The challenge populist governments pose for the process and theory of European integration

Abstract Although populists in government have already frustrated the common interest projects, curbed the institutional progress, and questioned the fundamental values of the European Union, integration theories have so far failed to address the question: what explains populist governments’ actions within the EU? This article claims that existing accounts either downplay the relevance or fail to grasp the complexity of populist governments, because populism disputes the democratic models and state-societal relations projected by these theories. Merging the literature on populism and theories of European integration, it is argued that populism in government exerts a transformative impact on both the democratic institutions and the society within a member state, which could have important ramifications for future integration. Highlighting the anti-plural and anti-democratic nature of populism, and the emergence of a ‘constraining consensus’ between populist governments and ‘the people’, the article proposes a complementary approach in addressing the populist challenge for European integration. Supplemental data for this article can be accessed online at: 10.1080/01402382.2021.1988388

[EPPO]), 1 frustrated common interest projects (e.g. linking 'rule of law' conditionalities to budgetary measures), refused compliance with EU policies and Court decisions (e.g. Hungary's asylum programme, and legislative package on higher education and civil society organisations), and above all, disputed the basic democratic values and principles of the EU (see Article 7 Procedures). These actions were often considered surprising and puzzling, yet, despite its potentially lasting impressions, compared to both the euro (Niemann and Ioannou 2015;Schimmelfennig 2014Schimmelfennig , 2015Verdun 2015) and the migration crises (Biermann et al. 2019;Börzel and Risse 2018), the populist challenge did not receive the same amount of scholarly attention.
On the one hand, while various integration theories have not yet addressed the issue explicitly (e.g. neo(-neo)-functionalism, different strands of institutionalism or governance approaches), others have downplayed the relevance of populism. Although we seem to be 'at the beginning of a new agenda for European integration scholarship that considers the internal and external implications of having illiberal regimes within the EU' (Meunier and Vachudova 2018), proponents of liberal intergovernmentalism (LI) likened populists to 'dogs that bark but never bite' . 2 Moravcsik explicitly stated that 'beyond migration, populists have had surprisingly little effect on EU policies' (Moravcsik 2018(Moravcsik : 1663, and that they were likely to moderate their opposition to the EU once in government, never actually daring to cancel a major EU policy. Yet, the persistent anti-EU narrative, the frequent obstruction of common interest projects, or the questioning of the value-based and institutional integrity of the community based on a populist ideology are hardly irrelevant developments (cf. Hooghe and Marks 2019b). While Moravcsik recognises domestic policy trends under populist regimes as 'deeply troubling' (Moravcsik 2018(Moravcsik : 1663, he only seems to consider the EU-level impact in terms of exit (as his example on Brexit also suggests). However, 'instead of advocating the departure from the EU, the populist challenge to European integration is precisely the one that comes from the inside (…) maintaining a consistently anti-European discourse while seeking to change the direction of the integration process' (Christiansen 2020: 19).
On the other hand, the complexity of the challenge posed by populist governments has not been captured in its entirety by existing approaches. Postfunctionalism (PF) Marks 2009, 2019a) and new intergovernmentalism (NI) (Hodson and Puetter 2019) both consider the emergence of populism, or rather populist parties, as a reaction to dysfunctional domestic democratic processes with regards to EU integration, yet remain silent on what happens when populists govern? PF does acknowledge that populism may exert some influence over European integration (cf. Hooghe and Marks 2019b), and that politicisation of the EU by populists at the national level may shift 'politics without policy' to 'politics against policy and even polity' (Schmidt 2019), yet it does not provide enough specifics. NI, on the other hand, recognises the explicit threat populist governments may pose for the post-Maastricht normative consensus on pluralist democracy. Yet, both approaches -along with Kelemen's (2017Kelemen's ( , 2020 more eclectic (federalist) account of the issue under an authoritarian equilibrium -seem to overlook the potential transformative impact of populism over society. However, as Jones correctly pointed out, under populism 'the weakening of democratic norms coincides with the strengthening of political identities, both positive and negative. Supporters of populist parties identify themselves ever more forcefully as the 'true people' and characterise opponents as either corrupt elites or dangerous outsiders' (Jones 2019: 19).
It is argued here that existing approaches maintain a relative analytical and conceptual distance from the phenomenon, and cannot fully grasp the impact of populist governments over EU integration given their projected ideas of democracy and state-societal relations. In contrast, the article claims that populism, understood as an ideology (Mudde 2004), poses a specific problem to European integration, and calls for an approach complementary to existing ones when analysing the actions of populist governments. Its unique way to political decision making (cf. Bartha et al. 2020; Grzymala-Busse 2019) and rather uneasy relationship with democracy (cf. Canovan 1999;Müller 2014;Urbinati 2019b) along with its transformative characteristic (cf. Vachudova 2021) feed into anti-plural and anti-democratic processes, societal polarisation and the emergence of a 'constraining consensus' between the populist government and 'the people' it claims to represent. This may influence populists' overall approach to EU policies, and thus have important ramifications for the integration process itself, which could prove populism to be anything but an episodic incident (cf. Csehi 2019).
The added value of the article is threefold. First, it highlights the relevance of democratic conditions and societal trends of member states for European integration (theory), and complements existing approaches that stress the need to analyse the domestic drivers of European unification. With this, the article complements more static approaches like LI and PF with a more dynamic account, which should also lead to better informed empirical studies in the future. Secondly, although the main focus of the article is on European integration (theories), connecting the corresponding literature with the one on populism has also relevant implications for the latter. Not only does it demonstrate that populism as an object of study may have an impact on various disciplines, it could broaden as well as further specify the research topics in the field of populism (cf. Mudde and Kaltwasser 2018;Rooduijn 2019). Thirdly, creating a better understanding of the potential impact of populist governments on European integration dynamics could help facilitate better and more efficient reactions to the populist challenge in the future.
The article unfolds as follows: first, a brief conceptual clarification is provided on populism and its political and societal implications. The subsequent part looks at these transformative features in light of existing theories, and complements them with an account which not only takes note of anti-democratic and anti-plural processes, but also advances the notion of a 'constraining consensus' between populist governments and their electorate. Throughout the discussion, as a paradigmatic case, the actions of Orbán's Hungarian government will be used as indicative and theory-generating examples. The article concludes with a discussion on the relevance of populism-induced democratic and societal transformations in EU integration, and suggests future research endeavours.

Populism and its transformative power
Populism may be studied as a political strategy (Weyland 2017), a political style (Moffitt and Tormey 2014), a discourse (Laclau 2005) or an ideology (Mudde 2004). The first two approaches may be described as rationalist where 'populist leaders are portrayed as power-seeking politicians who act rationally in order to maximise their profit, measured in popular support' (Rueda 2021: 2). The latter is a more constructivist account where the actions of populists are determined by an underlying ideology. This division highlights a key epistemological divide, but it is almost impossible to determine whether populism is a strategic tool used instrumentally, or a set of ideas determining principled action (Mudde and Kaltwasser 2012). While the importance of the framework adopted could be relevant in relation to integration theories 3 (e.g. an idea-based understanding of populism may be harder to integrate within rationalist theories such as LI), given the quasi-consensus around the ideational approach, this article also adopts this view.
At the core of populism as a 'thin-centered' ideology (Stanley 2008) there is a morally defined antagonistic relationship -which usually takes either a socio-economic or cultural form -between 'the honest people' , 'the undeserving non-people' and 'the corrupt elite' , and an understanding of politics as a reflection of 'the will of the people' . This article argues that these central ideas have two separate yet interrelated long-term consequences which have importance for European integration: one political and one societal.
On the one hand, given the exclusive and anti-plural understanding of 'the people' (Müller 2016) and the contrast between its closed nature and the open-ended definition of the demos (Mueller 2019;Rummens 2017), populism is believed to exert a negative impact on the quality of democracy (cf. Huber and Schimpf 2016) and an influence over perceptions of democratic decision making (Heinisch and Wegscheider 2020). Ultimately, its overemphasis on popular sovereignty usually leads to attacks against non-majoritarian institutions, transnational/supranational organisations, and epistemic communities that allegedly serve the interests of 'the corrupt elite' and act against 'the will of the people' . Real world manifestations include skirmishes with the judicial branch, civil society actors, the media, professional associations, international or regional organisations, etc. Furthermore, populism as an ideology also has important ramifications for decision-making processes (Bartha et al. 2020) and actual policy outcomes (e.g. see the various policy fields covered in the works of Lockwood 2018; Schumacher and van Kersbergen 2016;Verbeek and Zaslove 2015). Given the exclusionary understanding of 'the people' and the idea that populists and populists alone are the true representatives of 'the people' , the decision-making process under populism generally limits access for key political players from the electorate (i.e. those who are considered 'the non-people') through technocratic associations (who are considered to be serving the interests of 'the corrupt elite') to social interest groups (who by representing potentially contradictory positions in the policy-making process by definition become illegitimate actors). This is labelled as the anti-political feature of populism (Mudde 2021), which may also culminate in frequent policy changes, shorter duration of policies, and an overall increased unpredictability (Bartha et al. 2020). All in all, populism is expected to influence two main features of democracy: its formal institutional settings and the informal norms of democratic decision making (Grzymala-Busse 2019), which could challenge key assumptions of governmental action and transnational cooperation as described in European integration theories.
On the other hand, populism in government is expected to 'leave a lasting impression on social relationships' (Jones 2019: 20). The moral division projected onto society by populists often culminates in the questioning of conventional discursive and behavioural norms, which contributes to societal polarisation. Additionally, the morality claim not only obscures rational discussions (or oppresses critical approaches) on policies within society, but is also used as an identity-based proclamation of conformity between the populist leader and their electorate. However, this connection is not necessarily a reflection of bottom-up processes as expected in representative democracies. Quite the contrary, when populists make reference to 'the people' , 'they bring a subject called 'the people' into being: they produce what they claim to represent' (Moffitt and Tormey 2014: 389). In other words, as Müller (2016) points out, populists only wish to be corroborated in what they have already determined as 'the will of the people' . It is active cueing and manipulation by populist leaders to which, over time, voters are expected to eventually react by changing their preferences (Vachudova 2021). This societal impact is also captured by the fact that previously fringe populist positions are becoming increasingly mainstream (cf. Jones 2019). Backlund and Jungar (2019) show that right-wing populist parties not only decrease representational deficiencies in relation to European integration, but that their position also corresponds strongly with their voters.
The political and societal influences are separate yet have strongly interlinked dynamics (i.e. the decomposition of democratic cheques and balances are often necessary for societal polarisation), which Urbinati (2017)  It may be expected that the more persistent populism proves to be within a constituency, and the more power populist actors have, the greater its transformative impact will be (cf. Huber and Schimpf 2016). Consequently, the influence of populism over EU integration is likely to diverge between populists in opposition, populists as junior coalition members, populists as dominant parties of a coalition government, and populists having absolute or constitutional majorities. Similarly, populists who have been in power longer are expected to influence democratic and societal trends more than their 'colleagues' who have recently entered government.

The challenge of populist governments for European integration (theory)
Populism -despite its transformative potential -has received little attention in relation to European integration (theory). As the introduction highlighted, the phenomenon was either rendered practically irrelevant or its implications were not considered in their entirety. The article argues that the relative conceptual and analytical distance between integration theories and populism is partly driven by the latter questioning some of the building blocks of the former, which may also lead to an underestimation of the relevance of the phenomenon for European unification. In response, a complementary framework is advanced, which highlights various democratic and societal components populism is likely to influence, and which is necessary to study in order to understand the actions of populist actors and their relevance for EU integration. The example of the Hungarian government is used to illustrate the claims given that the transformative capacities of populism are best captured through a case of persistent, powerful populism in government. Clearly, as indicated before, we might expect variation across cases depending on the political and temporal dimensions of populist governments. While such a comparative analysis would stretch the limits of the current study, it certainly signals avenues for further empirical and theoretical testing and fine-tuning of the framework advanced here; and issue addressed in the conclusion.

Populist governments, democratic transformation and EU integration
Populism maintains a conflictual relationship with (liberal) democracy, which may dispute democratic expectations of existing integration theories. First, it is anticipated that populists in government would constrain the pluralist model of participation projected by various approaches. According to LI, functional interdependencies drive state-societal relations where governments are pressured into accommodating the interests of special interest groups when formulating national positions on EU policies (Moravcsik and Schimmelfennig 2019). Two main components of the populist ideology may be at play here. On the one hand, the societal division by populists between 'the deserving people' , 'the undeserving non-people' and 'the corrupt elite' is likely to determine and (re-)structure the relative power position of the different interest groups across the various sectors of the economy. Urbinati calls this populism's 'radical partiality in interpreting the people' (Urbinati 2019b: 112). As a consequence, 'when the regime takes control of large swaths of the economy while eliminating an independent judiciary, dominating the media and silencing independent groups, it is bound to skew economic preferences' (Meunier andVachudova 2018: 1639). This process is further deepened by the EU's regime-supporting function (Bozóki and Hegedűs 2018) where the populist government's appropriation of EU funds -often through the machinery of corruption (on oligarchical structures and corrupt networks see Cianetti et al. 2018; on the populist uses of patronage see e.g. Pappas 2019) -leads to an artificial concentration of capital in the hands of a limited number of actors. In the case of Hungary, there has been a 'transformation of an independent, entrepreneurial business sector into a partisan conglomerate. Orbán has named key allies to critical positions in the state and its newly enlarged national economic sector' (Grzymala-Busse 2019: 712). LI may argue that this should not concern the final outcome, as preferred groups (i.e. those deemed to be true representatives of 'the people') may adequately represent functional interdependencies. However, this practice questions the pluralist feature of the entire process, and may undermine LI's optimistic view on the EU's democratic deficit. Furthermore, it is likely to cause a 'sore in the eye' of other member state governments which are not willing to contribute financially or politically to the survival of an illiberal, corrupt regime, 4 which may undermine the normative foundations of the community. Ultimately, preferences under a populist government are not determined through a competition of interests, but rather through a reverse state capture where the state is occupying key economic positions and then determines the preferences. The example of 'the rule of law conditionality' may be a case in point. While a clear majority in Hungary supports the measure, 5 the overall economic interests (i.e. the guarantee of transparent application of EU funds) are trumped by the economic interests of the state (i.e. to finance the government's economic back-country) hidden behind arguments of national sovereignty.
While LI presupposes that the government is simply an agent in the process (cf. Putnam 1988), populism blends the agent with the principal. This leads to the second component of populism that matters here, and which concerns the notion of popular sovereignty. Given that populists belief that they and they alone are the true representatives of 'the people' , this constrains the relevance of other actors in the political decision-making process. Simply put, a populist government may ignore concerns formulated about functional interdependencies by non-governmental actors in general, and by those deemed representatives of 'the non-people' in particular, thus further distorting the preference formation and aggregation process. In fact, Berkhout et al. (2021) nicely demonstrate that populist parties (irrespective of their ideological background) have less contact with interest groups than their mainstream counterparts. This also applies to civil society in general: in many instances, their voices are not only not heard, but they are also harassed if deemed part of 'the non-people' (cf. Arato and Cohen 2017; Molnár 2019). Consequently, under populism, not only are states expected to represent unitary preferences, but those preferences seem to be unilaterally defined as well.
While LI maintains a pluralist approach to preference formation, PF adopts a pluralist understanding of politicisation, and claims that whenever identities are mobilised in relation to EU integration, there is an increase in the relevance of mass over elite-, or interest group-driven politics, thus leading to the domestic politicisation of the EU. Although PF assumes that politicisation is carried out in public fora by mass organisations, it is argued here that the extent to which public opinion and interest groups may influence or access politicisation under a populist government depends heavily on whether they are considered to be part of 'the people' (cf. Huber and Ruth 2017). As argued before, populism tends to be more critical towards special interest groups and civil society actors, and likens their activity to technocratic dealings which often stand in sharp contrast to 'the will of the people' (cf. Berkhout et al. 2021). Additionally, populist exercises of alleged participatory governance are often flawed and used for manipulation to maintain power, as the Hungarian example with the so-called National Consultations indicates (Bátory and Svensson 2019). It has to be noted here as well that while populist parties' voters may be more supportive of deliberative forms of democracy (Zaslove et al. 2020), populism is likely to run counter deliberative aspirations (Sharon 2019), and populist governments may dominate policy agendas effectively.
Secondly, populists in government are expected to attack formal, non-majoritarian institutions that may hold them accountable. While LI supposes healthy democratic institutions and processes at the domestic level (which ultimately culminates in the argument that there is no democratic deficit in the EU), PF and NI both acknowledge the existence of 'dysfunctional inputs' in EU-related matters at the national level (Hodson and Puetter 2019). It is this deficiency which triggers the emergence and strengthening of populist parties in both approaches. However, both accounts seem to overlook cases where populism is not a response to democratic shortcomings, but rather a force that actively contributes to it. Additionally, PF remains rather vague about the 'arena rules' where domestic politicisation is supposed to take place (Hooghe and Marks 2009). Yet, various components of democratic backsliding witnessed in Hungary Kelemen (2017) also takes note of authoritarian tendencies in member states governed by populist regimes, and argues that various features of the EU's quasi federal polity help sustain these polities under a so-called authoritarian equilibrium (Kelemen 2020). Yet, given that, much like the literature already assessed above, populism is considered here as the dependent, rather than the independent variable of European integration, this framework remains relatively silent on how democratic transformations at the national level (as induced by populist governments) may directly influence the process of European unification.
Thirdly, populists in government are expected to challenge supranational institutions rendering them representatives of 'the corrupt elite' acting against 'the will of the people' . This may indicate a shift towards intergovernmentalist solutions, and a pushback on supranational institutions and theories that stress their role in the integration process (e.g. neo-functionalist accounts, see Strøby Jensen 2019). LI argues that intergovernmental negotiation is based on the relative bargaining power of the member states dependent upon 'asymmetrical interdependencies' (Moravcsik 2018). Essentially, governments compare the relative gains of an agreement to a status quo, unilateral action and alternative agreements. Those that are 'least in need of an agreement are best positioned to determine the terms of the bargain, especially when the decision rule is unanimity' Marks 2019a: 1116). Under such circumstances, Moravcsik points out that even small states may exert great influence on certain issues 'when they have extreme negative preferences, little to gain, or powerful domestic veto groups' (Moravcsik 2018: 7). Populists in government are expected to have two different impacts. On the one hand, as populists often diverge from liberal values -which are expected to structure intergovernmental bargaining as well -they are expected to reduce the level of agreement within the EU (cf. Börzel and Risse 2019: 241). As Vachudova argues, 'suddenly, a member government is bringing to the EU negotiating table not just national interests related to EU policies and competences, but also the demand to decouple EU membership from the values and processes of liberal democracy' (Vachudova 2019: 702). Consequently, preferences of populist governments may sharply diverge from the strategies and goals of non-populist members of the community. Ultimately, it may be expected that populism increases the chances of negative or opposing preferences in an intergovernmental setting, especially if it is linked more to ideas, values, principles and morals rather than to actual economic interests. Under such circumstances it could also be expected that unilateral action -in the name of 'the people' -is always portrayed as a viable option over multilateral outcomes, thus questioning at least partially the notion of asymmetrical interdependencies. A narrative embedded in a populist ideology is what differentiates populist vetoes from their mainstream counterparts. The example on the 'rule of law conditionality' demonstrates this clearly. Orbán interpreted the issue as a conflict between the European Council (which he deems the only legitimate source of European policies) and the European Parliament, stating that the latter -under the influence of a global elite network -wanted to take away the power of the former. 6 The growing number of vetoes on migration policy measures, on the use of the European Commission's annual rule of law reports for Council dialogues on the same topic, or on 'gender equality' , just to name a few from recent years are further cases in point. As Urbinati argued -in relation to the domestic context -, the populist 'feels authorised to act unilaterally and make decisions without meaningful institutional consultation or mediations, while in permanent communication with the people outside the government, in order to reassure them that they are the master of the game' (Urbinati 2019b: 120). Essentially, depending on the decision-making rules, populist governments may exert a disproportionate impact (cf. Meunier andVachudova 2018: 1640), which is likely to be further buttressed by coalitions of 'like-minded' populists who set out not only to legitimise their actions through the other, but also mutually to protect one another against 'the corrupt elites' (Holesch and Kyriazi 2021). This also questions the 'optimistic' view of NI that despite a 'constraining dissensus' , EU elites manage to circumvent public opposition and push the integration forward. While it does acknowledge that this process may eventually lead to a 'destructive dissensus' , populists in government are expected to cause deadlocks, and even attempt to wind back integration, as Orbán's most recent suggestion about the disempowerment of the European Parliament clearly signals. 7

Populist governments, societal transformation and EU integration
Populism in government may not simply challenge existing democratic processes but over time exert a transformative impact of society. Most theories assume a bottom-up relationship between the people and their elected representatives, whereas populists in government are expected more actively to determine the interests and ideas of 'the people' (Vachudova 2021) by remaining 'in a permanent electoral campaign in order to reaffirm their identification with the people' (Urbinati 2019b: 121). 'Relentless propaganda that keeps the people mobilised around the issues the leader chooses to stress' (Urbinati 2019a(Urbinati : 1075 is a key feature of populism in government, and may question the notion of bottom-up responsiveness (Caramani 2017).
As has been previously shown, LI assumes an alignment between the government and its electorate. Although preferences are most often (although not exclusively) embedded in economic concerns, as Moravcsik points out, 'the more diffuse the domestic constituency behind a policy and the more uncertain the substantive implications of a choice, the more diffuse and vague is the social pressure on the state' (Moravcsik 2018(Moravcsik : 1651. Under such circumstances, it is expected that governments -instead of responding to the demands of special interest groups -'will represent the interests of the average voter' (Hix 2018(Hix : 1600, or more specifically the median voter. In a similar manner, PF claims that 'domestic and European politics have become more tightly coupled as governments have become more responsive to public pressures on European integration' (Hooghe and Marks 2009: 2). NI deviates from this view essentially arguing that European elites have often managed to circumvent public opposition. Yet, the populist ideology excludes the possibility of such de-alignment as it would contradict the claim that populists are the only true representatives of 'the people' . Furthermore, as Müller (2016) points out, populism is always a form of identity politics. It is highly active in the political construction of identities (i.e. the delineation between 'the people' , 'the non-people' and 'the elite') (Marchlewska et al. 2018), and clearly the EU serves as a perfect object against which identities may be mobilised (cf. Rupnik 2007). Populism in government is 'an ideology based on trust through faith more than trust through free and open deliberation (and thus also dissent) among the followers, and between them and the representative' (Urbinati 2019b: 122). This top-down constitution of 'the people' and their interests and ideas under a populist government is traceable in Hungary with Orbán's ever changing and strengthening (Eurosceptic) populist discourse (Csehi 2019). This leads to two additional transformative dynamics: societal polarisation and changing dynamics of consensus and dissensus.
As for the former, the populist division between 'the deserving people' and the 'undeserving non-people' , and the morally determined antagonism foreseen between these groups is likely to increase societal polarisation, which will shift the position of the average voter. Ezrow et al. (2011) argue that 'niche parties' (potentially even populists) respond to changes in the mean position of their voters as opposed to the average voter. The same is argued here with the caveat that voter position is determined by party position under a populist government. This may be in conflict with LI's expectations that governments remain responsive to the preferences of the median voter. European Social Survey (ESS) and Chapel Hill Expert Survey (CHES) data on the position on the EU suggests just that in Hungary (Figure 1 and Table 1). While in 2012 the mean (4.86) and the median (5.00) on the issue of European unification (whether it has gone too far [0] or not [10]) corresponded with Fidesz voters' mean (4.85) and median (5.00), by 2018 the overall mean (4.53) and median (5.00) deviated from Fidesz voters' mean (3.99) and median (4.00). The governing populist party has adopted a rather critical view of the EU over the course of the past decade, and the crowning moment of this transformation has been the departure of Fidesz from the faction of the European People's Party in the European Parliament. However, as data suggest, its electorate has also shifted towards a more sovereigntist stand, while all other parties and voters remained relatively stable (with the exception of the previously far-right Jobbik). Rather than responding to popular demand, it is argued here that the government's anti-EU rhetoric, its numerous billboard and advertisement campaigns and national consultations against 'Brussels' have actually shifted the position of Orbán's supporters on the EU. A study by the think-tank, Policy Solutions (Bíró-Nagy and Laki 2019) actually confirms that Fidesz voters are relatively the most sceptical towards not only EU-membership, but also towards specific EU policies (concerning democracy, migration, the common currency, the potential joining of European Public Prosecutor's Office and competence transfer in various areas).
The artificial, moral separation is likely to increase attempts to integrate more and more issues within identity or cultural debates (i.e. 'us' versus 'them') (cf. Kuhn 2019), which rhymes with PF's expectations on politicisation. In fact, Ivaldi and Mazzoleni (2020) argue that right-wing populist parties often combine economic populism with claims about sovereignty. Populism, which arguably represents so-far missing or under-represented positions on the EU (cf. Backlund and Jungar 2019;Bakker et al. 2020) is expected to embed an increased number of issues within narratives about the overall direction of EU integration. The example of the Hungarian government's contestation of the 'rule of law conditionalities' linked to EU funds is a case in point where a distributional question was turned into an identity-driven conflict between alleged sovereigntists and unionists.
As for the latter, top-down constitution of 'the people' is expected to lead to ever stronger party-voter alignment between populist governments and their voters, and an opposite dynamic between opposition voters and the government. PF claims that politicisation of the EU -through mobilisation of (national) identities -has challenged the previously existing 'permissive consensus' where transnational elites could carry on with integration in relative isolation as long as economic outputs created sufficient legitimacy for the process. However, with the EU becoming ever more salient, a 'constraining dissensus' has emerged where elites are constantly worried about the critical, domestic constituencies when deciding about European matters. As pointed out earlier, populism under PF is considered as a reaction to democratic deficiencies at the national level, which -along with other possible actors -is responsible for this constraint of the mainstream elites. Yet, we get to know little about a situation when populists are actually in power. Given the populist division of society between 'the people' and 'the non-people' , PF's perception of the society as a unitary actor constraining its political elite may be misguided, and its idea of a 'constraining dissensus' too static. Given the strong, supply-driven (Eurosceptic) politicisation as orchestrated by populist leaders, two parallel dynamics are likely to emerge. Instead of a dissensus, a 'constraining consensus' is expected to emerge between the populist government and its electorate (i.e. 'the people') who tend to adopt the government's more critical narrative of the EU, and are more readily accepting of identity-driven arguments to secure 'the will of the people' against the corrupt machinery of Brussels (cf. Csehi and Zgut 2021). On the other hand, a 'permissive dissensus' is likely to form between the populist government and its public opposition. 'The  non-people' remain more willing to permit further deepening of the EU, yet, the populist government is likely to stand in the way. These parallel dynamics are clearly traceable and a result of populist politics as data on Hungary suggests. Quantitative analysis on ESS data suggests that there is a link between party affiliation and assessment of EU unification. While in 2012 voters of the far-right Jobbik had a significantly different position on EU integration (whether it went too far or not) in comparison to other parliamentary parties, by 2018 Fidesz voters have taken over this position (see Online Appendix). Such a polarised societal view poses a double challenge for the EU: not only does the populist government and its electorate adopt a more critical approach towards the EU, but given the EU's relative weakness in responding to the populist challenge, opposition parties and their voters may also become frustrated with the integration process. It is the transformative power of populism over society, leading to a 'constraining consensus' , which also questions the NI approach. As argued previously, NI considers populists essentially in opposition, and argues -contrary to PF -that mainstream elites often manage to circumvent domestic opposition, which may temporarily neutralise the 'constraining dissensus' and contribute to further integration (Hodson and Puetter 2019). However, in the long run, such a dealignment, or disequilibrium is expected to turn the 'constraining dissensus' into a destructive one. As argued in relation to PF, however, populism in government is likely to turn the 'constraining dissensus' into a 'constraining consensus' first, which may prove to be destructive. Contrary to NI, it is argued here that it is not the appeasement of 'challenger governments' at the EU level that may lead to destruction, but rather the 'constraining consensus' at the national level which is likely to create policy deadlocks and undermine the community's legitimacy. The exit of the Hungarian governing party, Fidesz from the faction of the EPP may be an indication of the end of this tolerant approach, and the most recent EU-level opposition towards the Orbán government's new LGBTQ + regulation 8 also points in this direction.
The quasi-federalist approach advanced by Kelemen speaks of the issue of representation. It simply argues that the EU's authoritarian equilibrium is partly maintained because the EU facilitates the exit of dissatisfied citizens, which supports the survival of the regime (Kelemen 2020). While data, according to Kelemen's own account on Hungary is definitely not conclusive, the idea seems to feed into the societal polarisation and 'constraining consensus' argument, as emigration is expected to tip the balance, leaving a more loyal population behind (i.e. strengthening the voice of 'the people' in populist language).

Conclusion
The article has set out to argue that populism in government poses a challenge for European integration in its own right. It may transform the institutional and societal underpinnings of the integration process, which existing theories -given their projected models of democratic decision making -have either underestimated or failed to address in its entirety. State-of-the-art literature on populism was used to inform expectations about the populist impact over European unification. On the one hand, it was highlighted that populists in government are expected to constrain the pluralist model of participation, downplay the role of supranational institutions, and attack formal institutions and informal norms. On the other hand, the top-down constitution of 'the people' is thought to contribute to societal polarisation and the forming of a 'constraining consensus' between the populist government and its electorate on matters of European integration. 'Populism in power is a transmutation of democratic principles' (Urbinati 2019b: 118), and of societal relations one may add, which may ultimately undermine the legitimacy of the EU by questioning its fundamental values, eroding its efficiency and weakening its' citizens' loyalty towards the project. The aim of the article has been to provide an initial look at this complex relationship between populism in government and European integration, mainly from a theoretical, analytical perspective. This article has relied on the case study of Hungary, which may be described as an extreme case, based on which the effect of populism on European integration may be overestimated. However, Hungary is likely to serve as a forerunner rather than an outlier. Consequently, multiple issues addressed in the article will, no doubt, be substantiated and further specified by future research. First, given that much of the empirical data used in the article referred to approaches to overall integration, in-depth case studies are necessary to confirm a populist impact on specific EU policies. Moravcsik is right in pointing out that empirics on the populist impact are rather thin, 9 which needs to be addressed. Secondly, theoretical frameworks, which are missing so far, should attempt to incorporate the populist challenge within their frameworks (e.g. governance approaches). Thirdly, future comparative studies should analyse the potentially variegated impact of populism over EU integration dependent upon the power a populist government holds.
3. While social constructivism is a relevant approach in studying European integration, Risse (2019) rightly argues that is does not make particular substantive claims about the EU. Rather, it may join other theories which are ready to incorporate its ontological and epistemological framework. Clearly, the role of ideas and identities in determining populists' actions, and how this may influence norms and institutions of the EU is of central importance here, just as much as the centrality of discourses. Nevertheless, given the meta-theoretical nature of constructivism, these issues were incorporated within existing theories and their expectations about EU integration. 4. https://www.politico.eu/article/historic-rule-of-law-deal-faces-challenges/ .