Radical Right Parties: Voters and Parties in the Electoral Market and Voting Radical Right in Western Europe

2007 ◽  
Vol 40 (1) ◽  
pp. 267-269 ◽  
Author(s):  
Elisabeth Ivarsflaten
Keyword(s):  
Western Europe ◽  
First Generation ◽  
Political Influence ◽  
Party Competition ◽  
Radical Right ◽  
Political Factors ◽  
Cambridge University ◽  
Immigration Politics ◽  
Radical Right Parties ◽  
Electoral Market

Radical Right Parties: Voters and Parties in the Electoral Market, Pippa Norris, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005, pp. 349.Voting Radical Right in Western Europe, Terri E. Givens, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005, pp. 178The growing importance of immigration politics in Western Europe during the past two decades and the connected rise of radical right parties have justifiably received much scholarly attention. While a first generation of scholars treating this phenomenon were mostly concerned with the social bases for the growing political influence of such parties, recent studies have begun to emphasize the importance of purely political factors, such as institutional frameworks and strategic party competition. The books on this topic by Norris and Givens are two of the most prominent accounts in this second generation of studies.

scholarly journals The Radical Right as Niche Parties? The Ideological Landscape of Party Systems in Western Europe, 1980–2014

2016 ◽  
Vol 65 (1_suppl) ◽  
pp. 84-107 ◽  
Author(s):  
Markus Wagner ◽  
Thomas M Meyer
Keyword(s):  
Western Europe ◽  
Empirical Support ◽  
Party Systems ◽  
Party Competition ◽  
Radical Right ◽  
Economic Issues ◽  
Niche Parties ◽  
Radical Right Parties ◽  
Left And Right ◽  
The Right

The emergence of the radical right as a strong competitor to mainstream parties has fundamentally reshaped patterns of competition in many European party systems. In this article, we systematically explore changes to the ideological landscape in Western Europe by examining whether there has been programmatic mainstreaming of radical right parties due to (a) accommodation to and (b) moderation by radical right parties. We examine positions and salience on liberal-authoritarianism and the salience of economic issues using manifesto data from 68 parties in 17 countries. Our findings provide empirical support for a rightward shift in European party systems: on liberal-authoritarianism, mainstream left and right parties have increased their emphasis and moved to the right. Yet radical right parties have generally remained niche competitors; they are increasingly extreme and more focused on liberal-authoritarianism. Our analysis has important implications for understanding party systems, party competition and citizen representation in Europe.

scholarly journals The Centre Does Not Hold: Coalition Politics and Party System Change in the Netherlands, 2002–12

2016 ◽  
Vol 53 (2) ◽  
pp. 231-255 ◽  
Author(s):  
Huib Pellikaan ◽  
Sarah L. de Lange ◽  
Tom W.G. van der Meer
Keyword(s):  
Coalition Formation ◽  
Party System ◽  
Western Europe ◽  
Party Systems ◽  
Party Competition ◽  
Radical Right ◽  
Right Wing ◽  
Coalition Politics ◽  
Coalition Formation Process ◽  
The Impact

Like many party systems across Western Europe, the Dutch party system has been in flux since 2002 as a result of a series of related developments, including the decline of mainstream parties which coincided with the emergence of radical right-wing populist parties and the concurrent dimensional transformation of the political space. This article analyses how these challenges to mainstream parties fundamentally affected the structure of party competition. On the basis of content analysis of party programmes, we examine the changing configuration of the Dutch party space since 2002 and investigate the impact of these changes on coalition-formation patterns. We conclude that the Dutch party system has become increasingly unstable. It has gradually lost its core through electoral fragmentation and mainstream parties’ positional shifts. The disappearance of a core party that dominates the coalition-formation process initially transformed the direction of party competition from centripetal to centrifugal. However, since 2012 a theoretically novel configuration has emerged in which no party or coherent group of parties dominates competition.

The Rise of Challenger Parties

2020 ◽  
pp. 15-39
Author(s):  
Catherine E. De Vries ◽  
Sara B. Hobolt
Keyword(s):  
Western Europe ◽  
Party Competition ◽  
Past Century ◽  
Government Experience ◽  
Degree Of Stability ◽  
Radical Right Parties ◽  
Democratic Parties ◽  
The Right ◽  
Social Democratic Parties ◽  
Historical Origins

This chapter discusses the rise of challenger parties. Challenger parties are those parties that have not yet held the reins of power: the parties without government experience. There are three main ways of distinguishing between challengers and mainstream parties in the existing literature. One focuses on the historical origins of the parties, another focuses on the specific issues they mobilize, and the third focuses specifically on populism as a distinguishing feature. The chapter then presents three examples of “waves” of challenger parties over the past century (social democratic parties, green parties, and populist radical right parties) and explores the commonalities in the strategies these parties have pursued, despite their very different ideological outlooks. It also considers the evolution of party competition in postwar Western Europe, demonstrating both the remarkable degree of stability the established party families enjoyed for much of the postwar period and then the increasing fragmentation resulting from the strengthening of challengers on both the right and the left.

The Strategic Adaptation of the Populist Radical Right in Western Europe

2019 ◽  
pp. 837-862
Author(s):  
Elie Michel
Keyword(s):  
Working Class ◽  
Western Europe ◽  
Second Order ◽  
Radical Right ◽  
Strategic Adaptation ◽  
Populist Radical Right ◽  
Electoral Support ◽  
Radical Right Parties

Populist radical right parties have long been considered to mobilize their voters on specific issues, which they are deemed to “own.” Voters support these parties largely because of their “nativist” agenda, and more precisely because of their stance against immigration. In fact, research had established a “winning formula” of electoral persuasion for radical right parties, referring to a combination of “economically neoliberal” and “authoritarian” appeals that would jointly explain the strong electoral support. However, populist radical right parties have transformed their positions, through “second order messages,” by investing in a socioeconomic issue agenda. These parties can increase their electoral support by siding with their working class voters on redistributive issues, particularly through a welfare chauvinist frame. This chapter argues that populist radical right parties have strategically shifted on this latter dimension in order to adapt to their voters’ preferences. It shows that, in view of increased electoral persuasion, populist radical right parties modify some of their positions to tailor them to their working-class core electoral clientele.

The Myth of Global Populism

2020 ◽  
pp. 1-13
Author(s):  
David Art
Keyword(s):  
Western Europe ◽  
The United States ◽  
Radical Right ◽  
Left Wing ◽  
The People ◽  
Industrial Democracies ◽  
Policy Deliberation ◽  
Previous Decade ◽  
Radical Right Parties ◽  
Core Features

The “rise of global populism” has become a primary metanarrative for the previous decade in advanced industrial democracies, but I argue that it is a deeply misleading one. Nativism—not populism—is the defining feature of both radical right parties in Western Europe and of radical right politicians like Donald Trump in the United States. The tide of “left-wing populism” in Europe receded quickly, as did its promise of returning power to the people through online voting and policy deliberation. The erosion of democracy in states like Hungary has not been the result of populism, but rather of the deliberate practice of competitive authoritarianism. Calling these disparate phenomena “populist” obscures their core features and mistakenly attaches normatively redeeming qualities to nativists and authoritarians.

Book Reviews

2006 ◽  
Vol 24 (2) ◽  
pp. 89-112
Keyword(s):  
North Carolina ◽  
Western Europe ◽  
Radical Right ◽  
German Culture ◽  
Cambridge University ◽  
Black And White ◽  
Chapel Hill ◽  
The World ◽  
History Of

Gavriel D. Rosenfeld, The World Hitler Never Made (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005)Reviewed by Sheri BermanTerri Givens, Voting Radical Right in Western Europe (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2005)Reviewed by David ArtSteinar Stjernø, Solidarity in Europe: The History of an Idea (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004)Reviewed by Aaron P. BoeseneckerDavid Monod, Settling Scores: German Music, Denazification, and the Americans, 1945-1953 (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2005).Reviewed by Ivan RaykoffPatricia Mazón and Reinhild Steingröver, eds., Not So Plain as Black and White: Afro-German Culture and History, 1890-2000 (Rochester: University of Rochester Press, 2005)Reviewed by Karen M. Eng

Radical Right Parties in Office: Incumbency Records and the Electoral Cost of Governing

2012 ◽  
Vol 47 (4) ◽  
pp. 574-596 ◽  
Author(s):  
Tjitske Akkerman ◽  
Sarah L. de Lange
Keyword(s):  
Comparative Research ◽  
Western Europe ◽  
Radical Right ◽  
Coalition Governments ◽  
Integration Policies ◽  
Radical Right Parties ◽  
Additional Support ◽  
National Governments ◽  
Electoral Performance

AbstractRadical right parties are becoming increasingly likely candidates to participate in government coalitions in Western Europe. Comparative research on the electoral performance of these parties in government is still scarce. Our overview of the electoral effects of government participation of six parties in national governments shows that they do not run a higher risk of losing votes after government participation than other parties. There is considerable variation, however. Some radical right parties experienced great losses, while others won additional support. Focusing on the ways in which radical right parties conducted themselves in government, we explore why some parties won votes and others lost in post-incumbency elections. We compare their policy achievements with regard to immigration and integration policies, the performance of their ministers, and the party coherence of the six parties in office. Our analysis shows that policy records do not fully explain the variation in post-incumbency electoral results. Weak performance and internal party conflict prevent parties from credibly laying claim to the policy achievements of coalition governments and demonstrate that some of these parties were not ready for office.

scholarly journals Electoral participation, political disaffection, and the rise of the populist radical right

2021 ◽  
pp. 135406882098518
Author(s):  
Julia Schulte-Cloos ◽  
Arndt Leininger
Keyword(s):  
Western Europe ◽  
Party Competition ◽  
Radical Right ◽  
Difference In Differences ◽  
Populist Radical Right ◽  
Alternative Für Deutschland ◽  
Political Distrust ◽  
Political Disaffection ◽  
Electoral Mobilization ◽  
Established Democracies

Does the populist radical right benefit from increased electoral mobilization? Integrating theories of political grievances with accounts of party competition in Western Europe, we contend that the populist right gains advantage from increased electoral mobilization, but that this effect is conditional on political disaffection. We draw on a novel panel dataset (2009–2019) of more than 10,000 German municipalities and city districts to study the implications of turnout surges as a function of pre-existing levels of political disaffection in a difference-in-differences design. The results demonstrate that turnout surges benefit the populist right “Alternative für Deutschland” (AfD) in contexts of widespread political distrust. In contrast, increased mobilization acts to depress its electoral fortunes in communities marked by low baseline levels of political disaffection. In shedding light on the interplay between political disaffection and electoral mobilization, this study has important implications for understanding the surge of the populist right in established democracies.

scholarly journals The radical right, the labour movement and the competition for the workers’ vote

2018 ◽  
Vol 40 (1) ◽  
pp. 65-90 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nadja Mosimann ◽  
Line Rennwald ◽  
Adrian Zimmermann
Keyword(s):  
Working Class ◽  
Western Europe ◽  
European Social Survey ◽  
Radical Right ◽  
Social Survey ◽  
Labour Movement ◽  
Non Union ◽  
Radical Right Parties ◽  
Using Data ◽  
Better Than

This article analyses the capacity of radical right parties to attract support from union members in recent elections in Western Europe. It is argued that unionized voters resist the appeals of the radical right better than non-union members. Using data from the European Social Survey 2010–2016, the article shows that union members are overall less likely to vote for the radical right than non-union members. Even though it is found that unionized working-class and middle-class voters are less likely to vote radical right than their non-unionized peers in the pooled sample, it is also observed that these subgroups of unionized voters and especially unionized working-class voters are not immune to radical right voting in all the countries analysed. The article thus indicates a growing capacity of the radical right to attract unionized working-class segments of the electorate in some countries and to directly compete with left parties for these voters.

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