On a more personal note, this paper was a really hard nut to crack! It took a long time to mature, and not without some distress. I'm glad I stuck with it (or, rather, abandoned it only temporarily) as I'm genuinely happy with how it turned out. Grateful for the feedback I got along the way. (5/5)

How do I do this? I conducted a fine-grained pledge-based analysis of the coalition agreement - first, comparing it with party manifestos and, then, tracing the fulfilment of those pledges that originated from Podemos (a nightmarish exercise I do not recommend to anyone 🫢). (4/5)

Second, it argues its influence is most visible in socio-economic fields (housing, labour market reform) while pledges related to the ‘populist core business’ of corruption & democratic reform were muss less consequential - confirming that 'host ideology' matters more than populism. (3/5)

First, this paper shows that - contrary to the ‘failure-in-government’ thesis - Podemos secured a relevant share of policy commitments, roughly consistent with coalition pay-off theories and proportional bargaining expectations. (2/5)