The radical right as niche parties? The ideological landscape of party systems in Western Europe, 1980-2014

Autor(en)

Markus Wagner, Thomas Meyer

Abstrakt

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.

Organisation(en)

Institut für Staatswissenschaft

Journal

Political Studies

Band

65

Seiten

84-107

Anzahl der Seiten

24

ISSN

0032-3217

DOI

https://doi.org/10.1177/0032321716639065

Publikationsdatum

04-2017

Peer-reviewed

Ja

ÖFOS 2012

506014 Vergleichende Politikwissenschaft

Schlagwörter

ASJC Scopus Sachgebiete

Sociology and Political Science

Link zum Portal

https://ucris.univie.ac.at/portal/de/publications/the-radical-right-as-niche-parties-the-ideological-landscape-of-party-systems-in-western-europe-19802014(8f064388-c4eb-4df7-b645-fb3ae852f50a).html