What if democratic principles are undermined such that the basis for a community of states like the EU is eroded? A team of researchers from the Cluster of Excellence "The Politics of Inequality" at the University of Konstanz finds: A large majority of EU citizens supports using sanctions to protect democracy. The study was just published in the Journal of European Public Policy.

Freedom of the press and the independence of the courts are under fire: The fact that basic democratic principles are being systematically eroded by right-wing populist parties is clearly visible in EU countries like Hungary and Poland. The "democratic backsliding" of individual member states, as the erosion of democratic systems is called, poses a problem for the European Union (EU), which sees itself as a community of democratic states. How should the EU respond? What reaction do the region's citizens expect of the EU? Political scientists from the Cluster of Excellence "The Politics of Inequality" at the University of Konstanz have just published a study on this topic in the Journal of European Public Policy.

The rules of democracy must be upheld
EU citizens are very concerned about democratic backsliding in EU member states. This is a result of surveys conducted by Sharon Baute, Max Heermann (first author) and Dirk Leuffen in Germany, Italy, Poland and Sweden. A large majority of EU citizens would like the EU take measures to protect democracy. Political scientist Max Heermann emphasizes: "Our data clearly show that most EU citizens would like member states to be sanctioned if they leave the canon of democratic and constitutional rule of law." According to Heermann, people do not support these policies out of malice towards such countries, but because they "recognize that the community of states can only work if all of the countries follow the rules that they agreed to when joining the EU." The high level of support for such sanctions should encourage the EU to actually enact and enforce them effectively.

Sanctions in groups and in inter-country relationships
In their study, the researchers draw on findings from the field of behavioural economics – that groups respond to norm violations with strong sanctioning behaviour. For Dirk Leuffen, Vice Rector for Research and Academic Staff Development at the University of Konstanz and co-author of the study, this is a good example of how findings from one discipline can inspire work in other areas: "Without the knowledge provided by literature from the field of behavioural economics, we definitely would have asked different questions and constructed our study very differently. It is exciting to see that the results of lab research in behavioural economics can be applied to inter-country relationships in the EU."
Sharon Baute, a junior professor in the Department of Politics and Public Administration, highlights the political implications: "Our study demonstrates that EU citizens show less solidarity for member states that violate shared basic rules. This means that countries that break these rules are harming themselves over the long term."
Link to the publication

Key facts:

• Original publication: Heermann, Max, Baute, Sharon & Leuffen, Dirk (2025), Democratic Backsliding and Support for Public Good Provision in the European Union, Journal of European Public Policy: https://doi.org/10.1080/13501763.2025.2503973.
• Key result: A large majority of EU citizens would like the EU take measures to protect democracy.
• Authors of the study: Political scientist Max Heermann (first author), who was recently hired by ETH Zurich, had been a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Konstanz beforehand. Sharon Baute, junior professor of comparative social policy, and Dirk Leuffen, professor of political science with a focus on international politics, both work at the University of Konstanz and in the university's Cluster of Excellence "The Politics of Inequality".
• The study was funded by the German Research Foundation (DFG) in the context of the Excellence Strategy of the German federal and state governments.
• The Cluster of Excellence "The Politics of Inequality" at the University of Konstanz investigates the political causes and consequences of inequality from an interdisciplinary perspective. The research is dedicated to some of the most pressing issues of our time: access to and distribution of (economic) resources, the global rise of populists, climate change and unfairly distributed educational opportunities.