Effects of exposure to immigration news The three dimensions of European illiberal-transformative populism

Although opposition to immigration has been one of the ideological pillars of Western European right-wing populists, the ‘thin’ nature of their populism means its effects are limited to electoral contests, as the democratic system itself remains stable. In the post-communist East, with the escalation of the Syrian war and the establishment of the 'Balkan migrant route', the newly generated salience of the immigration issue has been instrumentalized to forge a ‘thick’ populist mindset among citizens, serving to legitimize the illiberalization of society. This doctoral thesis investigates the role media had in the formation of such a proto-ideology, through the processes of framing and priming of migration in Macedonia, a country on the Balkan route ruled by a populist party in the past decade. Media hostility, preferences for the extent of presidential powers, and cultural conceptions of Europeanism have been identified as the distinct proxies for the individual-level illiberal-transformative populism, as they reflect three fundamental layers of political reality - institutions, authority and identity respectively. Testing the effect of migration news on these proxies through a series of experiments illuminates the emergence of the illiberal-transformative populist citizen: as participants respond to immigration news by losing trust in mainstream media, supporting stronger executives and feeling more ‘culturally’ European, there is tentative evidence of a causal link between media coverage and the evolution of populist attitudes.