Populist Governance Strategies: How Growth Coalition Tensions Affect Populist Policymaking

Abstract

This article integrates insights from comparative political economy and public policy studies into the populism scholarship to analyze how populist governments (PoGos) transform economies, with important implications for the regulatory state. While previous research shows that populists centralize power and pursue illiberal policies, approaches can vary across policy domains. Investigating Poland's Law and Justice (PiS) government (2015–23), this article reveals how PoGos manage sectoral conflicts within the growth coalition of businesses and voters. The findings reveal that PoGos tailor governance modes based on the intensity of sectoral conflicts. In the financial policy domain, where conflict was low, PiS centralized governance to nationalize the financial system. Conversely, in the migration policy domain, with high tension, PiS facilitated decentralized governance to liberalize migration. The findings demonstrate that PoGos employ diverse governance strategies across policy domains, underscoring the importance of a cross-sectoral lens in assessing their impact on the regulatory state. The study offers broader implications for understanding how governments reconfigure growth coalitions to reshape economies.