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Mariana S. Mendes

@marianasmendes.bsky.social

Political Scientist at @ForumMIDEM, @TUDresden. PhD @EUI. Research on the far right, migration, political parties, memory politics, Portuguese and Spanish politics. Based in 🇩🇪, with a heart in 🇵🇹 & 🇮🇹.

Posts Replies Media

Mariana S. Mendes @marianasmendes.bsky.social · 08/10/2026

Okay, straight to the list of favorite quotes @populismblog.bsky.social : "History without political science bears no fruit, and political science without history has no roots." ❤️

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Mariana S. Mendes @marianasmendes.bsky.social · 08/10/2026

Looks great and so so interesting, congratulations Luca! 👏👏

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Reposted by Mariana S. Mendes

POP @populismblog.bsky.social · 30/09/2026

New book out 🔥 The Fascist Zeitgeist. Authoritarian Legacies and the Iberian Far Right. (Elements in the History and Politics of Fascism @universitypress.cambridge.org) How is the success of the Iberian far right linked to the memory of Franco and Salazar? doi.org/10.1017/9781009588072

The image shows, on the right half, the book's cover, with fascist architecture from Rome, which is the signature image used by the series on "The History and Politics of Fascism". The left half of the image shows the book's back, that includes the following summary:
The far right is achieving unprecedented electoral success, even in countries once considered immune such as Spain and Portugal. For decades, the stigma surrounding the long dictatorships of António Salazar and Francisco Franco seemed to inoculate the Iberian Peninsula against far-right mobilisation, yet Chega and VOX have shown that collective memory evolves – and stigma fades. This Element argues that understanding the far right's global rise requires attention to authoritarian nostalgia: a longing for an idealised authoritarian past. When activated by credible political actors with sufficient media visibility, this sentiment can generate support for far-right movements even in societies with a collective memory firmly condemning their authoritarian past. Using original survey data, the Element shows how contemporary far-right forces mobilise the ghosts of authoritarianism to erode democratic norms, revealing the enduring power of collective memory in shaping political behaviour.

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Mariana S. Mendes @marianasmendes.bsky.social · 06/01/2026

On a more personal note, this paper was a really hard nut to crack! It took a long time to mature, and not without some distress. I'm glad I stuck with it (or, rather, abandoned it only temporarily) as I'm genuinely happy with how it turned out. Grateful for the feedback I got along the way. (5/5)

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Mariana S. Mendes @marianasmendes.bsky.social · 06/01/2026

How do I do this? I conducted a fine-grained pledge-based analysis of the coalition agreement - first, comparing it with party manifestos and, then, tracing the fulfilment of those pledges that originated from Podemos (a nightmarish exercise I do not recommend to anyone 🫢). (4/5)

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Mariana S. Mendes @marianasmendes.bsky.social · 06/01/2026

Second, it argues its influence is most visible in socio-economic fields (housing, labour market reform) while pledges related to the ‘populist core business’ of corruption & democratic reform were muss less consequential - confirming that 'host ideology' matters more than populism. (3/5)

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Mariana S. Mendes @marianasmendes.bsky.social · 06/01/2026

First, this paper shows that - contrary to the ‘failure-in-government’ thesis - Podemos secured a relevant share of policy commitments, roughly consistent with coalition pay-off theories and proportional bargaining expectations. (2/5)

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Mariana S. Mendes @marianasmendes.bsky.social · 06/01/2026

Very happy to share this OPEN-ACCESS article on 'left populism in office', examining Podemos' policy impact while in a coalition government in Spain (2020-2023) 👇 Very short summary below (1/5): www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....

tandfonline.com

Left populism in office: the policy record of Podemos in Spain

Though left-wing populism has lived an ephemeral life in Southern Europe, we know surprisingly little about its policy record in office. Widely considered one of the main faces of left-wing populis...

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Reposted by Mariana S. Mendes

Bonnie Field @bonniefield.bsky.social · 13/10/2025

With Portugal's local election results in the news, good time to read the new, open access article on the May general elections in which the radical right Chega became the 2nd largest parliamentary party. By @marianasmendes.bsky.social in @sespjournal.bsky.social www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....

tandfonline.com

Late, but swift: the restructuring of Portugal’s political space in the May 2025 general election

Long considered a beacon of stability, Portugal has recently undergone a swift political reconfiguration. The 2025 general election, in particular, marks a potential critical juncture in the transf...

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Reposted by Mariana S. Mendes

ECPR SG Extremism & Democracy @ecpr-ead.bsky.social · 03/09/2025

📣 Our latest e-Extreme Newsletter is out! Find it here: ecpr.eu/news/news/de... (Current Issue) ✋ Kindly brought to you by @audreygagnon.bsky.social, @lazaroskaravasilis.bsky.social and @sabinedvolk.bsky.social! 🍿 Read on for expert interviews (on elections in 🇵🇹 & 🇷🇴), book reviews and more!

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