Crisis signaling: how Italy's coronavirus lockdown affected incumbent support in other European countries

De Vries, Catherine E., Bakker, Bert N., Hobolt, Sara B. and Arceneaux, Kevin (2021) Crisis signaling: how Italy's coronavirus lockdown affected incumbent support in other European countries. Political Science Research and Methods, 9 (3). 451 - 467. ISSN 2049-8470

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Abstract

The COVID-19 pandemic is an unparalleled global crisis. Yet, despite the grave adversity faced by citizens, incumbents around the world experienced a boost in popularity during the onset of the outbreak. In this study, we examine how the response to the COVID-19 outbreak in one country affected incumbent support in other countries. Specifically, we leverage the fact that the first country-wide lockdown on European soil, in Italy on 9 March 2020, happened during the fieldwork of surveys conducted in four other European countries, France, Germany, Poland and Spain. This allows us to examine how an event abroad that alerted citizens to an imminent crisis-prior to a similar domestic government response-influenced incumbent support. Our results indicate a crisis signal effect of Italy's COVID-19 lockdown, as support for the incumbent increased domestically in other European countries after the lockdown. Importantly, these findings suggest that incumbents can benefit from a crisis unfolding in other countries, even when their own performance in response to the same crisis is not yet fully clear. They illustrate the importance of developments abroad for incumbent approval and the difficulty facing citizens seeking to disentangle performance signals from exogenous shocks.

Item Type:	Article
Official URL:	https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/political-...
Additional Information:	© 2021 The Authors
Divisions:	Government
Subjects:	R Medicine > RA Public aspects of medicine > RA0421 Public health. Hygiene. Preventive Medicine H Social Sciences > HV Social pathology. Social and public welfare. Criminology J Political Science > JZ International relations
Date Deposited:	24 Mar 2021 16:48
Last Modified:	17 Apr 2024 05:18
URI:	http://eprints.lse.ac.uk/id/eprint/109304

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