Negative partisanship towards the populist radical right and democratic resilience in Western Europe

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-21
Author(s):  
Carlos Meléndez ◽  
Cristóbal Rovira Kaltwasser
Keyword(s):  
Western Europe ◽  
Radical Right ◽  
Populist Radical Right

scholarly journals Exploring Gender Differences in Support for Rightist Parties: The Role of Party and Gender Ideology

2018 ◽  
Vol 14 (01) ◽  
pp. 80-105 ◽  
Author(s):  
Rosie Campbell ◽  
Silvia Erzeel
Keyword(s):  
Gender Differences ◽  
Western Europe ◽  
Gender Ideology ◽  
Radical Right ◽  
Special Issue ◽  
Gender Ideologies ◽  
Populist Radical Right ◽  
And Gender ◽  
The Right

This contribution to the Special Issue on Gender and Conservatism uses expert and election surveys to explore the extent to which the feminist or traditional gender ideology of parties of the right relates to their economic and liberal/authoritarian ideology. We show that although parties of the left generally espouse more feminist ideologies than parties of the right, there are a significant number of rightist parties in Western Europe that combine laissez-faire economic values with liberal feminist ideals. That said, there is more homogeneity among parties of the populist radical right than rightist parties more generally. We find that despite some variation in their gender ideology, parties of the populist radical right overwhelmingly—with the exception of one party in the Netherlands—continue to adopt traditional or antifeminist gender ideologies. In terms of attracting women voters, we find that rightist parties who adopt a feminist gender ideology are able to attract more women voters than other parties of the right. We detect several examples of center-right parties that include feminist elements in their gender ideologies and are able to win over larger proportions of women voters than rightist parties that fail to adopt feminist positions.

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.

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.

Do religious voters support populist radical right parties? Opposite effects in Western and East-Central Europe

2021 ◽  
pp. 135406882098518
Author(s):  
Kamil Marcinkiewicz ◽  
Ruth Dassonneville
Keyword(s):  
Central Europe ◽  
Western Europe ◽  
European Social Survey ◽  
Radical Right ◽  
Far Right ◽  
East Central Europe ◽  
East Central ◽  
Populist Radical Right ◽  
Religious Devotion ◽  
Radical Right Parties

The rise of populist radical right parties fuels a discussion about the roots of their success. Existing research has demonstrated the relevance of gender, education and income for explaining the far-right vote. The present study contributes to the aforementioned debate by focusing on the role of religiosity. The data collected in the eighth round of the European Social Survey (2016) allow examining in more detail the political relevance of attendance at religious services and other measures of religious devotion. This study focuses in particular on 15 countries, 11 from Western Europe and 4 from East-Central Europe. In none of the Western European countries is there evidence of a positive relationship between religiosity and vote for a populist radical right party. In fact, in many countries of this region more religious voters are substantively less inclined to support far-right movements. The situation is different in parts of East-Central Europe. In Poland, and to a weaker extent also in Hungary, the probability of a vote for right-wing populists increases with religiosity.

scholarly journals A tough trade-off? The asymmetrical impact of populist radical right inclusion on satisfaction with democracy and government

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-21
Author(s):  
Eelco Harteveld ◽  
Andrej Kokkonen ◽  
Jonas Linde ◽  
Stefan Dahlberg
Keyword(s):  
Western Europe ◽  
European Social Survey ◽  
Political Support ◽  
Radical Right ◽  
Satisfaction With Democracy ◽  
Coalition Governments ◽  
Populist Radical Right ◽  
Track Record ◽  
Using Data ◽  
Asymmetrical Impact

Abstarct Populist radical right (PRR) parties are increasingly included in coalition governments across Western Europe. How does such inclusion affect satisfaction with democracy (SWD) in these societies? While some citizens will feel democracy has grown more responsive, others will abhor the inclusion of such controversial parties. Using data from the European Social Survey (2002–2018) and panel data from the Netherlands, we investigate how nativists’ and non-nativists’ SWD depends on mainstream parties’ strategies towards PRR parties. We show that the effect is asymmetrical: at moments of inclusion nativists become substantially more satisfied with democracy, while such satisfaction among non-nativists decreases less or not at all. This pattern, which we attribute to Easton’s ‘reservoir of goodwill’, that is, a buffer of political support generated by a track-record of good performance and responsiveness, can account for the seemingly contradictory increase in SWD in many Western European countries in times of populism.

scholarly journals Assessing the fourth wave of the populist radical right: Jair Bolsonaro’s voters in comparative perspective

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lisa Zanotti ◽  
José Rama ◽  
Talita Tanscheit
Keyword(s):  
Presidential Elections ◽  
Western Europe ◽  
Radical Right ◽  
Populist Radical Right ◽  
European Parties ◽  
European Election ◽  
The Individual ◽  
Party Family ◽  
Election Studies ◽  
Fourth Wave

The determinants of the vote for the populist radical right (PRR) have been thoroughly studied especially in Western and Eastern Europe. However, the PRR has become a global phenomenon. At this point, comparative studies are essential in order to advance in the understanding of the success of this party family. For this reason, in this paper, we analyze the individual factors that help to understand the support for Jair Bolsonaro in the last 2018 Presidential elections in Brazil at the light of the findings for the PRR in Western Europe. The aim is twofold. First, we contribute to the comparative literature on the determinants for the vote for the PRR in a non-European country. Second, we also assess, if any, the peculiarity of the vote for the PRR in Latin America and specifically in the Brazilian case. In order to carry on our analysis, we used the European Election Studies (EES) dataset for Western European parties and data from the Estudio Electoral Brasileño for Brazil (ESEB). The main results show that religion (evangelists), race (white), income (high), and, above all, negative views of the main opposition party (Partido dos Trabalhadores [PT] – Worker’s Party), i.e., antipetismo, are the main reasons to understand the vote for Bolsonaro in the 2018 Presidential elections.

Authoritarianism and Support for Populist Radical Right Parties

2021 ◽  
pp. 115-144
Author(s):  
Erik R. Tillman
Keyword(s):  
Western Europe ◽  
Study Data ◽  
Radical Right ◽  
The Political ◽  
Populist Radical Right ◽  
National Election Study ◽  
Radical Right Parties ◽  
Immigration Attitudes ◽  
Party Support ◽  
The Relationship

This chapter examines the relationship between authoritarianism and the likelihood of voting for populist radical right parties in Western Europe. Radical right parties share an ideology based around nativism, authoritarianism, and populism. This ideology appeals to high authoritarians because it promises tough measures to preserve social cohesion, so high authoritarians are more likely to vote for radical right parties. This prediction is tested using national election study data from a range of West European countries. The results show that high authoritarians are more likely to vote for radical right parties, but even more so if they have weaker attachments to the political mainstream. The final set of analyses examines whether economic anxieties or anti-immigration attitudes moderate this relationship. While economic anxieties matter little to radical right party support, high authoritarians who oppose immigration are more likely to vote for a radical right party. These findings build on existing research by providing a stronger explanation of previous findings linking anti-immigration attitudes or cultural anxieties to radical right party support.

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