The thesis develops an understanding of the relationship between populism and the changes in the media landscape brought about by the advent of web 2.0. Its aim is to explain the rapid emergence of the Beppe Grillo’s Five Star Movement in Italy. A contextual analysis of the structures of opportunities reveals that the key to understand the ‘success’ of 5SM lays in the fact that the political actor fully exploited the affordances of the Web 2.0, making them resonate with the ‘thin’ ideology of populism. The advent of web 2.0 can then benefit political actors employing a populist ideology in three ways; enhancing the declining trust and separation between people and the political establishment, providing a seemingly more direct form of communication with the electorate and providing a new way of constructing the ‘people’ of populism through the networks. / Graduate

This thesis analyzes the rise of populist parties in southern Europe - italian Five Star Movement, greek SYRIZA and spanish Podemos. The aim is to define the key factors, that contributed to the perception of these protest political formations as political alternatives. The thesis chronologically follows development of examined political parties. Further it defines their strategy in terms of levels of protests and programme. Finally it outlines probable transformations of party systems, which is caused by the rise of protest parties.

This essay researches the link between populism and political trust by comparing the development of these two phenomena in Sweden and Italy. Populism is defined as a political strategy in which one appeals to the people and uses anti-establishment rhetoric. The purpose of the study is to analyze if voters that are less politically trustful are also more prone to vote for anti-establishment populist candidates. By using a temporal comparative analysis with a historical perspective in mind, the development and linkage of political trust and populism is analyzed in the cases’ most recent four elections.  The Swedish case is distinguished by relatively high levels of political trust but have in the latest decade seen an ever-growing proportion of their electorate turning to the right-wing populist Sweden Democrats. Italy, comparatively, is currently distinguished for low levels of political trust and has seen populist politicians thrive in the electorate ever since the 1990s ‘Mani Pulite’ scandal, and over a majority voted for the two populist parties Lega Nord and Five Star movement. The main research findings suggest that political trust, while not being a crucial determinant for contemporary populist successes, certainly helps populist parties gain attention and attraction. It also shows indications that the relation between populism and political trust can go in two directions. Sweden resembles a case where increased support for the SD have led to decreased political trust. In contrast, Italy’s political scandals, volatile voters and drastic decreases in political trust seems to have sparked increased support for populists.