Michael Main

Author: Michael Main | Major: Political Science & Journalism | Semester: Spring 2025

This research applies theories such as policy diffusion and the Narrative Policy Framework to the rise of far-right political parties across much of Europe. I became interested in this topic after following politics throughout 2024, which was touted as the “year of elections” as many western nations went to the ballot box in a critical voting cycle. The results shocked many political scientists, as far-right parties – right-wing populist parties, in particular – dominated and made historic gains in many European nations. The German AfD and Dutch PVV are both prominent examples of this, and England’s Reform party has continued to surge in 2025 to become the most popular opposition party in the country. What I found most interesting was that many of the leading figures in these political parties not only shared many policy positions in common with the American Republican Party, but they were specifically mentioning Trump as an example they were following. Politicians such as the AfD’s Alice Weidel, PVV’s Geert Wilders and Spanish Vox leader Santiago Abascal were directly borrowing Trump’s rhetoric on issues such as immigration and nationalism, decrying “wokeism,” “climate fanaticism” and the “import of murderers and terrorists” from foreign countries. From this, I decided to analyze the extent to which the MAGA movement had influenced these European populist movements.
The choice for my mentor was pretty easy, as I’ve taken multiple classes with Dr. Ryan and really enjoyed his expertise. He specializes in international relations and authoritarian politics, so this research was right up his alley. He was a tremendous help to me on this research, and struck a perfect balance between offering a guiding hand and providing good advice on
which direction to take while also allowing me to perform the research and explore the topic on my own. He was also of great help editing the paper, as his experience mentoring dozens of previous political science students meant he knew what a good honors thesis is supposed to look like. Overall, his guidance was very useful, and I wouldn’t have been able to get this thing across the finish line without him.
What I discovered in this research was a clear and significant amount of policy diffusion from Trump to the European far right through a rhetorical analysis of speeches from three of the most prominent right-wing populists in Europe – Weidel, Abascal and Wilders. While Trump is far from the first right-wing populist to rise to power – and he certainly won’t be the last – his truly unique and brash brand of politics allowed for a solid analysis of the extent to which “Trumpisms” made their way over to Europe. His unique language and signature phrases that he so often repeats allowed me to see the rhetoric that was able to travel across the Atlantic and embed itself in European politics. It’s clear that these leaders were using Trump’s success as a springboard to try and engineer electoral wins of their own using a very similar playbook. I believe this research has a definite use in the real world, as it explores the rise of the brand of politics that is most dominant in our current cycle. It’s a game of pattern recognition, in a way, that seeks to uncover how politicians are using fear and racism to score electoral victories by dividing up the population along ethnic lines.
After graduation, I will be staying in Fayetteville and taking on a full-time sportswriting position with Best of Arkansas Sports, which I am very much looking forward to. I plan to use that time to save up some money and gain some valuable working experience before heading back to school to pursue either a law degree or a master’s in political science – or both, ideally. This research was by far my most interesting academic endeavor to date. It wasn’t perfect, and I
would hardly call it groundbreaking – but I put a lot of work into it and I’m proud of the final product. I certainly hope it is not my last contribution to the field, and I look forward to conducting more research like this in the future.