability" of populist stories.

Their research identifies four key narratives informing populist storytelling in the protests:

• Protesters believed that they are truth-tellers, who wake the people up to the truth that the pandemic is the result of a plot;
• Protesters identified themselves as the heroes, who oppose the villain-elites enacting the plot;
• We are within a societal crisis—through the imposition of lockdowns and restrictions;
• While engaged in a moral struggle, the protesters were motivated by the promise of averting the crisis and returning to normality.

Their findings further an understanding of how joint grievances surrounding a threatening pandemic coalesced into a coherent populist narrative expressed by a protest movement.