Electoral fortunes of social democratic parties

Author(s)
Tarik Abou-Chadi, Markus Wagner
Abstract

The dramatic decline in vote shares on the mainstream left in many recent elections has led to a renewed discussion about a crisis of Social Democracy. One popular argument is that Social Democratic decline is the result of these parties' liberal cultural positions and pro-EU stance, with both topics increasingly salient for their traditional voters, particularly among the working class. However, we lack comparative evidence testing this argument. In this paper, we combine CHES data on party positions with ESS survey data to analyze the electoral effects of Social Democratic parties' second dimension and EU positions. In addition, we focus on whether support from different socio-economic groups is sensitive to these positions. In contrast to much public debate, we find that more authoritarian/nationalist and more anti-EU positions are if anything associated with lower rather than greater electoral support for social democratic parties.

Organisation(s)
Department of Government
External organisation(s)
Universität Zürich (UZH)
Journal
Journal of European Public Policy
Volume
27
Pages
246-272
No. of pages
27
ISSN
1350-1763
DOI
https://doi.org/10.1080/13501763.2019.1701532
Publication date
01-2020
Peer reviewed
Yes
Austrian Fields of Science 2012
506014 Comparative politics
Keywords
ASJC Scopus subject areas
Sociology and Political Science, Public Administration
Sustainable Development Goals
SDG 10 - Reduced Inequalities
Portal url
https://ucris.univie.ac.at/portal/en/publications/electoral-fortunes-of-social-democratic-parties(aa8cf779-2f6d-4234-be72-a1b49632b272).html