Globalization, Cleavages, and the Radical Right

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Simon Bornschier
Keyword(s):  
Social Structure ◽  
Party System ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Social Groups ◽  
System Change ◽  
Party Competition ◽  
Radical Right ◽  
Right Wing ◽  
Scale Transformations ◽  
Relative Salience

This chapter underscores the merit of studying the emergence and growth of the radical right from a cleavage perspective, which sees party system change as rooted in large-scale transformations of social structure. The chapter begins by discussing explanations for the rise of the radical right in terms of the educational revolution, the processes of economic and cultural modernization, and globalization, showing where these perspectives converge and where they differ. It then goes on to show how the structuralist perspective has been combined with a focus on agency. Under conditions of multidimensional party competition, the behavior of mainstream parties is crucial, because it determines the relative salience of competitive dimensions and whether they offer space for radical right-wing challengers. Some of the most exciting recent research studies how the processes of dealignment and realignment structure the propensity of specific social groups such as the manual working class to support the radical right.

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.

Contesting the EU in times of crisis: The Front National and politics of Euroscepticism in France

Politics ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 38 (3) ◽  
pp. 278-294 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gilles Ivaldi
Keyword(s):  
Party System ◽  
Current Knowledge ◽  
Party Competition ◽  
Radical Right ◽  
Right Wing ◽  
The European Union ◽  
French Politics ◽  
Front National ◽  
Political Outcomes ◽  
The Relationship

This article examines the performance and party system diffusion of Euroscepticism of the French Front National (FN) during recent European crises. The article argues that Europe’s successive crises since 2008 have been essentially ‘absorbed’ by the FN into its existing Eurosceptic framework which is guided by its radical right-wing ideology. While allowing the FN to successfully mobilize issues and grievances about the European Union (EU), Euroscepticism is, however, significantly impeding its strategy of governmental credibility. The article identifies the main political outcomes of these crises and finds differences in impact between the different EU crises on party competition over Europe. These findings provide insight into the relationship between the radical Right, Euroscepticism, and party competition. They also inform our current knowledge of Euroscepticism in French politics, and changes that EU crises have triggered, according to party system location and whether FN influence can be postulated.

The Rise of Caste Politics: Party System Change and Voter Realignment, 1962–2004

2010 ◽  
Author(s):  
OLIVER HEATH ◽  
YOGENDRA YADAV
Keyword(s):  
Social Structure ◽  
Party System ◽  
System Change ◽  
Political Conflict ◽  
Party Competition ◽  
The Past ◽  
The Social ◽  
Social Cleavage ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
Cleavage Structure

This chapter explores the relationship formed between the social structure of India and its contemporary patterns. It tries to show how this relates to the theories of social cleavage alignment, and examines change in the cleavage structure of party competition. The chapter also discusses how different contemporary patterns of political conflict in India are from those of the past.

scholarly journals The determinants of Party System Change in Sub-Saharan Africa

2018 ◽  
Vol 8 (2) ◽  
pp. 124-129
Author(s):  
Riccardo Pelizzo
Keyword(s):  
Social Transformation ◽  
Party System ◽  
System Change ◽  
Party Systems ◽  
Party Competition ◽  
Sub Saharan Africa ◽  
Democratic Regimes ◽  
Primary Driver ◽  
Sub Saharan ◽  
The Stability

This article examines what socio-economic factors are conducive to changes in the patterns of inter-party competition in Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA). The literature has in recent years paid considerable attention to measuring party system change, to identifying the consequences of party system instability for the proper functioning of democratic regimes, and to understanding what factors are responsible for the instability of party systems. In contrast to previous studies that view political change in general and party system change more specifically as the result of social transformation, development, modernization and change in the cleavage structure, this paper shows instead that poverty is the primary driver of party system change in the SSA region. In countries with high levels of poverty, political elites do enjoy little to no performance-based legitimacy. The lack of performance-based legitimacy is the reason why voters in such countries are willing to alter their voting habits and parties are unable to preserve their electoral fortunes over time—which is precisely why party systems do change. The literature showed that stable party systems are good for democracy. This paper shows that to enhance the stability of party system in SSA, poverty has to be reduced and possibly eradicated.

Nordic Countries: Rational Algorithm to Overcome the Crisis

2014 ◽  
pp. 37-48
Author(s):  
K. Voronov
Keyword(s):  
Sustainable Development ◽  
Division Of Labor ◽  
Political Party ◽  
Party System ◽  
Radical Right ◽  
Right Wing ◽  
Swedish Model ◽  
Rational Algorithm ◽  
Political Party System ◽  
New Type

A group of socially and economically prosperous North-European countries (Iceland is to be considered separately) has successfully got over the crucial phase of the 2008–2010 crisis. However, it is untimely to speak about its total overcoming. The system consequences of the crisis strike the next blow to the “Scandinavian/Swedish” model, aggravated the search for ways of sustainable development. The prospects to upgrade the northern economies and societies are not associated here with the change of actual viable models of participation in European and global division of labor. The current challenges are linked with such problems as the further accumulation of riches, increase of consumption, aging of population, growth of immigration etc. The bipolar political party system is being diluted, the struggle is aggravating between traditional parties and radical right-wing, populist parties of the “new type”, which expand their mission.

Anti-Establishment Parties in Government

2021 ◽  
Vol 45 (1) ◽  
pp. 19-47
Author(s):  
Vasiliki Georgiadou ◽  
Jenny Mavropoulou
Keyword(s):  
Great Recession ◽  
Party System ◽  
Radical Right ◽  
Coalition Government ◽  
Supply Side ◽  
Right Wing ◽  
Left Wing ◽  
The Great Recession ◽  
Chapel Hill

Abstract Anti-establishment parties with either a left-wing or a right-wing ideological slant have been entering contemporary European Democracies with sizeable vote shares. During the Great Recession, the Greek party system could be perceived as a relevant case-study for the formation and breakthrough of anti-establishment parties. Given the fact that two deeply ideologically diverging anti-establishment parties, the Coalition of the Radical Left – Social Unionist Front (syriza) and the populist radical right-wing Independent Greeks (anel), came to power, forming a coalition government from early 2015 to January 2019, the primary goal of this article is to enquire into ‘supply-side’ parameters, exploring potential associations along a range of programmatic stances and policy dimensions that effectuated the syriza-anel alliance. Using the Comparative Manifesto Project and the Chapel Hill Expert Survey datasets from 2012 to 2017, our findings confirm beyond the expected programmatic differences the existence of a converging policymaking basis between syriza and anel which goes beyond the ‘pro-Memorandum vs. anti-Memorandum’ divide.

Party Systems and Radical Right-Wing Parties

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Herbert Kitschelt
Keyword(s):  
Life Cycle ◽  
Political Parties ◽  
Party Systems ◽  
Strategic Interaction ◽  
Party Competition ◽  
Radical Right ◽  
Right Wing ◽  
Issue Ownership ◽  
Initial Rise ◽  
Radical Right Parties

This chapter presents an introduction to different theories of party competition, as exemplified by the substantive puzzle of radical right-wing partisan rise. The first task, however, is to conceptualize radical right party fortunes within the context of competitive party systems. The next three sections discuss the initial rise of radical right parties through three lenses: spatial theories of party competition, institutional and historical mediators of current competitive opportunities for radical right entry, and non-spatial theories of party competition based on valence and issue ownership. This is followed by a report on research about the ongoing strategic interaction between radical right parties and their competitors after the former’s initial rise to electoral prowess. The chapter concludes with several general synthesizing hypotheses about the life cycle of political parties, with the radical right’s rise and possible future demise being a particular application.

scholarly journals Explaining the end of Spanish exceptionalism and electoral support for Vox

2019 ◽  
Vol 6 (2) ◽  
pp. 205316801985168 ◽  
Author(s):  
Stuart J. Turnbull-Dugarte
Keyword(s):  
Party System ◽  
Western Europe ◽  
Radical Right ◽  
Right Wing ◽  
Electoral Success ◽  
Individual Level ◽  
Electoral Support ◽  
The Individual ◽  
The Right ◽  
Regional Elections

The 2018 regional elections in Andalucía marked the end of Spain’s exceptional status as a country with a party system free from the radical right. The electoral success of the radical right-wing challenger, Vox, who gained 11% of the vote and 12 seats in the regional parliament, brought this exceptionalism to an end. This paper analyses the individual-level determinants that explain the electoral success of Vox and the emergence of the radical right within the Spanish party system. The results indicate that concerns over devolution, likely engendered by the Catalan separatist crisis, predominantly explain voters’ preferences for the right-wing challenger. This is true both amongst the general electorate as well as amongst the former voters of other right-wing parties. Significantly, against popular assumptions and empirical observations explaining the rise of radical right-wing parties across much of Western Europe, the results display no empirical link between immigration and electoral support for Vox.

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