Targeting politicians, triggering participation? The (gendered) effect of violence against politicians on citizens’ political engagement

Intimidation, harassment and violence are increasingly a part of politics. While existing research explores the character and impact on candidates, elected representatives and politics in general, less is known about the impact on citizens as bystanders. This article addresses this gap, investigating how learning about violence against a politician influences citizens’ own willingness to participate in politics and their political ambition. We test this using a factorial survey experiment on more than 25,000 respondents in Belgium and the Netherlands. We find that future political engagement, that is, both political ambition and political participation, is not affected by learning about violence against a politician, regardless of the location of the incident (private versus public sphere) or the gender of the victim. However, respondents do perceive politics as a less safe environment when confronted with a story about violence towards an elected representative

• Too burdensome to be acknowledged? How sexism is rendered invisible to women candidates through seven mechanisms

  Open Access•Clémence Deswert, Robin Devroe et al.•Political Studies•2026

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