Opinion | Is a Tide Turning Against Populism?

Hungary, Romania, Moldova and Georgia have also experienced significant anti-populist protests in the past two years. Hungarians turned out in large numbers this spring to protest against the most well-known populist head of government in Europe, Viktor Orban, who has a reputation for undermining democracy through his corruption, economic mismanagement and clamping down on the media. The Romanian people recently celebrated the jailing of Liviu Dragnea, the country’s most powerful politician and head of the ruling Social Democratic Party, which had defied the European Commission and made repeated efforts to shield politicians from the law.

After protests in Moldova, a liberal opposition party has entered government, albeit alongside the Russia-leaning Socialist party. And Georgians have been in the streets of Tbilisi in large protests against their quasi-populist government, which had allowed a Russian member of Parliament to give a speech inside a government building.

Central European countries have also taken strong stands or direct actions against Russia. Greece expelled Russian diplomats in response to Russian interference in the naming of North Macedonia. In 2016, Montenegro arrested a range of violent coup plotters who were backed by Russia. This year, 14 of them were convicted and sentenced to prison.

These anti-populist trends have occurred in the face of heavy Russian interference in the form of cyber warfare and in some cases the direct intervention of Federal Security Service agents. Russia also interfered in the European Parliament elections in May, which polls and pundits had predicted would bring a populist takeover. However, not only did numerous populists — like Germany’s A.F.D. party — perform less well than expected, but they are also far from being able to form a majority.

Western Europe itself has not been entirely devoid of liberal results. In Denmark, a rare national victory went to the Social Democrats over right-leaning populists last month. Populists have also been kept out of recent governments formed in Finland, Sweden and Estonia. (The Estonian prime minister has since brought a minority populist party into his governing coalition, but opinion polls indicate that the experiment is not working out very well.)

Spain’s Socialist Party routed the populists with ease, and the right-leaning young Austrian leader Sebastian Kurz, after losing a vote of confidence that cost him his role as chancellor, appears well positioned to fight for a new term in coming elections, having jettisoned the populist contingent from his coalition. And last weekend, Greece’s far-right Golden Dawn party performed surprisingly poorly in an election that brought to power a traditional center-right party and prime minister.

Yet the question remains: Is a discernible trend at work here? Either way, logic may well be on the liberals’ side. First, populist leaders tend to be poor at governing, particularly in the area of economic policy. Second, the more Russia continues to rattle its sabers and make European countries feel insecure, the more places like Poland will avoid becoming too populist. Third, while electorates in Europe have been withdrawing their support from traditional center-left and center-right parties, liberal, green and other parties offer decidedly anti-populist policies.

We may need more time to ascertain whether a larger global “backlash to the backlash” trend is afoot. But in Central Europe the evidence is clear. Major protests have also recently sprung up in Turkey, Algeria, Sudan, Kazakhstan, Venezuela and, most notably, Hong Kong. Though the trend already appears to have crested in the West, the battle against populism has been joined by regrouped liberal forces. The vaunted liberal international order, however damaged, remains intact to a significant degree.

Jeffrey A. Stacey served as a State Department official in the Obama administration and is the author of “Integrating Europe.”

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