The Language of Legacies: The Politics of Evoking Dead Leaders

• Author: Amy H. Liu,Caitlin Andrews-Lee
• Published date: 01 September 2021
• Date: 01 September 2021
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1177/1065912920930822
• Subject Matter: Articles

https://doi.org/10.1177/1065912920930822

Political Research Quarterly

2021, Vol. 74(3) 658 –673

© 2020 University of Utah

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DOI: 10.1177/1065912920930822

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Article

How Can Leaders Recover Public

Trust and Approval During Periods

of Low Performance?1

With modern polling, scholars have shown that public trust

and approval can influence an executive’s ability to consoli-

date power and govern effectively (Carlin, Carreras, and

Love 2019; Espinal, Hartlyn, and Kelly 2006; Galvin 2014;

Love and Windsor 2018; Reyes-Housholder 2019). In the

United Kingdom, Margaret Thatcher’s impressive ratings

increased popular support for her Conservative Party. This

proved crucial for enacting paradigm-shifting policies

(Clarke, Ho, and Stewart 2000). Likewise, in the United

States, Americans consider Franklin Roosevelt a great leader

in part due to his high approval ratings—on average 65 per-

cent—during trying times of depression and war (Baum and

Kernell 2001). Conversely, Americans remember Richard

Nixon as one of the worst presidents. His approval of 24

percent accelerated his resignation (Gronke and Newman

2003). And in Brazil, Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva’s soaring

approval—over 80 percent in 2011—helped consolidate his

powerful legacy; conversely, Dilma Rousseff’s dismal sup-

port—less than 15 percent in 2015—brought about her pre-

mature fall (de Souza 2011; Lemann 2015). Even in

authoritarian regimes such as China, pre-2000 Mexico, and

Russia, executives rely on some degree of popular approval

to consolidate power and implement their preferred policies.

The close relationship between executive approval

and power incentivizes leaders to protect their popular

support. Doing so is not particularly difficult during peri-

ods of high economic, political, and social performance.

The challenge, however, manifests when performance

drops—even when the cause is beyond the leader’s con-

trol (Mishler and Rose 1997).

Several scholars suggest that leaders actively try to

restore supporters’ trust and approval during hard times

(Druckman and Holmes 2004; Galvin 2014; Hart 2013).

Leaders can engage in various forms of “political drama”

including public speeches, domestic and foreign tours,

and other activities to generate “short-term bursts” in sup-

port (Simon and Ostrom 1989, 58–61). Here, rhetoric is an

attractive instrument. It is low cost, requires no substan-

tive action, and can be implemented at a moment’s notice

(Brace and Hinckley 1993). Moreover, while rhetoric can

be “empty words,” it can also be “a powerful tool” for

motivating people to think and behave in particular ways

(Breuning and Ishiyama 1998, 6). Specifically, political

930822PRQXXX10.1177/1065912920930822Political Research QuarterlyAndrews-Lee and Liu

research-article2020

1Ryerson University, Toronto, ON, Canada

2The University of Texas at Austin, USA

Corresponding Author:

Amy H. Liu, Department of Government, The University of Texas at

Austin, 158 21st Street, Stop A1800, Austin, TX 78712, USA.

Email: amy.liu@austin.utexas.edu

The Language of Legacies: The Politics

of Evoking Dead Leaders

Caitlin Andrews-Lee1 and Amy H. Liu2

Abstract

How can leaders recover public trust and approval when government performance is low? We argue politicians use

speeches evoking images of deceased predecessors to reactivate support temporarily. This distracts supporters from

the poor performance and arouses empathy and nostalgia among them, causing them to perceive the current leader

more favorably. We test this argument by scraping for all speeches by Argentine president Cristina Fernández de

Kirchner. We identify all instances when she referenced Juan Perón—the charismatic founder of the Justice Party. We

find that as Kirchner’s approval rating decreases, the number of Perón references increases. To identify the causal

mechanism and to ensure that endogeneity is not a concern, we employ text analysis and a natural experiment—

courtesy of LAPOP. The results provide robust evidence that leaders reference their dead predecessors to evoke

positive feelings. However, while doing so can improve public opinion, the effects manifest only in the short term and

among supporters.

Keywords

Argentina, executive approval, LAPOP, Peron, presidential rhetoric

Andrews-Lee and Liu 659

psychologists suggest that this instrument—whether

employed consciously or subconsciously—can increase

voters’ approval (Druckman and Holmes 2004; Emrich

et al. 2001; Love and Windsor 2018; MacKuen 1983).

Yet much remains unclear about leaders’ rhetorical

strategies for reactivating popular support—including

the type of rhetoric employed, the conditions under

which they are used, the tradeoffs they pose for leaders,

and the effectiveness of such strategies. We investigate

these issues from the perspectives of the leader and the

voters whose approval is being sought. First, we focus

on a specific rhetorical strategy used by politicians

globally—referencing the legacies of deceased party

leaders in public speeches. Next, we theorize how

invoking these legacies might resuscitate trust and

approval. We also demonstrate the conditions under

which doing so is most effective. By priming voters to

focus on beloved past icons, we contend this strategy

causes voters to feel nostalgic, distracts them from the

present unpleasantness, increases their feelings of

belonging, and thus leads them to perceive the current

leader more favorably. This effect, however, is short-

lived and resonates only among supporters. Finally, we

highlight an important trade off leaders face when asso-

ciating themselves with their predecessors. While doing

so can help jump-start approval, it constrains current

leaders’ ability to consolidate their own legacies. Thus,

we claim leaders evoke this strategy only when their

approval is in jeopardy—that is, during periods of low

performance.

To test this argument, we focus on Argentina during

six years of President Cristina Fernández de Kirchner’s

(CFK) tenure (2008–2013). We scrape data from over

700 presidential speeches to evaluate the timing and

frequency with which CFK references her party’s char-

ismatic predecessor, Juan Perón. Consistent with our

theory, we find the number of Perón references increases

as CFK’s approval ratings decline. Moreover, we use

text analysis to show the Perón-referencing speeches

are laced with distinct words associated with Peronism

and with the past. We also examine two observable

implications. First, leveraging a natural experiment

courtesy of the Latin American Public Opinion Project

(LAPOP), we demonstrate that after CFK mentions

Perón, public opinion improves—but only temporarily

and among CFK supporters. Second, we find that CFK

only mentions dead leaders (and their beloved spouses)

with whom supporters feel a positive, emotional con-

nection—but not leaders with irrelevant or unappealing

legacies—during times of low performance. Altogether,

these results suggest both that leaders invoke rhetorical

strategies to recover their approval ratings during peri-

ods of low performance and that this strategy is effec-

tive only under specific conditions.

Priming, Charisma, and Support

Presidential speeches can temporarily reactivate support-

ers’ trust and approval through a priming mechanism.

Rather than persuading voters to change their opinions

about the concerned topic (e.g., economic conditions),

this speech type primes voters to employ different criteria

when evaluating the leader (Druckman and Holmes 2004;

Hart 2013). Speeches invoking image-based rhetoric—

unlike depersonalized factors such as economic num-

bers—can bring about a strong symbolic response in

citizens. It makes the leader’s message “more immediate,

real, and appealing” (Emrich et al. 2001). This rhetoric

type reaffirms supporters’ shared identity with the leader,

enhances their perceptions of the leader’s abilities, and

shields the leader from “negative attributions in the con-

text of crisis [or] decline” (Haslam et al. 2001).

Although the image-based rhetoric available to politi-

cians include historic events, shared experiences, and cul-

tural icons, we argue that referencing a specific image

type—that of a deceased party leader—has the potential

to boost approval for several reasons.2 First, it can reacti-

vate party supporters’ memories of the deeply emotional

bonds they (or their loved ones) formed with the prede-

cessor (Andrews-Lee 2019). Psychology studies indicate

that voters tend to idealize deceased leaders, perceiving

such leaders as more charismatic and morally virtuous in

death than in life (Allison et al. 2009; Steffens et al.

2017). The personal association between the deceased

and current leaders can therefore encourage empathy for

the current leader and bestow upon her a charismatic

sheen—as she represents the contemporary iteration of

the beloved predecessor (Haslam et al. 2001). Second,

this strategy can constitute a form of “diversionary behav-

ior” that primes supporters to recall the impressive char-

acter of the past leader and thus distracts them from the

current leader’s declining performance (Foster and

Palmer 2006; Haslam et al. 2001). Third, by referencing a

glorified predecessor, the current leader can trigger nos-

talgia among supporters. Social psychologists indicate

that nostalgia infuses individuals with positive feelings,

and therefore serves as a coping mechanism to manage

unpleasant circumstances (Cheung et al. 2013; Sedikides

and Wildschut 2016). Moreover, positive sentiments

among the public—including those triggered by nostal-

gia—can temporarily boost executive approval (Love

and Windsor 2018).3 Consequently, priming citizens to

focus on the legacies of deceased party leaders can help

current politicians restore popular support during periods

of low performance.

However, we expect two conditions to limit the effec-

tiveness of invoking charismatic legacies. First, this strat-

egy should only work temporarily. Scholars have noted

the ephemeral nature of symbolic primes (Druckman and