How populism emerged from the shadow of neoliberalism in Central and Eastern Europe

Hungary and Poland have pursued a notably ‘populist’ approach to the economy in recent years, which has begun to spread to other countries in Central and Eastern Europe. Mitchell A. Orenstein and Bojan Bugarič argue that Central and Eastern European states’ dependence on foreign capital initially constrained them to follow neoliberal economic policies following their democratic transition. After the global financial crisis, populist parties began to break from this consensus, embracing a populist agenda which includes an economic programme built on a conservative developmental ‘statism’.