“Kukiz’15” And “Korwin”: The Essence Of The Polish Populist Rise And Its Possible Causes

Abstract

The article analyzes the configuration, ideology, program and electorate of two national-populist parties in Poland — “Kukiz’15” and “KORWiN”, which showed significant results in the 2015 and 2019 elections and thereby demonstrated society has a demand for change. Further, the possible reasons for the populist success are considered in terms of the increase in the amount of demand because of the socioeconomic situation, the problem of migration and the high volatility of the party system. And from the point of view of increasing the quality of the proposal the article deals with the development of communication channels “party — voter”, the use of the Internet in electoral campaigns and adaptation to the policies pursued by the ruling party “Law and Justice” (Prawo i Sprawiedliwosc). The 2015 Polish parliamentary elections were characterized by the successful debut of the right-wing populist and anarchist “Kukiz’15”. Nearly a quarter of her voters in 2015 voted for the left-wing populist “Palikot Movement” in 2011, when it debuted in elections and entered parliament. However, ideologically these are diametrically opposite forces. They are related only by aggressive and irreconcilable discourse and, of course, populism. Thus, the success of these parties did not come so much from the ideologies and programs they proposed, but from the fact that in recent years the Polish voter is consciously ready to choose any non-systemic radical alternative protest force, which is expected to be populists, as opposed to the established party establishment.