scholarly journals Political Responses to the Extreme Right in Poland. Motivations and Constraints for Collaboration in the Executive Arena

2019 ◽  
Vol 47 (4) ◽  
pp. 65-95 ◽  
Author(s):  
Aleksandra Moroska-Bonkiewicz
Keyword(s):  
Coalition Formation ◽  
Party System ◽  
Western Europe ◽  
Right Wing ◽  
Extreme Right ◽  
Systemic Analysis ◽  
Starting Point ◽  
Law And Justice ◽  
The Right ◽  
Quantitative And Qualitative Methods

The aim of the article is to indicate potential causes for formation of a government coalition with the extreme right-wing League of Polish Families (LPR) in Poland in 2006. The aim is to determine the motivation of the right-wing mainstream Law and Justice party to cooperate with LPR, but also to indicate potential reasons why the coalition was not concluded until nine months after the elections. The goal is therefore to highlight potential constraints in the formation of the coalition. The analysis uses theories of coalition formation based on the rational choice paradigm (office, policy and vote) combined with an empirical approach to coalition research, with particular emphasis on factors such as the structure of competition in the party system and the internal dynamics of parties. The starting point for this analysis is the result of research on the causes of cabinet collaboration with the extreme right in Western Europe. The aim is to indicate whether the motivations for forming a coalition with the extreme right in Poland are based on similar premises and mechanisms. The analysis combines the deductive approach resulting from the theory of coalition formation with the inductive analysis of facts and factors that accompanied the formation of the coalition. In order to achieve the assumed goals, the article uses quantitative and qualitative methods and systemic analysis.

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.

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.

Romania

2019 ◽  
pp. 388-434
Author(s):  
Laurențiu Ștefan
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Party System ◽  
Prime Minister ◽  
Political Regime ◽  
The Political ◽  
Right Wing ◽  
Left Wing ◽  
Coalition Governments ◽  
Political Spectrum ◽  
The Right

In Romania, a highly segmented and extremely volatile party system has contributed to a predominance of coalition governments. Alternation in power by coalitions led by either left-wing or right-wing parties used to be a major feature of Romanian governments. Thus, until a short-lived grand coalition in 2009, ideologically homogeneous coalitions were the general practice. Since then, parties from the right and left of the political spectrum have learned to work together in government. Given the semi-presidential nature of the political regime and the exclusive power to nominate the prime minister, the Romanian president plays an important role in coalition formation. The president also plays a pivotal role by shadowing the prime minister and therefore influencing the governance of coalitions. She has the power to veto ministerial appointments and therefore she can also shape the cabinet line-up. Pre-election coalitions are a common feature, more than two-thirds of Romanian coalition governments have been predicated on such agreements. Coalition agreements dealt with both policy issues and coalition decision-making bodies and the governance mechanisms that have been in most cases enforced and complied with—until the break-up of the coalition and the downfall of the respective government. One very common decision-making body is the Coalition Committee, which has been backed on the operational level by an inner cabinet made up of the prime minister and the deputy prime ministers, which usually are the heads of the junior coalition parties.

The new challengers: greens and right-wing populist parties in western Europe

1998 ◽  
Vol 6 (2) ◽  
pp. 191-202 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ferdinand Müller-Rommel
Keyword(s):  
Western Europe ◽  
New Left ◽  
Right Wing ◽  
Green Parties ◽  
The Right

The decline in confidence in the traditional parties in Western Europe has manifested itself through the emergence of the Green parties on the Left and populist parties on the Right. Despite successes in some countries, these parties have remained small, although they have been able, respectively, to play on the growth of ‘post-materialist’ values on the Left, and of anti-immigrant sentiments on the Right. The prospects for these parties are not very good, in particular for the right-wing populist parties, which are highly dependent on the popularity of their leaders, and even for the Green parties, although these can exploit the internal divisions within Socialist parties between supporters of the ‘traditional’ Left and supporters of the ‘New’ Left.

The Radical Right in Germany, Austria, and Switzerland

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Uwe Backes
Keyword(s):  
Party System ◽  
Common Ground ◽  
Civic Culture ◽  
Right Wing ◽  
Constitutional State ◽  
German Speaking ◽  
The Face ◽  
The Common ◽  
The Right ◽  
Special Case

This chapter analyzes and compares political developments in Germany, Austria, and Switzerland. It highlights the common ground between groups on the right-wing fringe of each country’s party system. To an extent the differences between the way right-wing groups developed in each of these countries is due to the different histories of the respective states. Recently however, they have moved closer to each other in the face of very similar problems. To a degree Switzerland is a special case because of its multilingual cantons and the early development of a pluralist civic culture that sustains an extraordinarily dynamic democratic constitutional state. This is particularly true given the autocratic relapses toward right-wing politics in neighboring German-speaking countries.

From a Five to a Six-Party System? Prospects of the Right-wing Extremist NPD

2009 ◽  
Vol 27 (2) ◽  
pp. 92-107 ◽  
Author(s):  
Frank Decker ◽  
Lazaros Miliopoulos
Keyword(s):  
Democratic Party ◽  
Party System ◽  
The Other ◽  
Political Environment ◽  
Right Wing ◽  
Electoral Success ◽  
Nazi Ideology ◽  
Nazi Past ◽  
The One ◽  
The Right

Right-wing extremist and populist parties operate in a rather difficult social and political environment in Germany, rendering notable electoral success fairly improbable, especially when compared to other European countries. The main reason for this is the continuing legacy of the Nazi past. Nevertheless the neo-Nazi National Democratic Party of Germany (NPD) managed to gain substantial votes in recent Land elections and became the leading force in the right-wing extremist political camp. Its success is attributable to rightwing extremist attitudes in some parts of the electorate in connection with a widespread feeling of political discontent. Nevertheless, it is questionable whether the NPD will be able to transform these attitudes into a viable ideological basis for two main reasons. On the one hand, maintaining a neo-Nazi ideology makes the NPD unattractive to many potential voters. On the other hand, given its internal power struggles and severe financial problems, the party may be unable to meet its challenges in organizational terms.

Flank attacks

2015 ◽  
Vol 23 (3) ◽  
pp. 193-204 ◽  
Author(s):  
Matthijs Rooduijn ◽  
Tjitske Akkerman
Keyword(s):  
Western Europe ◽  
The Political ◽  
General Category ◽  
Right Wing ◽  
Left Wing ◽  
Good People ◽  
Economic Elites ◽  
Political Spectrum ◽  
The Right ◽  
Radical Left

How is populism distributed over the political spectrum? Are right-wing parties more populist than left-wing parties? Based on the analysis of 32 parties in five Western European countries between 1989 and 2008, we show that radical parties on both the left and the right are inclined to employ a populist discourse. This is a striking finding, because populism in Western Europe has typically been associated with the radical right; only some particular radical left parties have been labeled populist as well. This article suggests that the contemporary radical left in Western Europe is generally populist. Our explanation is that many contemporary radical left parties are not traditionally communist or socialist (anymore). They do not focus on the ‘proletariat’, but glorify a more general category: the ‘good people’. Moreover, they do not reject the system of liberal democracy as such, but only criticize the political and/or economic elites within that system.

How right-wing versus cosmopolitan political actors mobilize and translate images of immigrants in transnational contexts

2017 ◽  
Vol 16 (3) ◽  
pp. 315-336 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nicole Doerr
Keyword(s):  
Political Parties ◽  
Western Europe ◽  
Contentious Politics ◽  
Right Wing ◽  
Left Wing ◽  
Political Issues ◽  
Political Actors ◽  
People's Party ◽  
The Right ◽  
Syrian Refugee Crisis

This article examines visual posters and symbols constructed and circulated transnationally by various political actors to mobilize contentious politics on the issues of immigration and citizenship. Following right-wing mobilizations focusing on the Syrian refugee crisis, immigration has become one of the most contentious political issues in Western Europe. Right-wing populist political parties have used provocative visual posters depicting immigrants or refugees as ‘criminal foreigners’ or a ‘threat to the nation’, in some countries and contexts conflating the image of the immigrant with that of the Islamist terrorist. This article explores the transnational dynamics of visual mobilization by comparing the translation of right-wing nationalist with left-wing, cosmopolitan visual campaigns on the issue of immigration in Western Europe. The author first traces the crosscultural translation and sharing of an anti-immigrant poster created by the Swiss People’s Party (SVP), a right-wing political party, inspiring different extremist as well as populist right-wing parties and grassroots activists in several other European countries. She then explores how left-libertarian social movements try to break racist stereotypes of immigrants. While right-wing political activists create a shared stereotypical image of immigrants as foes of an imaginary ethnonationalist citizenship, left-wing counter-images construct a more complex and nuanced imagery of citizenship and cultural diversity in Europe. The findings show the challenges of progressive activists’ attempts to translate cosmopolitan images of citizenship across different national and linguistic contexts in contrast to the right wing’s rapid and effective instrumentalizing and translating of denigrating images of minorities in different contexts.

scholarly journals Confederacy — the polish new right wing between tradition and modernity

2020 ◽  
Vol 30 ◽  
pp. 7-32
Author(s):  
Jarosław Tomasiewicz
Keyword(s):  
New Right ◽  
Right Wing ◽  
Far Right ◽  
Protest Movements ◽  
Economic Liberalism ◽  
Social Basis ◽  
Cultural Conservatism ◽  
Right Wing Populism ◽  
Law And Justice ◽  
The Right

Konfederacja Wolność i Niepodległość (Confederacy for Freedom and Independence) is new, far-right force in Poland. Success of the KWiN broke political monopoly of the Prawo i Sprawiedliwość (Law and Justice) party on the right wing. The paper examines structure, strategy, ideology and social basis of the Confederacy. This new formation amalgamating cultural conservatism and economic liberalism is similar rather to American Trumpism and alt-right than the protest movements of Western-European right wing populism.

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