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Far Right Parties in Europe
Abstract
The far right party family is the fastest-growing party family in Europe. In addition to describing the ideological makeup of the far right party family, this review examines demand-side and supply-side explanations for its electoral success. Demand-side explanations focus on the grievances that create the "demand" for far right parties, whereas supply-side explanations focus on how the choices that far right parties make and the political opportunity structure in which they act influence their success. The review finishes by suggesting that far right scholars must recognize the interaction between demand-side and supply-side factors in their empirical analyses in order to draw valid inferences and that it would be productive to pay more attention to the political geography of far right support and the different stages of far right success.
... A vast body of literature links populism to the politics of grievances (e.g. Betz 2018;Golder 2016;Kriesi 2014). Grievances capture the demand side of the PRR and provide economic, political and cultural explanations for its origins and manifestations. ...
... Demand and supply factors do not act in isolation from each other, as Matt Golder observes (2016). The presence of demand translates into the development of a new PRR party only if the party competition structure allows it and if the party develops into a professional organization (Golder 2016). ...
... In Hungary, Fidesz promotes exclusionary policies and a return to pre-World War I Greater Hungary (Leff and Armeanu 2017). As Golder (2016) observes, based on Benedict Anderson's theory of 'imagined communities' (1991), the 'people' in the PRR discourse are not real but imagined, and so are their enemies. Thus, the exclusionary rhetoric is likely to be more effective with the individuals who have low exposure to ethnic diversity and multiculturalism. ...
How did the new Alliance for the Union of Romanians (AUR) obtain 9% of the vote in the 2020 Romanian general elections? This article explores the fast rise of populist radical right (PRR) parties by examining the support for the AUR at the locality level in Romania during the coronavirus crisis. The AUR's discourse combined populism, nationalism and anti-masking rhetoric. The findings show great variation across the 3,181 localities, from 0% to 50% support for the AUR, and highlight the significant influence of local cultural and political factors, while economic explanations were not confirmed. The vote for the AUR was high in localities with low ethnic diversity and low voter turnout. This research underscores that national-level explanations obscure important dynamics of PRR support that take place at the subnational level. The rise of the AUR is important beyond the Romanian and European contexts and emphasizes the significance of local responses to global crises.
... D ecades of research on the demand for populist radical right (PRR) parties have documented their overrepresentation among the lower and lowermiddle classes, whether defined in terms of education, income, occupation, or marketable skills (Kitschelt 1995;Minkenberg 2000;Oesch and Rennwald 2018;Rydgren 2012; for reviews, see Berman 2021;Golder 2016;Mudde 2007;Rydgren 2007). Scholars consider the reason for this pattern to lie in part in the penalties and rewards associated with major transformations in the economy and society, such as the postindustrial transition, the technological revolution, and globalization (Betz 1994;Kriesi 1999), an argument that EU policy makers also support (Buti and Pichelmann 2017). ...
... A voluminous literature investigates why the PRR enjoys broader support among the lower middle class (for reviews see Berman 2021;Golder 2016;Mudde 2007;Rydgren 2007). 1 Originally, this debate was polarized along two axes. A first strand of scholarship contended that PRR voters are driven by cultural concerns, mainly the threat of mass immigration and the crisis of national identity (Achterberg and Houtman 2006;Frank 2004;Norris and Inglehart 2019;Oesch and Rennwald 2018). ...
Citizens’ resentment at losing out to the rest of society is commonly regarded as the foundation of the demand for the populist radical right (PRR). Yet whether this motive has an objective economic basis remains disputed. Relying on European Social Survey individual-level data from 23 elections across Western Europe, combined with Eurostat data, I demonstrate that the PRR polls better among social classes facing economic status loss. To do so, I leverage a novel positional measure of income. This approach allows me to gauge economic status loss as a distinct experience from worsening financial circumstances, which has been the initial focus of empirical research. Evidence that economic status loss is the economic engine of PRR support is corroborated by data on cultural stances and redistributive preferences. My study confirms the complementarity of cultural- and economic-based explanations of PRR voting and reveals one electoral consequence of rising economic inequalities.
... Postwar immigration, driven by labor migration, intra-European movement, and conflicts in Iraq, Afghanistan, Syria, and sub-Saharan Africa, has significantly altered Europe's demographics and politics (Dancygier & Margalit, 2020). Integration challenges and the rise of anti-immigration parties remain prominent in the public discourse (Adida et al., 2016;Golder, 2016). ...
... Radical-right parties are among the most prominent mobilizers of anti-Muslim hostility in contemporary Europe (Mitts, 2019). A common theme in the platforms of such parties is support for exclusionary, "nativist" populism, aimed at ostracizing groups with certain religious or ethnic characteristics (Golder, 2016). These parties portray Muslim immigrants as a threat, whether economic or symbolic; they conjure up a moral divide between the "good" ordinary people and "bad" Muslim immigrants (Schmuck & Matthes, 2017). ...
A well-documented fact is that Muslim citizens tend to vote for the left in greater proportion than non-Muslim citizens. In Western Europe, this difference in the vote for left-wing parties exceeds 30%. Interestingly, the gap endures despite Muslims’ integration into the host society, which is expected to militate against group voting. Why, then, do Muslims continue to vote as a group? And what factors account for their leaning towards the left? We argue that exclusion and discrimination, to which Muslims are regularly subjected as a group, work against the effect of integration on their vote choice, as it strengthens the saliency of group interests and “linked fate” in their voting calculus. Using public opinion survey data, we show that the more Muslims feel discriminated against by their host society, the more likely they are to engage in group voting and vote for the left. We also show that political exclusion, proxied by the electoral strength of radical-right parties, has a positive association with Muslims’ support for left-wing parties. Finally, we delve into the British case and show that experiences of physical violence are also manifested in stronger group voting by non-Western immigrants. Our article sheds light on a phenomenon that has the potential to reshape the electoral landscape in Europe by rendering ethnic and religious identity a crucial dimension of party competition.
... Their nativism manifests in viewing the nation as a homogeneous unit requiring protection from foreigners or dangerous intruders (Wodak, 2019). This protection of the homeland favours a strong or even authoritarian rule (Golder, 2016;Bustikova, Kitschelt, 2009;Mudde, Ed., 2016), particularly emphasizing the majority rule as an essential feature of democracy (Mudde, Ed., 2016;Wodak, 2019). These groups perceive political elites as corrupt entities working against the people's will (Golder, 2016;Bustikova, Kitschelt, 2009;Wodak, 2019). ...
... This protection of the homeland favours a strong or even authoritarian rule (Golder, 2016;Bustikova, Kitschelt, 2009;Mudde, Ed., 2016), particularly emphasizing the majority rule as an essential feature of democracy (Mudde, Ed., 2016;Wodak, 2019). These groups perceive political elites as corrupt entities working against the people's will (Golder, 2016;Bustikova, Kitschelt, 2009;Wodak, 2019). ...
... Por un lado, los factores promovidos por las actitudes, preferencias o agravios percibidos por parte de los electores que les inducirían a apoyar este tipo de partidos (factores de la demanda) y un segundo grupo de factores (factores de la oferta) que pondrían el foco en la estructura de oportunidad política y en las propias estrategias que adoptan los partidos de la ultraderecha para hacerse un hueco en el sistema de partidos. Siguiendo la línea formulada por otros autores (Golder, 2016;Mols & Jetten, 2020), consideramos importante enfatizar la interacción entre ambos tipos de factores para explicar el éxito creciente de los partidos pertenecientes a este espectro político. ...
... Entre los factores de la demanda se suelen mencionar: el impacto del proceso de modernización, el deterioro de la situación económica, el crecimiento de la desigualdad y una "ansiedad cultural" que se traduce en la percepción de que existe una cultura propia amenazada por las nuevas comunidades migrantes o por nuevos valores sociales frente a valores más tradicionales. Por otro lado, en los factores de la oferta, se analizan las estrategias implementadas por los partidos de la ultraderecha para incrementar su éxito electoral, como su organización partidista, el rol de sus líderes y las ventanas de oportunidad política que lo facilitan: el sistema electoral, la competición partidista, la estructura de clivages del sistema de partidos y el papel de los medios de comunicación (Golder, 2016;Ortiz Barquero, Ruíz Jiménez & González Fernández, 2020;Mols & Jetten, 2020). ...
El devenir de los resultados electorales obtenidos en los últimos años por partidos
de extrema derecha,en más de la mitad de los países de la Unión Euro pea, suscita algunos temores y supone una normal preocupación ante la posible amenaza que las presentes y futuras políticas que estos partidos pueden implantar, se traduzcan en un efecto limitador de los derechos fundamentales de la población. Es posible encontrar algunas respuestas en el análisis de las medidas llevadas a cabo por los países integrantes en el área de política social, en particular en relación a aquellas que fomentan o inhiben la inclusión social de los colectivos más vulnerables, y en especial de la población inmigrante. Resulta curioso observar cómo, al margen
de Polonia y Hungría, el mayor auge se está produciendo en los países de corte
socialdemócrata (Suecia y Finlandia), mediterráneo (Italia) y continental (Francia)
y el menor, en países de corte liberal (Reino Unido e Irlanda).
... Algunos académicos argumentan que estas etiquetas, aunque útiles para describir tendencias generales, no capturan adecuadamente las variaciones locales y las adaptaciones contextuales de estas corrientes políticas. Por ejemplo, mientras que el populismo inclusivo es una característica distintiva de las izquierdas latinoamericanas, el populismo excluyente predomina en las derechas europeas y latinoamericanas (Mudde & Rovira Kaltwasser, 2013;Golder, 2016). ...
... La literatura sobre las nuevas derechas e izquierdas ha explorado las condiciones estructurales que favorecen su ascenso, destacando factores como las crisis económicas, la globalización y la percepción de una crisis de representación política (Golder, 2016). En Europa, las consecuencias de la crisis de 2008 exacerbaron el descontento con las élites económicas y políticas, creando una ventana de oportunidad para que partidos radicales capitalizaran estas tensiones y reinvindicaran políticas económicas más proteccionistas. ...
El artículo analiza el impacto y las características de las nuevas derechas e izquierdas en el siglo XXI, destacando su influencia en las dinámicas políticas globales y su relación con los valores democráticos. Las nuevas derechas, identificadas por discursos autoritarios, populistas y nativistas, han logrado consolidarse como fuerzas políticas importantes en contextos de crisis económicas y sociales. Estas corrientes combinan elementos neoliberales con conservadurismo religioso y utilizan estrategias digitales para amplificar mensajes polarizantes y disputar narrativas culturales. Ejemplos como Jair Bolsonaro en Brasil, Javier Milei en Argentina o Viktor Orbán en Hungría ilustran cómo estas derechas adaptan sus estrategias a contextos locales, promoviendo identidades nacionales homogéneas y valores tradicionales.
Por su parte, las nuevas izquierdas se caracterizan por una mayor diversidad ideológica, combinando demandas redistributivas tradicionales con preocupaciones postmaterialistas como la justicia ambiental y la equidad de género. Sin embargo, enfrentan desafíos internos relacionados con la fragmentación ideológica y las tensiones entre movimientos sociales y partidos políticos. A pesar de sus logros en la institucionalización de demandas radicales en algunos casos, su capacidad para articular una narrativa unificada sigue siendo limitada, especialmente en contextos marcados por la desigualdad estructural.
El texto destaca cómo ambas corrientes participan en intensas disputas culturales, buscando redefinir valores sociales, identidades y marcos democráticos. Estas dinámicas, que incluyen desde luchas simbólicas hasta transformaciones institucionales, están redefiniendo los sistemas políticos contemporáneos y plantean interrogantes sobre el futuro de la democracia y el pluralismo en diversos contextos nacionales y globales
... The stigma, in turn, made them struggle electorally (Rydgren 2005). During the far right's third wave , far-right parties had already started entering parliaments and achieving a prominent role in European politics, but it is with the fourth wavefrom the beginning of the 21st centurythat they became the 'new normal' (Golder 2016;Mudde 2019). In the last decades, previously stigmatized far-right discourses became accepted political wisdom for mainstream political parties and the media, thus normalizing them (Krzyżanowski 2020). ...
... It is therefore crucial to understand under what conditions far-right parties are electorally successful. So far, the literature has pointed to different explanatory factors such as economic anxiety, cultural backlash, political-institutional factors, psychological mechanisms, collective memory and the role of the media (Golder 2016;Mudde 2019). This study sets out to analyse the recent electoral breakthrough of far-right parties in four countries where the far right had until recently remained taboo: Germany, Portugal, Spain and Sweden. ...
In contemporary Europe, far-right parties threaten liberal democratic principles such as pluralism, media freedom and minority rights. Despite the stigma they normally face, far-right parties have experienced electoral breakthroughs even in countries where they remained electorally marginal such as Germany, Portugal, Spain and Sweden. We advance the idea that this happened because the level of stigmatization faced by these parties decreased before their electoral breakthrough. Therefore, we form a theoretical framework based on a threefold mechanism: far-right parties manage to reduce the stigma they face because of a reputational shield or by moderating their message; the media help the far right gain visibility and legitimacy by accommodating its views; established parties accommodate far-right parties without ostracizing them. Then, we test the framework by looking at the electoral breakthroughs of four parties: the results confirm the expectations except for the role of established parties, which is inconclusive.
... First, it primarily applies to issue stances that are widely perceived as extreme or deviant. Second, discounting is most likely among moderate conservative voters, as left-leaning voters are less likely to seriously consider supporting the far right (Golder, 2016) and extreme-right voters are unlikely to penalize extreme positions, as they may be dismissive of liberal norms surrounding those issues. This leaves moderate conservative voters, who may share some policy stances and grievances with the far right but are not primarily attracted to the party by more marginally held cultural grievances (Halikiopoulou and Vlandas, 2020), as the most likely to discount extreme positions. ...
When are far right parties punished for their extreme positions? We argue that the punishments of deviant position-taking are conditional on the degree to which a far right party is normalized or stigmatized in the party system. When the far right is treated as normal, the costs suffered from these parties’ extreme positions decrease, as moderate voters discount the authenticity of their commitment to such positions. We use a survey experiment to test this argument in Spain, finding evidence for discounting on the far right’s extreme anti-LGBTQ+ statements, but not on its embrace of authoritarian history. This study thus shows that normalization and stigmatization of the far right can change how its extreme positions are interpreted by voters.
... Overall, this study contributes to the broader discussion on the rise of anti-immigrant party support in Europe (Golder, 2016), suggesting that in countries with more negative immigration news, a corresponding increase in threat perceptions may contribute to support for these parties, especially in contexts with more exclusive integration policies and higher levels of poverty. ...
Immigration is often portrayed negatively in the news, yet previous research remains inconclusive about how the valence of immigration news in national coverage relates to individual immigration policy preferences. Furthermore, the psychological mechanisms underlying this relationship are not well understood. This study examined whether, in national contexts where immigration news has a more negative valence, there is greater support for restrictive policies and heightened threat perceptions. Drawing on Intergroup Threat Theory, we also assessed whether threat perceptions explained the link between more negative immigration news and restrictive immigration policy support. Additionally, we tested whether greater salience of immigration in the news amplifies these associations. Using data from Rounds 6–8 of the European Social Survey (ESS; n = 113,654) and the ESS Media Claims dataset ( n = 18,451), covering 26 countries from 2012 to 2017, multilevel regression analyses showed that more negative immigration news was associated with increased restrictive policy support, a relationship fully explained by heightened threat perceptions. Greater salience did not reinforce these associations. These findings underscore the link between immigration news valence in national media and policy preferences, highlighting threat perceptions as a key factor in this process.
... Although citizens are confronted with a variety of information in their daily life, by emphasising certain aspects, political elites' rhetoric guides the masses and stimulates them to update their views on political topics such as immigration (Hopkins 2011). Especially (populist) radical right parties have taken the issue of immigration to the core of their program, rhetoric, and campaigning (Golder 2016). In the electoral competition, other parties embraced the issue of immigration as well, making it one of the prominent topics in politics in the last decades (Abou-Chadi and Krause 2020). ...
... In summary, the two approaches and the related research on the demand-side factors of PRRP voting behaviour indicate that economic deprivation and inequality, resistance to immigration, as well as cultural anxiety and cultural backlash are the most common predictors (Mols and Jetten 2020). However, current debates in populism research show that it is advisable to consider interactions between demand-and supply-side factors (Golder 2016) and that PRRP voting could be a result of the combination of both (Mols and Jetten 2020). Accordingly, PRRP voting is more dynamic and context-dependent than assumed. ...
The rise of right-wing populist actors has increased academic interest in the relationship between personal values and electoral support for right-wing populist parties. Studies have found a complex relationship between conservative values and right-wing populist voting; some studies have found positive associations, while others have found negative ones. This study aims to investigate the relationship between conservative values captured by higher-order value conservation in Schwartz’s theory of basic human values and voting for right-wing populist parties by examining the role of the liberal versus authoritarian composition of the party landscape as a moderating factor. Using data from the European Social Survey and the Chapel Hill Expert Survey, the study employs multilevel multinomial regression models to analyse this relationship. The results indicate that the likelihood of right-wing populist voting or not voting (as another possible alternative to voting for conservative parties) increases for individuals with a higher priority for conservative values in more liberal party landscapes, defined as the sum of all ideological positions of relevant political parties on economic and social policies. This study contributes to the literature by further unpacking the relationship between conservative personal values and voting behaviour in the context of populism and the context-dependence of personal values on voting.
... This context-dependency is particularly relevant given the changes in the Dutch context that likely impact the experiences of Turkish-Dutch citizens. Western European societies have demonstrated increasing resistance to population diversity since the 1980s, as evidenced by the emergence of nationalist and anti-migration parties (Golder, 2016). In the Netherlands, this trend is exemplified by the growth of populist radical right parties like the Party for Freedom (PVV). ...
Despite decades of residence, Turkish-Dutch citizens, one of the largest immigrant groups in the Netherlands, continue to face significant disparities in health, social, and economic factors compared to native Dutch citizens. To better understand this persistent disparity, we examined the acculturation process of Turkish-Dutch citizens across three generations. Our study addressed two critical research gaps: (1) acculturation processes across three generations within a specific immigrant group, and (2) different acculturation domains across these generations. Data from 464 participants (232 Turkish-Dutch, 232 Dutch) show that acculturation varies significantly across generations (1st, 2nd, and 3rd) and domains (i.e., national identification, cultural values, language, and media use), with the second generation demonstrating the strongest resemblance to native Dutch citizens in most domains. These findings contribute to a nuanced understanding of acculturation processes and confirm the need for future research to consider generational differences and domain-specificity. The results have potential implications for policymakers and practitioners aiming to reduce disparities of Turkish-Dutch citizens with tailored policy and communication strategies.
... To select the specific far-right movement in each country, local collaborators were consulted to ensure that the far-right groups selected were somewhat comparable and grounded in similar ideologies, especially in terms of holding ethnonationalist, xenophobic beliefs and endorsing right-wing populism. [AQ: 30] Furthermore, the far-right groups we selected have been described as radical-right groups in the media (e.g., see "Germany AfD," 2016) and have been classified as far-right groups by scholars who have conducted comparative research of these groups (e.g., Davis & Deole, 2017;Golder, 2016;Lubbers & Coenders, 2017;Lubbers et al., 2002;Mudde, 2016;Rydgren, 2018). [AQ: 31] All measures except media exposure were identical to a recent investigation conducted by members of the research team (Selvanathan & Leidner, 2022). ...
Considering the rise of far-right groups in Western countries, we examined whether exposure to media coverage on the far-right is associated with attitudes toward it, using surveys in 15 Western democratic countries (total N = 2,576). We hypothesized that greater media exposure to the far-right will be associated with greater perceived prevalence and acceptability of it, which will in turn be associated with divergent attitudes. On the one hand, greater perceived prevalence may be associated with more unfavorable attitudes toward the far-right (a threat response). On the other hand, greater perceived acceptability may be associated with more favorable attitudes toward the far-right (a normalization response). Overall, there was more evidence for a threat response than a normalization response: media exposure was consistently related to greater perceived prevalence (but not acceptability) of the far-right. This research underscores the importance of studying the consequences of the rise of the far-right.
... Ninth, during the last decade, far-right parties and movements have increase in importance across Europe (Castelli Gattinara & Pirro 2019;Golder 2016). Their growth has also translated in some of the largest protests in some of our case countries. ...
... Demand-side theories refer to the conditions that influence voters' decisions, whereas supply-side approaches focus on the political opportunity structure and parties' perspectives. Demand and supply side are interwoven closely as populist grievances are sometimes induced technically by right-wing populist parties whose strategies are made based on voters' demand (Golder 2016;Mols and Jetten 2020). ...
This study examines the intra-party mechanism that links right-wing populist parties' electoral performance in European elections and their persistence on the national political stage. Nationally marginalized right-wing populist parties have benefited from the second-order character of European elections since the introduction of the direct election in 1979. However, not every right-wing populist party has been able to turn its European victory into a national success. The most similar system comparison of right-wing populist parties in France and the UK shows that only parties that have strategically utilized the resources provided by the European Parliament have persisted in the national political arena.
... Bu nedenle, aşırı sağ popülizm, elitlerin bu tutumuna karşı halkın birleşmesi gerektiğini savunur. Halkın, elitler tarafından ezilen ve unutulan bir topluluk olarak görülmesi, aşırı sağın söylemlerinde ve politikalarında önemli bir yer tutar (Taggart, 2000;Mudde, 2000;2007;Golder, 2016;Güzel, 2022). Canovan'ın gözlemlediği gibi, istisnasız tüm popülizm biçimleri, halkı bir tür yüceltme ve onlara doğrudan hitap etme eğilimindedir. ...
Siyasi partiler, toplumun farklı kesimlerini temsil etme ve talepleri siyasi arenaya taşıma açısından hayati bir fonksiyona sahiptir. Ancak, aşırı sağ partiler, kullandıkları nefret söylemleriyle bu sürecin sağlıklı işlemesini sekteye uğratarak demokrasilerin derinleşmesine zarar vermektedir. Buna rağmen son yıllarda Avrupa’da aşırı sağ partilerin göçmen karşıtı söylemleri ve milliyetçi-popülist politikaları, birçok seçmenin ilgisini çekmiş ve bu durum seçim sonuçlarına da yansımıştır. Nitekim 2024 yılında yapılan Avrupa Parlamentosu seçim sonuçlarına bakıldığında aşırı sağ partilerin ciddi bir ivmelenme yakaladığı görülmektedir. Elbette bu politik sonucu ortaya çıkaran birçok tarihsel, siyasal, sosyal ve kültürel neden ve birikim vardır. Bu makalede, aşırı sağ partilerin göçmen karşıtlığını nasıl temellendirdiği incelenmekte ve bunun teorik arka planı ortaya koyulmaktadır. Bu çerçevede öncelikle aşırı sağın ideolojik temelleri milliyetçilik, ekonomik kriz, güvenlik, etnik üstünlük ve kültürel homojenlik gibi kavramların aşırı sağ partilerin retorik ve politikalarındaki yeri tartışılmaktadır. Ardından, bu teorik temellerin pratikte nasıl tezahür edildiğine odaklanılmaktadır. Ayrıca göçmen karşıtı tutumların farklı ülkelerde nasıl somut politikalara, kampanyalara ve söylemlere dönüştüğü değerlendirilmektedir. Nihayetinde makale, aşırı sağ partilerin göçmen karşıtlığını sadece ideolojik bir araç olarak kullanmakla kalmayıp aynı zamanda politik pratikler yoluyla pekiştirdiğini ve böylece toplumsal dinamikler üzerinde derin etkiler yarattığını göstermeye çalışmaktadır.
... According to Gozgor (2022), when studying the factors stimulating populist voting, it is important to distinguish between economic uncertainty and economic insecurity. It implies making the difference between (economic) uncertainty and (economic) grievances, losses, scarcity and crises that can cause (economic) insecurity, as discussed by Golder (2016). Consequently, Gozgor (2022) is the first author to study empirically the effects of uncertainty (as measured by the WUI index) on populist voting behaviour in EU countries. ...
... The literature identifies several waves through which the dimension of party competition resulting from these structural transformations gained political traction, with the New Social Movements of the 1970s and 1980s finding expression in the emergence of the New Left and Green party family (Kitschelt 1988(Kitschelt , 1994Kriesi 1989Kriesi , 1998Kriesi , 1999, followed by a countermobilization on the part of the Far Right (Ignazi 1992;Minkenberg 2000;Bornschier 2010;Häusermann and Kriesi 2015). Leaving aside more fine-grained distinctions, we use the term "Far Right" as an umbrella term to encompass parties that have been referred to as "Radical Right," "Populist Radical Right," and "Extreme Right" based on their distinctive programmatic position regarding socioculturally traditionalist, nativist, and authoritarian stances (Golder 2016, Pirro 2023. Similarly, we use the term "New Left" to denote parties that combine progressive stances on both economic-distributive and sociocultural policies. ...
Western Europe is experiencing growing levels of political polarization between parties of the New Left and the Far Right. The authors argue that this antagonism reflects the emergence of a social cleavage between universalism and particularism. To understand cleavage formation in the midst of party system fragmentation and the proliferation of new competitors, they emphasize the crucial role of group identities. Anchored in social structure, group identities help us understand why specific party appeals resonate with certain groups, thereby mediating the link between socio-structural change and broader party blocks defined by their distinctive ideologies along the new cleavage. Based on original survey data from France, Germany, Switzerland, and the UK, this Element presents evidence for the formation of a universalism–particularism cleavage across European party systems that diverge strongly on institutional and political characteristics. This title is also available as Open Access on Cambridge Core.
... URL: https://www.counterterrorismgroup.com/post/the-role-of-video-gamesand-online-platforms-in-terrorist-radicalization-and-recruitment (дата обращения 18.03.2024). 60 Schlegel L. Jumanji Extremism? How games and gamification could facilitate radicalization processes. ...
The monograph examines the combination of ethnopolitical, migration and electoral processes in contemporary European countries. The authors use both qualitative and quantitative research methods within the framework of a political science approach. The paper analyzes the attempts of European Union institutions and member-states to address various challenges associated with the continuously growing influx of ethnically diverse migrants, implement reforms in migration and asylum policy. The role of ethnicity in electoral processes, the influence of migration on them, the activities and discursive practices of ethnoregional and nationalist parties in European countries are also studied, as well as an attempt to classify them. The formation of ethnic enclaves, changes in the ethno-confessional balance, and the threat of irredentism in certain regions of Europe are also within the authors’ scope of study. Special attention is paid to the problem of extremist and terrorist organizations using artificial intelligence and efforts to combat these phenomena.
... The main question is right-wing populism and why now; regressions in the social status of distinct clusters happen frequently, but populism does not grow all the time. Golder (2017) points out that current economic modifications have acted as a considerable source of this deteriorating status, prompting the increase in support among losers from economic considerations that are triggering the economic changes. Besides, a notable effect of the transformation nurtures social disintegration and increases alienation, as workers are forced into lowpaying occupations or forced out of the market (Bussolo et al., 2018). ...
Governments attempt to inflate the economy before elections to ensure that the purported political business sequence forms ebbs and flows of economic motion and activities around elections (Colantone & Stanig, 2018). Similarly, economic considerations and conditions have a strong impact on elections. Politicians require votes from the individuals who determine elections. However, according to economic theories, economic considerations toward globalisation are probable to negatively impact labour, particularly unskilled and semi-skilled labour (Milner, 2018). If the affected individuals are middle-class voters, then it might be anticipated that political parties will react by turning against economic considerations focused on globalisation and openness to capital flows, goods, services, and people. Essentially, this assertion elucidates why presidential candidates, especially in the OECD nations, have become increasingly protectionist, though most of their populations support trade openness (Passari, 2020). This essay aims at assessing whether international politics are driven by economic consideration. The paper examines whether economic concerns have led political parties, especially in the developed western nations, to embrace more extreme right or populism platforms and the influence of economic considerations on voters. The paper also scrutinises whether some political parties, particularly extremist ones, have attained vote share as a result of economic considerations.
... Their rhetoric is distinguished by populism and nativism, where the nation is viewed as a homogeneous entity that needs to be defended from both a corrupt political elite and perceived external threats (Wodak, 2019). The populist far right portrays the political elite as corrupt, acting against the populace's interests and advancing the agenda of the European Union (Golder, 2016;Buštíková & Kitschelt, 2009;Wodak, 2019). Finally, they place a strong emphasis on traditional family values and a nostalgic yearning for an idealized past (Wodak, 2019). ...
The full-scale invasion of Ukraine by Russia has disrupted the previously perceived stability in Central and Eastern Europe (CCE) and exacerbated the prevailing sense of insecurity. The evolving circumstances are reshaping the political terrain and presenting avenues to mobilize support for the populist far right. However, to date, the far-right populist parties in Lithuania have not been successful in either national or European Parliament (EP) elections, as they have failed to surpass the required thresholds. However, the most recent European Parliament elections were an exception, with the election of a long-standing far-right politician in Lithuania as an MEP. This study delves into an analysis of the discourse employed by Lithuanian far-right populists throughout the 2024 EP election campaign, with a specific focus on the narratives pertaining to (in) security that they propagated. The investigation seeks to ascertain whether the far right capitalized on the situation to fuel discussions on the crisis with the aim of attracting support and identifying the strategies utilized in constructing the narratives surrounding ()security.
... En cuanto al término fascismo, éste no se adapta a la realidad al incluir un sentido militarista del cual adolecen los partidos objetos de estudio. Por el contrario, el elemento vertebrador del movimiento estudiado es la defensa de Estados-nación únicamente compuestos por nativos, pasando a representar los elementos foráneos -tanto ideas como personas-una amenaza (Finnsdottir, 2019;Gidron & Hall, 2019;Golder, 2016;Halikiopoulou & Vlandas, 2016;Rodrik, 2018;Savelkoul et al., 2017;Schraff, 2019). Consecuentemente, optamos a lo largo del estudio por utilizar el término partidos ultranacionalistas para definir el elemento analizado. ...
En esta investigación se describe la Representación Social del Fenómeno del Suicidio y
Resiliencia de los estudiantes de medicina de una universidad privada con orientación
católica en el estado de Puebla. Para describir la representación social que los estudiantes de
medicina tienen sobre el fenómeno del suicidio a través de sus historias de vida y los factores de protección que han desarrollado durante su trayectoria universitaria se formuló a siguiente pregunta de investigación: ¿Cuál es la representación social del fenómeno del suicidio de los estudiantes de la carrera en medicina y cuáles son los factores de protección que han desarrollado.
... This article is intended solely for the personal use of the individual user and is not to be disseminated broadly. study focuses on a proxy of far-right attitudes, namely nationalistic and xenophobic attitudes whereby followers call for "nonnative" others to be excluded from society (Golder, 2016;Pirro, 2022). In the 21st century, the far-right's key "nonnative" target in European societies are Muslims (Mudde, 2019), who are often falsely referred to as immigrants despite having citizenship status and being born and bred in the "native" country (Mudde, 2019). ...
Objective: Far-right violent radicalization has been on the rise in Europe, with youth being more at risk. Previous research on the topic has mostly been variable-centered and conducted in adults. To better tailor prevention efforts based on the needs of different subgroups of youth, a person-centered study was conducted to explore the presence of far-right violent radicalization profiles in a sample of Dutch youth (N = 1,167, age range: 15–26 years old). Person-centered analyses can capture diversity in youth’s far-right violent radicalization tendencies. Method: Data collection took place online and in educational settings. To detect possible profiles, latent profiles analyses were conducted based on participants’ far-right nativistic and violent radical attitudes. Associations between profile membership, demographic variables, and radicalization risk factors (i.e., perceived injustice, governmental illegitimacy, aggression, lack of intergroup contact, perceived group threat, superiority) were tested. Results: The four detected profiles were named as follows: Far-right violent radical (n = 75), violent experimenter (n = 287), low-violence (n = 386), and no-violence (n = 419). An association with profile membership was found for certain background characteristics (e.g., younger age, being male) and all risk factors. Conclusions: For prevention purposes, it is important to understand risk factors associated with far-right violent radical attitude profiles. Current findings demonstrate the importance of considering youth’s behavioral problems and their societal experiences in terms of injustice, governmental illegitimacy, and feelings of superiority.
Which parties embrace multilingualism in their communication? Despite growing interest in parties’ multilingualism among normative scholars of deliberative democracy, empirical research has largely overlooked the linguistic aspect of party competition. We leverage large‐scale data on Facebook posts by more than 800 parties in 87 democracies and analyze their day‐to‐day language practices. By so doing, we develop, for the first time, the classification of monolingual and multilingual parties around the world. Moreover, using this novel dataset, we explore what factors are associated with parties’ adoption of multilingualism and how multilingual parties predict the language use of candidates they nominate. Overall, this study provides the most comprehensive picture of parties’ multilingualism in contemporary democracies and sets agendas for future research in the intersection of parties and language representation.
Democratic status is not forever. Many scholars have explained it based on a different approach and provided more and more evidence. They tend to assess the regime change between an authoritarian regime and a democratic regime. Some of them found that regime change moves to some degree even under the authoritarian regime or democratic regime towards strengthening or weakening the particular regime respectively.
This chapter examines the historical and contemporary dynamics of human mobility, highlighting its role in shaping civilizations and responding to changing environmental, social, and political conditions. It explores early hominin migrations, including the movement of Homo erectus out of Africa, and their impact on adaptation, tool use, and social cooperation. The chapter also evaluates the emergence of Homo sapiens, detailing migration routes and patterns, including the Southern and Northern routes, and interactions with Neanderthals and Denisovans. The chapter also addresses the transformative impact of climate change on migration, illustrating how environmental stressors like droughts, sea-level rise, and extreme weather events are driving both internal and international displacements. Case studies from Sub-Saharan Africa, Asia, and Central America demonstrate these pressures. Economic migration is contextualized through theories such as push-pull, neoclassical economics, and network migration, emphasizing global inequalities and structural labour demands. Finally, the chapter analyses the socio-economic implications of migration, including labour market shifts, integration challenges, and political tensions in host nations, underscoring the need for adaptive and inclusive policies to manage the complexities of migration in the twenty-first century.
This study examines the link between diminishing support for globalisation, particularly in the realm of free trade, and shifts in public perceptions, using Eurobarometer survey data across 29 European countries. It explores the impact of socio‐economic factors and personal characteristics on attitudes towards globalisation, focusing on how these elements contribute to collective sentiments that influence national policy directions. The findings reveal no direct correlation between economic growth or trade dependence and awareness of globalisation at the macro level. However, a clear relationship is observed between globalisation perceptions and both unemployment rates and income inequality. At the micro level, positive views on globalisation are significantly associated with younger age, higher education levels, better economic status and right‐leaning political views. Additionally, greater trust in political institutions and favourable views on trade policies that accommodate globalisation correlate with more positive perceptions of globalisation. This suggests that domestic policies and governance be important in mitigating the adverse effects of globalisation and enhancing its acceptance, contributing valuable knowledge to the discourse on global economic policy and international relations.
İletişim Sosyolojisinde Temel Kavramlar ve Yaklaşımlar Aykut SIĞIN Kitle İletişimi ve Toplum Kemal ER İletişim Teorileri Ercan ŞAHBUDAK İletişim Sosyolojisinde Güncel Konular Hakan ARIKAN Basının Dönüşümü ve Toplumsal Etkileri Merve YALÇINKAYA Matbaa’dan Metaverse’e Evrilen Toplum Hakan ARIKAN Yapay Zekâ, Toplum ve İletişim Yavuz BELENDİR Emel YİĞİTTÜRK EKİYOR Çoğul Sesler, Biriciklik ve Çeşitlilik Özlem AYDOĞMUŞ ÖRDEM “İnsanın Ölümü”nden Sonra İletişim: Posthümanist Çağda İletişim ve İletişim Çalışmalarının İmkanlarına Dair Bir Derkenar Sibel EZGİN AĞILLI
Populist Radical Right parties (PRR) have gained prominence in many European countries, with leadership often considered a key factor in their electoral success. Despite this, limited research has explored how voters’ perceptions of leaders’ traits influence support for PRR parties. This study delves into the impact of perceived leaders’ traits on the vote for PRR parties, using original survey data collected during recent general elections in six European countries (Italy 2022, France 2017, Germany 2017, Austria 2017, UK 2017, Netherlands 2017). Combining descriptive findings and regression analyses, our results reveal three key insights: (1) Voters differentiate among leaders’ traits, with the influence of each trait varying across different party types; (2) the effect of leader’s perceptions on all traits is significant also after taking into account party identification; (3) PRR parties are particularly adept at attracting voters based on positive assessments of leaders’ strength and empathy, more so than other party types.
This article presents an explanation to observed trends in redistribution and cultural and political polarization. I extend a one-dimensional voting model by taking into account that voters, in addition to having economic preferences, also care about cultural issues. Political parties diverge in the cultural dimension to be able to implement different tax rates. A higher level of pre-tax income inequality makes it more difficult to win the election by proposing a low tax rate, but the right-wing party may be able to win the election by bundling a low tax rate with a focus on cultural issues.
An extensive literature links the rise of populist radical right (PRR) parties to immigration. We argue that another demographic trend is also significant: emigration. The departure of citizens due to internal and international emigration is a major phenomenon affecting elections via two complementary mechanisms. Emigration alters the composition of electorates, but also changes the preferences of the left behind. Empirically, we establish a positive correlation between PRR vote shares and net‐migration loss at the subnational level across Europe. A more fine‐grained panel analysis of precincts in Sweden demonstrates that the departure of citizens raises PRR vote shares in places of emigration and that the Social Democrats are the principal losers from emigration. Elite interviews and newspaper analyses explore how emigration produces material and psychological grievances on which populists capitalize and that established parties do not effectively address. Emigration and the frustrations it generates emerge as important sources of populist success.
Refugees enrolling in host country higher education can improve their position in the labour market. However, little is known about the patterns underlying enrolment, and existing studies have only examined explanations at the individual level. This is problematic because opportunities to enrol in education are also dependent upon structural factors, and by ignoring this, studies run the risk of depicting non‐enrolment as a consequence of individual shortcomings. We address this issue through the notion of arrival infrastructures and argue that existing infrastructures at multiple spatial scales may support or discourage enrolment. By focusing on the Netherlands, we were able to follow the enrolment of all registered refugees that arrived between 2014 and 2017 over time using registry data. We find that the accessibility of education, the municipal political climate and regional economic conditions influence educational enrolment. These findings show that dispersal policies can have detrimental effects on the social mobility of refugees.
This final chapter focusses on the possibly most critical part of our diagnosis of susceptibilities: grievances that emerge from individuals’ struggle to fulfil their basic human ‘need for personal significance—the desire to matter, to “be someone,” and to have meaning in one’s life’ (Kruglanski et al., 2018: 107). Finding ways to effectively counter the appeal of far-right movements needs to acknowledge that these susceptibilities are not limited to small ‘vulnerable’ segments of society. Everyone has a desire for meaning, purpose, respect and social connectedness—and a fair, cohesive and politically healthy society is characterised by its capacity to provide ample opportunities for its citizens to fulfil this desire. The key question in the specific context of this book is: what can be concretely done to ensure that everyone can meet these basic human needs within the democratic realm of society rather than going on a quest in exclusivist and anti-democratic anti-publics of far-right communities?
The alternative conceptual framing of the far right, as proposed in Chapter 2, urges us to also look beyond ideological factors in our attempt to not only delineate far-right fringe movements from the social mainstream but also understand the appeal of these milieus and communities. This chapter addresses what is arguably one of the most crucial questions in the context of far-right extremism or radicalism: Why are individuals attracted to far-right spaces and what makes them more receptive to the appeal of these anti-democratic, counter-hegemonic communities? There is, of course, no simple answer, but any attempt to prevent and counter far-right extremism (Part II of this book) is destined to remain ineffective without a good grasp of the various interconnected psychological, socio-political and structural factors that influence these susceptibilities.
Many western democracies have witnessed an upsurge of partisan alternative media that explicitly challenge the legitimacy of mainstream media and politics alike and promote populist discourses. Accordingly, alternative media are often discussed in relation to lower levels of political trust and support for populist parties. Yet, only a limited number of studies have investigated these relationships empirically. Drawing on survey data representative of the Danish adult population ( n = 1,518) collected in January/February 2023, this study investigates how using alternative media is related to political trust, populist attitudes, and populist vote intentions. Unlike previous studies, it distinguishes between left-wing and right-wing alternative media users and finds notable differences: Users of right-wing alternative media have lower political trust, hold more populist attitudes, and have greater predicted probability of intending to vote for a right-wing populist party than non-users, but similar results were not found for users of left-wing alternative media. The study discusses potential explanations for this and how (different) alternative media might impact democracy.
This paper empirically assesses public attitudes towards immigration amid a simultaneity of political and economic crises, offering critical insights into the effects of economic determinants on perceived cultural and economic threats posed by immigration in the Czech Republic. The importance of cultural determinants of attitudes towards immigration gained prominence in the context of growing nationalism and ethnic conflicts. Conversely, some argue that material vulnerabilities remain central to understanding anti‐Immigration sentiments, especially in times of economic crises. This paper challenges separating economic and cultural concerns, highlighting how economic vulnerabilities shape cultural perceptions. The study utilises unique data, delving beyond conventional measures that explore economic determinants and looking into more granular measures of economic vulnerability. Our findings suggest that economic drivers remain pivotal in shaping attitudes towards migration. In addition, we show that the effects of economic drivers can also manifest as cultural concerns.
Is there a popular backlash against globalization? When did it start and in which forms? What do we know about its causes? We address these questions in the context of advanced democracies. We see the ‘globalization backlash’ as the political shift of voters and parties in a protectionist and isolationist direction, with substantive implications on governments’ leaning and enacted policies. We discuss the empirical evidence on the backlash. We develop a theoretical discussion within the framework of the crisis of embedded liberalism. We nest within this framework theoretical results from international economics showing how the backlash may arise within standard trade models when considering the ‘social footprint’ of globalization. These theoretical insights are consistent with available empirical evidence pointing to the role of globalization as a driver of the backlash. Yet, globalization is only one of the drivers of the backlash. There are other economic factors playing a similar role, such as technological change, fiscal austerity, and immigration. Moreover, cultural concerns such as status threat, authoritarianism, and nativism do play a relevant role, with a significant interplay with economic drivers. This calls for a broad and comprehensive approach to the backlash, both from an academic and from a policy making perspective.
Inequality is a challenge for societies around the globe. In addition to its socio‐economic and political dimensions, inequality also has a territorial dimension. Focusing on educational inequality across regions, this article explores factors that shape regional differences in student enrolment and educational attainment in 14 OECD countries. The findings of the article suggest that a strong level of regional authority over education increases regional inequality in education. Further factors are regional differences in education expenditures and variation in the population size of regions. Low regional inequality in education seems to be explained by a low degree of regional authority or low differences in education spending. By examining regional inequality in education, the article enhances our understanding of the way multilevel governance influences the quality of life within regions. In particular, it highlights the impact of decentralization on territorial inequality.
What is the effect of personal discrimination on the political engagement of ethnic and racial minorities? Existing research theorizes increased engagement, but evidence is mixed. The discrimination and political engagement link is tested across six countries: Canada, Denmark, France, Germany, the United Kingdom, and the United States. Interest in politics and political actions (e.g. protest and donations) show constant relationships: people who have experienced discrimination have more interest in politics and take more political actions. There is no clear evidence of different effects of political vs social discrimination. However, the link between turnout and discrimination varies systematically across countries: a positive correlation in three separate American datasets, but mixed and null in other countries. This may be the result of the distinctive American conflict over voting rights for racial minorities. The conclusion discusses priorities for future research, including a focus on establishing causal relationships and testing mechanisms.
This paper examines the bases of opposition to immigrant minorities in Western Europe, focusing on The Netherlands. The specific aim of this study is to test the validity of predictions derived from two theories - realistic conflict, which emphasizes considerations of economic well-being, and social identity, which emphasizes considerations of identity based on group membership. The larger aim of this study is to investigate the interplay of predisposing factors and situational triggers in evoking political responses. The analysis is based on a series of three experiments embedded in a public opinion survey carried out in The Netherlands (n = 2007) in 1997-98. The experiments, combined with parallel individual-level measures, allow measurement of the comparative impact of both dispositionally based and situationally triggered threats to economic well-being and to national identity at work. The results show, first, that considerations of national identity dominate those of economic advantage in evoking exclusionary reactions to immigrant minorities and, second, that the effect of situational triggers is to mobilize support for exclusionary policies above and beyond the core constituency already predisposed to support them.
In recent years more and more studies have pointed to the limitations of demand-side explanations of the electoral success of populist radical right parties. They argue that supply-side factors need to be included as well. While previous authors have made these claims on the basis of purely empirical arguments, this article provides a (meta)theoretical argumentation for the importance of supply-side explanations. It takes issue with the dominant view on the populist radical right, which considers it to be alien to mainstream values in contemporary western democracies – the ‘normal pathology thesis’. Instead, it argues that the populist radical right should be seen as a radical interpretation of mainstream values, or more akin to a pathological normalcy. This argument is substantiated on the basis of an empirical analysis of party ideologies and mass attitudes. The proposed paradigmatic shift has profound consequences for the way the populist radical right and western democracy relate, as well as for how the populist radical right is best studied. Most importantly, it makes demand for populist radical right politics rather an assumption than a puzzle, and turns the prime focus of research on to the political struggle over issue saliency and positions, and on to the role of populist radical right parties within these struggles.
Multiplicative interaction models are common in the quantitative political science literature. This is so for good reason.
Institutional arguments frequently imply that the relationship between political inputs and outcomes varies depending on the
institutional context. Models of strategic interaction typically produce conditional hypotheses as well. Although conditional
hypotheses are ubiquitous in political science and multiplicative interaction models have been found to capture their intuition
quite well, a survey of the top three political science journals from 1998 to 2002 suggests that the execution of these models
is often flawed and inferential errors are common. We believe that considerable progress in our understanding of the political
world can occur if scholars follow the simple checklist of dos and don'ts for using multiplicative interaction models presented
in this article. Only 10% of the articles in our survey followed the checklist.
Although there is a lively academic debate about contemporary populism in Europe and Latin America, almost no cross-regional research exists on this topic. This article aims to fill this gap by showing that a minimal and ideological definition of populism permits us to analyse current expressions of populism in both regions. Moreover, based on a comparison of four prototypical cases (FN/Le Pen and FPÖ/Haider in Europe and PSUV/Chávez and MAS/Morales in Latin America), we show that it is possible to identify two regional subtypes of populism: exclusionary populism in Europe and inclusionary populism in Latin America.
This article questions the utility of assessing radical right party placement on economic issues, which has been extensively analyzed in academic literature. Starting from the premise that political parties have varying strategic stakes in different political issues, the article considers political competition in multiple issue dimensions. It suggests that political competition is not simply a matter of taking positions on political issues, but rather centers on manipulating the dimensional structure of politics. The core argument is that certain political parties, such as those of the radical right, seek to compete on neglected, secondary issues while simultaneously blurring their positions on established issues in order to attract broader support. Deliberate position blurring – considered costly by the literature – may thus be an effective strategy in multidimensional competition. The article combines quantitative analyses of electoral manifestos, expert placement of political parties, and voter preferences, by studying seventeen radical right parties in nine Western European party systems.
Over the past 2 decades, some anti-immigrant parties have managed to gain substantial electoral support in various European countries, most notably, Austria (Freiheitliche Partei Österreichs) and Flanders (Vlaams Blok). However, in other countries, the success of such parties either has been insignificant or did not last. The most popular models of support for anti-immigrant parties focus primarily on the demand side of the electoral process. The authors develop a model to explain differences in aggregate-level support for these parties, which also takes into account the supply side. This model builds upon an explanation provided by Kitschelt. The model is tested empirically for 13 European anti-immigrant parties in the period from 1989 to 1999, altogether yielding 25 party-year combinations. The authors test the sociostructural model and their alternative model at the level of political parties. The sociostructural model explains 3% of the variance in success, whereas the authors’ model explains 83%.
In Flanders, the Dutch-speaking part of Belgium, one of the strongest extreme right parties of Europe thrives: the Vlaams Blok (the Flemish Bloc). The basic question of this article is straightforward: Do the Flemish media contribute to the success of the Vlaams Blok by emphasizing the themes of the party? The theoretical argument is twofold: agenda setting by the media and issue ownership by parties. The issues the Vlaams Blok owns are determined using two sources: its electoral manifestoes and its electorate's motivations to vote for the party. This leads to four issues: Flemish nationalism, immigrant topics, antipolitics issues, and crime-related themes. Using a vast media data set covering three newspapers and two TV stations and stretching over 10 years (1991-2000), we examine to what extent these issues were covered. The analysis shows that especially immigrant topics and crime receive extensive and growing media attention, and time series analysis shows that this rise parallels the electoral growth of the Vlaams Blok. The media could be considered co-responsible for the Vlaams Blok's upsurge.
This article focuses on the two most significant forms taken by ideological mutations of the fascist species of radical right in the hostile climate of post-war Europe: internationalization (Eurofascism, Universal Nazism, Third Positionism), and metapoliticization (Revisionism, the New Right, cyberfascism). It goes on to argue that the 'democratic fascism' of some political parties is emblematic of the extreme marginalization of revolutionary nationalism, and that the most potent species of radical right ideology now consists in ethnocratic perversions of liberalism, which help perpetuate Europe's less than democratic impact on the global community.
This article presents an overview of the writings on the extreme right party family of the third wave (1980–95). First, the prime criterion for the classification of the party family is discussed. Second, the main critiques of, and alternatives to, the term right‐wing extremism are evaluated. Third, the political parties that are generally considered to be members of the party family are identified. Fourth, subgroups within the larger party family are examined. In the conclusion, the various writings are structured on the basis of four theoretical schools within the broader study of right‐wing extremism.
Since the 1980s, a growing number of radical right‐wing populist parties have managed to establish themselves permanently in the party systems of advanced liberal capitalist democracies. Initially dismissed as ephemeral reflections of a general debasement of politics in recent years, they represent today one of the most serious challenges to liberal democracy in Western Europe and elsewhere. Unlike the traditional postwar radical right, the contemporary populist right has developed an ideology that, albeit fundamentally anti‐liberal, is compatible with the basic formal principles of democracy. Radical right‐wing populist ideology is anti‐elitist, appealing instead to the common sense of ordinary people; exclusionary, appealing to the right to cultural diversity and identity; and openly discriminatory, appealing to the right to ‘national preference’. The larger goal behind the radical right‐wing populist political project is to halt and reverse the erosion of the established patterns of ethnic political and cultural dominance.
Previous studies on the electoral fortunes of extreme right parties (ERPs) have pointed to the importance of variables of party competition for the success – or failure – of ERPs. These studies vary greatly when it comes to describing the political opportunity structure of the extreme right. Apart from their methodological differences, existing studies differ especially with regard to the assumed underlying dimension of party competition. This article tests the impact of three frequently discussed variables in the political opportunity structure of ERPs (mainstream party convergence, position of the established right and party system polarisation) on the vote share of ERPs in Western Europe. In addition to examining previous studies in this field, it focuses on the interplay between the economic and the cultural dimensions as part of the political opportunity structure. The authors show that a decrease in polarisation with regard to economic questions is accompanied by a growing salience of ERPs' core issues, leading in the end to an increase in ERPs' vote share.
This article has two aims. The first attempts to define the ‘extreme right’political family. The three criteria adopted — spatial, historic-ideological, attitudinal-systemic — have led us to identify two types of the extreme right party. One type comprises parties with a fascist imprint (old right-wing parties); the other comprises recently-born parties with no fascist associations, but with a right-wing antisystem attitude (new right-wing parties). The second aim of this article is to explain the recent ‘unexpected’rise of the new right-wing parties. Changes in the cultural domain and in mass beliefs have favoured radicalization and system polarization on one side, and the emergence of attitudes and demands not treated by the established conservative parties on the other one. These two broad changes have set the conditions for the rise of extreme right parties.
The rise of parties that challenge the political establishment has recently sparked the interest of political scientists. Scholars have identified several factors that lie behind the success of such anti-political-establishment parties. Most empirical studies, however, have concentrated their attention either on the importance of electoral system features or on the effects of socioeconomic conditions. This article focuses instead on the role that party system factors play in the electoral success of these parties. Using three data sets from studies conducted in three different time periods it tests two seemingly contradictory hypotheses. On the one hand, the claim that where the established parties have converged toward centrist positions and thus fail to present voters with an identity that is noticeably different from their established competitors, the electorate will be more susceptible to the markedly different policies put forward by anti-political-establishment parties. On the other hand, there is the argument that these parties profit more from increasing polarization and the subsequent enlargement of the political space than from a convergence toward the median. The results of the analyses show that anti-political-establishment parties generally profit from a close positioning of the establishment parties on the left-right scale. However, there is no consistent support for the notion that party system polarization by itself is associated with an increase in the support for parties that challenge the political establishment.
Conventional academic research into the legacy of inter-war fascism has generally neglected the myriad minuscule and often ephemeral formations of the extreme right which have sprung up since 1945, to concentrate instead on abortive attempts to emulate the success of the Nazi and Fascist party-based mass movements, and more recently on non-revolutionary 'neo-populist parties'. However, when examined closely many of them can be observed to behave as fully developed, highly specialized, and largely autonomous grouplets that simultaneously form the constituents of an amorphous, leaderless, and centreless cellular network of political ideology, organization, and activism termed here 'the groupuscular right'. As such these 'groupuscules' are to be seen as the product of a sophisticated process of evolutionary adaptation to post-1945 realities which allows extreme variants of revolutionary nationalism to survive in the 'post-fascist' age in a form which is largely resistant to attempts to suppress them, and may represent a number of permanent, if mostly inconspicuous, threats to the liberalism of liberal democracy .
Previous research has suggested that the electoral success of radical right parties can be derived either from the behavior of the mainstream parties or from the dynamics of competition between the nearby parties. Studies of intolerant radical right politics have tended to overlook the role of the radical right’s ideological ‘twin-opponent’: tolerant parties promoting minority rights. I argue that radical right parties arise to counterbalance the strength of parties advocating accommodation and tolerance towards social and ethnic minorities. An empirical implication of this theory is that the formation of a governing coalition between a mainstream party and a ‘twin-opponent’ party should increase the probability of the radical right’s success in the subsequent electoral cycle. The ruling coalition’s accommodation of minority demands aggravates pre-existing grievances, creates a reciprocal backlash, and strengthens radical right parties that promise to punish the politics of tolerance. Supportive evidence for the theory is found using an original data set that covers all post-communist democracies from 1989 to the present.
This study focuses on ethnic competition as a contextual explanation of cross-national differences in anti-immigrant prejudice.
It contributes to the existing literature by refining the concept of ethnic competition into a socio-economic and a cultural
aspect, which is reflected in two different measures of outgroup size. To improve cross-national comparability, the outgroup
size measure is based on foreign country of birth instead of citizenship. Moreover, as outgroup size does not only measure
competition, but also contact opportunities and familiarity with immigration, intergroup contact theory is taken into account
and a non-linear relationship between outgroup size and perceived ethnic threat is tested. This study employs multi-level
linear regression and uses the first round data set of the European Social Survey. The main conclusions of this analysis are
that economic and social competition between groups might play a lesser role in the explanation of cross-national differences
in anti-immigrant attitudes than often assumed, and that it might be rather lacking familiarity and fear of conflict over
values and culture that drive the relationship between outgroup size and anti-immigrant attitudes.
Social change and multicultural society in Western Europe against diversity - new right ideology in the new Europe individualism and xenophobia - radical right-wing populism in a comparative perspective the social basis of radical right-wing populism political conflict in the postmodern age.
Radical right parties have only been successful in a few countries. Why do such a small percentage of voters choose the radical right in Germany? Why is the radical right winning more seats in Austria than in France and Germany? Terri Givens argues that radical right parties will have difficulty attracting voters and winning seats in electoral systems that encourage strategic voting and/or strategic coordination by the mainstream parties. Her analysis demonstrates that electoral systems and party strategy play a key role in the success of the radical right.
What explains the cross-national variation in the radical right’s electoral success over the last several decades? Challenging existing structural and institutional accounts, this book analyzes the dynamics of party building and explores the attitudes, skills and experiences of radical right activists in eleven different countries. Based on extensive field research and an original data set of radical right candidates for office, David Art links the quality of radical right activists to broader patterns of success and failure. He demonstrates how a combination of historical legacies and incentive structures produced activists who helped party building in some cases and doomed it in others. In an age of rising electoral volatility and the fading of traditional political cleavages, Inside the Radical Right makes a strong case for the importance of party leaders and activists as masters of their own fate.
The core puzzle which this book resolves is to explain why radical right parties have advanced in a diverse array of democracies--including Austria, Canada, Norway, France, Italy, New Zealand, Switzerland, Israel, Romania, Russia, and Chile--while failing to make comparable gains in similar societies elsewhere, such as Sweden, Britain, and the United States. This book expands our understanding of support for radical right parties by presenting an integrated new theory which is then tested systematically using a wealth of cross-national survey evidence covering almost forty countries.
Theory: This paper develops and applies an issue ownership theory of voting that emphasizes the role of campaigns in setting the criteria for voters to choose between candidates. It expects candidates to emphasize issues on which they are advantaged and their opponents are less well regarded. It explains the structural factors and party system variables which lead candidates to differentially emphasize issues. It invokes theories of priming and framing to explain the electorate's response. Hypotheses: Issue emphases are specific to candidates; voters support candidates with a party and performance based reputation for greater competence on handling the issues about which the voter is concerned. Aggregate election outcomes and individual votes follow the problem agenda. Method: Content analysis of news reports, open-ended voter reports of important problems, and the vote are analyzed with graphic displays and logistic regression analysis for presidential elections between 1960 and 1992. Results: Candidates do have distinctive patterns of problem emphases in their campaigns; election outcomes do follow the problem concerns of voters; the individual vote is significantly influenced by these problem concerns above and beyond the effects of the standard predictors.
This book examines the fascinating interplay of party and media behavior to explain one of the most important phenomena in Western Europe: the rise of far-right parties. To account for the divergent electoral fortunes of these parties, the book examines how political parties and the mass media have dealt with growing public concerns over national identity. Mainstream politicians chose to “play the nationalist card,” creating opportunities for the entry of far-right parties into the political system. In some cases, the media gave outsized exposure to such parties, allowing them to capitalize on these opportunities; in other cases, they ignored them, blocking their entry into the political system. Using elite interviews, content analysis, and primary documents to trace identity politics since the 1980s, this book presents an original interpretation of identity politics and media behavior in Austria, Germany, Greece, and France since the 1980s.
Contemporary debates give the impression that the presence of immigrants necessarily spells strife. Yet as Immigration and Conflict in Europe shows, the incidence of conflict involving immigrants and their descendants has varied widely across groups, cities, and countries. The book presents a theory to account for this uneven pattern, explaining why we observe clashes between immigrants and natives in some locations but not in others and why some cities experience confrontations between immigrants and state actors while others are spared from such conflicts. The book addresses how economic conditions interact with electoral incentives to account for immigrant-native and immigrant-state conflict across groups and cities within Great Britain as well as across Germany and France. It highlights the importance of national immigration regimes and local political economies in shaping immigrants' economic position and political behavior, demonstrating how economic and electoral forces, rather than cultural differences, determine patterns of conflict and calm.
This article investigates the recent government participation of a number of radical right‐wing populist parties in West European democracies. With the help of coalition formation theories the government coalitions in which these parties have participated are characterised and inferences are made about the reasons for the cooperation between mainstream right and radical right‐wing populist parties. The accuracy of these inferences is then examined in more detail by analysing the changing electoral fortunes and party positions of both mainstream and radical right‐wing populist parties. These analyses demonstrate that office, policy and votes made mainstream right parties turn to radical right‐wing populist parties as new coalition partners and that two important changes in West European party systems have enabled the formation of the new alliances, the first being an electoral shift to the right and the second the convergence of party positions of mainstream right and radical right‐wing populist parties.
Existing research on public opinion related to race and immigration politics emphasizes the role of prejudice or bias against minority groups. We argue that the social norm against prejudice, and individual motivations to comply with it, are crucial elements omitted from prior analyses. In contemporary Western societies, most citizens receive strong signals that prejudice is not normatively acceptable. We demonstrate that many majority-group individuals have internalized a motivation to control prejudiced thoughts and actions and that this motivation influences their political behavior in predictable ways. We introduce measures capturing this motivation, develop hypotheses about its influence, and test these hypotheses in three separate experimental and nonexperimental survey studies conducted in Britain and Germany. Our findings support a dual-process model of political behavior suggesting that while many voters harbor negative stereotypes, they also—particularly when certain contextual signals are present—strive to act in accordance with the “better angels of their natures.”
It is well established that all interactions are symmetric: when the effect of X on Y is conditional on the value of Z, the effect of Z must be conditional on the value of X. Yet the typical practice when testing an interactive theory is to (1) view one variable, Z, as the conditioning variable, (2) offer a hypothesis about how the marginal effect of the other variable, X, is conditional on the value of Z, and (3) construct a marginal effect plot for X to test the theory. We show that the failure to make additional predictions about how the effect of Z varies with the value of X, and to evaluate them with a second marginal effect plot, means that scholars often ignore evidence that can be extremely valuable for testing their theory. As a result, they either understate or, more worryingly, overstate the support for their theories.
This article explores the effects of party organizational strength on party success and survival in the new postcommunist democracies. Organizational strength is defined as extensive network of branch offices, large membership, and professional staff. Using quantitative information on parties in the Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, and Poland, the study shows that strong organization helps parties increase their vote share significantly and steadily. Focused comparisons of “most similar” parties with different electoral performance from Estonia and the Czech Republic further exemplify the significant independent role that organizational strength plays in helping parties succeed electorally.
Since the 1960s, new left-socialist or ecology parties have appeared in approximately half of the advanced Western democracies. These parties have a common set of egalitarian and libertarian tenets and appeal to younger, educated voters. The author uses macropolitical and economic data to explain the electoral success of these left-libertarian parties. While high levels of economic development are favorable preconditions for their emergence, they are best explained in terms of domestic political opportunity structures. There is little evidence that these parties are a reaction to economic and social crises in advanced democracies. The findings suggest that the rise of left-libertarian parties is the result of a new cleavage mobilized in democratic party systems rather than of transient protest.
In this article, the author argues that a gender gap exists in the vote for the radical right and that this gender gap can be explained using techniques drawn from the literature on mainstream gender gaps. The analysis emphasizes the impact of the immigration issue on the vote for the radical right. Logit and regression analysis are used to determine what can be explained by structural, situational, and political factors versus gender alone in France, Germany, and Austria. It is found that there is a gender gap, but it varies across the three cases; that attitudes toward political issues, particularly immigration, have a disproportionate impact on the probability of voting radical right but not on the gender gap specifically; and that there is a difference between men and women on the immigration issue, and blue-collar workers are more likely to be anti-immigrant than those in other sectors.
This contribution aims, first, to determine whether support for the far right is based on perceptions of cultural or economic threats posed by immigrants in 11 European countries. Second, it seeks to reanalyze the question of whether class is an important explanation for support for the far right using new measures of class and, related to this, to determine the extent to which class interacts with perceived threat to explain support for far-right parties. The study reveals that perceived cultural ethnic threats are a stronger predictor of far-right preferences than are perceived economic ethnic threats. This cultural versus economic distinction is also depicted in social class differences in far-right preference. These are particularly evident between sociocultural specialists and technocrats, as anticipated by the new social class scheme. Sociocultural specialists particularly perceive fewer cultural ethnic threats compared to technocrats and consequently have a smaller likelihood to prefer the far right. On the contextual level, the authors find that higher levels of GDP in a country result in greater far-right preference, whereas higher levels of GDP do result in lower levels of ethnic threats. The effect of proportion of Muslims on far-right preference is nonsignificant. The study shows that the choice of countries in cross-national research can heavily influence the results.
Methodological problems associated with selection bias and interaction effects have hindered the accumulation of systematic knowledge about the factors that explain cross-national variation in the success of extreme right parties. The author uses a statistical analysis that takes account of these problems to examine the effect of electoral institutions, unemployment, and immigration on the support for these parties. The data set used in this analysis is new and spans 19 countries and 165 national elections. There are four substantive conclusions. The first is that it is important to distinguish between neofascist and populist parties on the extreme right because their fortunes depend on different factors. The second is that populist parties do better in countries where the district magnitude is larger and more seats are allocated in upper tiers. The third is that although immigration has a positive effect on populist parties irrespective of the unemployment level, unemployment only matters when immigration is high. Finally, there is evidence that the permissiveness of the electoral system mediates the effect of immigration on populist parties.
In the last two decades several anti-immigration parties have risen in Western Europe. Some of these parties have been very successful in elections, whereas others have been rather unsuccessful. Some scholars have argued that this success depends in part on the extent to which voters perceive these parties (and their leaders) as legitimate (not violent or undemocratic) and as effective. However, no studies exist that test the effect of these public perceptions on electoral support. We fill this void by proposing operationalizations of voters’ perceptions of parties in terms of legitimacy and effectiveness. These operationalizations were employed to measure public perceptions of leaders of two anti-immigration parties and leaders of four established parties that participated in the Dutch national parliamentary elections of 2006. The analyses of these data (n = 382) demonstrate the significance of measuring public images directly and show that legitimacy and effectiveness are important predictors of support for anti-immigration parties. Prior research showed that voters evaluate anti-immigration parties largely by the same criteria as they use to evaluate other parties. Our study demonstrates that this is only true when voters consider an anti-immigration party as effective and legitimate.
In an updated version of his well-known work on the radical right, Kitschelt attributes the persistent success of this type of party to a new winning formula. Where the radical right first campaigned on a neoliberal and authoritarian programme, it now presents a more centrist economic position. The article tests this idea through a reconstruction of the positions of the French Front National, the Flemish Vlaams Blok and the Dutch Lijst Pim Fortuyn, and establishes that some, but not all, radical right parties make use of the new winning formula. Moreover, innovative analysis of the positions of radical right parties in West European party systems reveals that Kitschelt's theory needs to be improved on several points, most notably when it comes to the definition of concepts and the operationalization of dimensions.
In this article it is argued that the conceptualization of anti-immigrant parties has been inadequate. Starting from the non-theoretical concept of anti-immigrant parties, three main concepts are discussed and defined: protest parties, racist parties and extreme-right parties. Each of these concepts has its own emphasis and highlights a specific feature of a political family in statu nascendi. Protest parties are non-revolutionary anti-system parties; racist parties are single-issue parties, while extreme-right parties are revolutionary anti-system parties. The article develops a typology of anti-immigrant parties that runs from the general and diffuse (protest parties) to the specific (racist) and ideologically articulate (extreme right). The concepts are not nested but are overlapping, yet they allow us to differentiate between different types of anti-immigrant parties in Western Europe. Protest parties are primarily a product of political alienation, racist parties arise from misgivings about national immigration policy, while extreme-right parties implicitly or explicitly present a political tradition that reacts against the spirit of international capitalism. Researchers who concentrate on electorates tend to use the concept of protest party, those who study militants tend towards the concept of racist parties while those who analyse party programmes and ideology often use the label extreme right.
Unlike for the green party family, no empirically backed scholarly consensus exists about the grievances mobilized by populist right parties in Western Europe. To the contrary, three competing grievance mobilization models can be distinguished in the existing literature. These models focus on grievances arising from economic changes, political elitism and corruption, and immigration. This study discusses these three grievance mobilization models and tests them on comparable cross-sectional survey data for all seven relevant countries using multinomial probit analysis. The study finds that no populist right party performed well in elections around 2002 without mobilizing grievances over immigration. However, it finds several examples of populist right parties experiencing electoral success without mobilizing grievances over economic changes or political elitism and corruption. This study therefore solves a long-standing disagreement in the literature by comprehensively showing that only the appeal on the immigration issue unites all successful populist right parties.
This paper investigates how electoral laws affect the position-taking incentives of parties and candidates. It seeks to extend the finding presented in the classical "median voter theorem" to a wide class of electoral systems--or to show the limits of such extension. The factors examined are the district magnitude, the electoral formula, the number of votes each voter is allowed to cast, whether voters can cumulate their votes, and whether voters can "partially abstain." I suggest a crude division of electoral systems into those producing predominantly centripetal incentives and those producing predominantly centrifugal incentives. Among the factors found to produce centripetal incentives, at least in noncumulative systems, are the following: increases in the number of votes per voter; outlawry of "partial abstention"; and decreases in the district magnitude. In systems allowing the cumulation of votes, matters are a bit different.
Although Duverger is traditionally seen as synonymous with the institution-list approach to party systems, this article shows that he believed social pressures were the driving force behind the multiplication of parties. Electoral institutions are important, but only because they determine the extent to which social forces are translated into political parties. Although the literature has finally come to realize that social and institutional forces interact to shape party systems, scholars still do not seem to fully understood the implications of Duverger’s theory. This article shows that existing research employs flawed statistical specifications, makes inferential errors, and does not calculate desired quantities of interest. Using a new data set that includes elections since 1946, the authors reexamine Duverger’s theory and find that modern tests largely bear out his expectations when properly specified and interpreted. This analysis also extends current research by specifically estimating the mechanical and strategic modifying effects of electoral institutions.
This article addresses the electoral success of far right political parties in West European party systems and suggests that there is a new type of party ‐ the New Populist. Differentiating between neo‐fascism and the New Populism is instructive in two senses. First, it reveals that the current wave of comparative electoral success is more associated with the New Populism than neo‐fascism. Second, it demonstrates that there are certain parallels between the New Politics and the New Populism thereby suggesting that changes in the contemporary far right may well be telling indicators of changes in West European societies that are deeper set than a simple resurgence of racist and anti‐immigrant sentiment.
Ever since the end of the Second World War, the connection between the horrors of the ‘classic’ fascism of the interwar years and contemporary movements of the European radical right has seemed obvious. In the later 1940s and 1950s any extreme nationalist groups were naturally identified as neo-fascist or proto-Nazi, not least because they harboured so many old henchmen of the fascist regimes. But even today, news of violent acts or electoral successes of radical right organisations in Europe raise the spectre of fascism in the minds of observers everywhere. There is hardly a popular or scholarly article that does not refer to this link at least indirectly, above all in analyses of German politics. Thus one German weekly, in a report on nationalist activities in the new eastern Länder , asked forebodingly: ‘Is the ex-GDR sinking into a brown [Nazi] morass? Is the SA marching again, is the Fourth Reich imminent?’ ² A recent scholarly article on the German Republikaner made the same obligatory references in a more veiled manner: ‘Against the background of the course of twentieth-century European history, right-wing radical tendencies any where in Europe warrant special attention.’ ³ No doubt, this will hold true for decades to come. The link of all present-day right-wing movements with the interwar years remains inescapable. The catastrophes associated with fascism are the kind of historical experience that shapes the political consciousness of several generations. Both for the adherents of extreme nationalism and for their enemies, interwar fascism thus provides a basic paradigm through which contemporary rightist groups are defined or define themselves.
We examine the systemic conditions that have influenced the electoral success of parties of the extreme right in West European politics from 1970 through 1990. Empirical estimates based on 103 elections in sixteen countries suggest that electoral and party-system factors interact with each other to generate conditions conducive to these parties. Specifically, increasing electoral thresholds dampen support for the extreme right as the number of parliamentary parties expands. At the same time, multi-partism increasingly fosters parties of the extreme right with rising electoral proportionality. Our analyses also indicate that higher rates of unemployment provide a favourable environment for these political movements. These results suggest that levels of electoral support for the extreme right are sensitive to factors that can be modified through policy instruments.
The existing comparative literature focuses on political institutions to explain party unity in parliament, and largely ignores the role of party characteristics in this process. This study argues that the strength of political party organization directly and independently influences the level of party unity. Organizational strength makes the party a valuable asset to individual legislators, thus increasing their willingness to be disciplined. Therefore, parties with strong organizations are likely to be more unified in parliament than those with weak organizations. I find support for this argument with data from four post-communist democracies: the Czech Republic, Estonia, Hungary, and Poland. Narratives suggest that the proposed causal mechanism is plausible.
FIFTY-FIVE YEARS AFTER THE FALL OF FASCISM AND THE END OF THE Second World War, right-wing radical movements and parties are part of the political normalcy in many Western democracies. In the face of the twentieth-century experiences of fascism and state socialism, and their failures, this stubborn persistence seems at the same time anachronistic and frightening. While there is no shortage of explanations and interpretations of this phenomenon in an evergrowing body of literature, most studies focus on national trends and derive their criteria from country-specific histories and discourses. Serious comparative scholarship on the radical right is still in its infancy.
This article is a plea for more comparative research on rightwing radicalism at the turn of the century. It begins by highlighting the three central dimensions of the problem. First, one must state that contemporary right-wing radicalism is an international phenomenon. Thus, more than before, comparative studies are needed both to analyse the international quality and to specify the nation-specific characteristics of the radical right in each country. Secondly, it must be borne in mind that contemporary right-wing radicalism is a modern phenomenon. It has undergone a phase of renewal, as a result of social and cultural modernization shifts in post-war Europe. Thus it is only vaguely connected with previous versions. Terms like ‘fascism’ or ‘neo-fascism’ which suggest a historical continuity from Munich to Mölln and Magdeburg in Germany, or from Vichy to Vitrolles in France, become increasingly obsolete. The third factor to bear in mind is that contemporary right-wing radicalism is a complex phenomenon. The ongoing specialization and compartmentalization in the social sciences, such as discourse analysis, party and electoral research, and youth sociology – to name but a few of the approaches applied to the radical right – fail to do justice to the complexity of the subject. Clearly, the many faces of right-wing radicalism require clear analytical distinctions, but ultimately they need to be approached in a truly interdisciplinary way.
Research on the voters of the extreme right in Western Europe has become a minor industry, but relatively little attention has been paid to the twin question of why support for these parties is often unstable, and why the extreme right is so weak in many countries. Moreover, the findings from different studies often contradict each other. This article aims at providing a more comprehensive and satisfactory answer to this research problem by employing a broader database and a more adequate modeling strategy. The main finding is that while immigration and unemployment rates are important, their interaction with other political factors is much more complex than suggested by previous research. Moreover, persistent country effects prevail even if a whole host of individual and contextual variables is controlled for.
This article attempts to explain the impact of department-level political opportunity structures on the electoral success of the French Front National (FN) in the 2004 regional elections. The concept of ‘political opportunity structure’ refers to the degree of openness of a particular political system and the external institutional or socio-economic constraints and opportunities that it sets for political parties. Comparative analysis across subnational units is conducted where the 94 departments of mainland France are the units of analysis. The significance of electoral institutions (district magnitude), party competition (effective number of parties), electoral behaviour (turnout) and socioeconomic conditions (immigration and unemployment) on the ability of the FN to gather votes across the departments is assessed by means of multiple regression. The empirical results show that the subnational political opportunity structures have been of great importance for the FN. Some four out of the five independent variables are statistically significant and explain a great deal of the variance in the two dependent variables (electoral support for FN list and index of electoral success). Turnout and district magnitude are negatively correlated with the electoral fortunes of the FN, while unemployment and the effective number of party lists are positively correlated with the success of the FN in the regional elections. The variable that indicates the share of non-European immigrants does not provide additional explanatory power in a statistically significant way.
Since the 1980s, parties of the far right have increased their share of votes in many Western European nations, and some have even participated in governing coalitions. The ascendancy of far right parties has been met with various hypotheses attempting to rationalize their role in the politics of these nations: Are far right parties a manifestation of protest politics, brought about by hard economic times (old right model), or are they representative of the continued political development of Western industrialized nations (new right model)? Most analyses have focused on the voters for these parties; this work focuses on the election manifestos of the Freedom Party of Austria (FPÖ), National Front of France (FN), Italian National Alliance (MSI-AN), Lega Nord (LN) and the Germany Republikaner (Reps) in order to reconstruct the dimensions of party competition in each nation and determine where each of these parties fall within the dimensions of party competition. Support is shown for a new right axis of party competition, suggesting that parties of the far right may in fact be part of the political development of Western European nations.
The two occupational groups most likely to vote for populist right parties in Western Europe in the 1990s also disagree the most over issues relating to the economic dimension of politics. The two groups were: blue-collar workers – who support extensive state intervention in the economy – and owners of small businesses – who are against such state intervention. Proponents of economic realignment theories have held that both groups voted for the populist right because their economic preferences became aligned in recent decades. This article analyzes more detailed comparative data than has previously been available in the two cases held to be most propitious for the realignment hypotheses – France and Denmark – and finds strong evidence against them. The key mechanism for bringing together voters who disagree on state intervention in the economy is the populist right's appeal on issues cross-cutting the economic dimension, and these voters’ willingness to grant such issues pre-eminence over economic ones. As a result, it is argued, populist right parties in Western Europe are limited by or vulnerable to the salience of the economic dimension.