Individual Submission Summary
Share...

Direct link:

Download

Sources of Radical Right Party Support Among Economically Leftist Citizens

Sat, August 31, 8:00 to 9:30am, Hilton, Kalorama

Abstract

One of the most visible consequences of the recent fiscal crisis in European countries has been the surge of radical left parties (RLP) and radical right parties (RRP), which have maintained their strength even well after the financial crisis has reached its peak. While both kinds of parties claim to protect those citizens who are most vulnerable to globalization, RRP are not staunch advocates of the welfare state and some even are fiscal conservatives. To examine how these parties can nevertheless attract citizens with strong pro-spending and redistribution attitudes, we test two competing explanations. The first explanation is policy-based and rests on the idea that RRP can appeal to citizens with pro-distribution preferences through a welfare chauvinist stance which involves restricting social benefits and material wealth to nationals. This way, they might attract economically leftist voters even if these do not exhibit a culturally-based anti-immigration stance. The second explanation takes an anti-system orientation as a source of support of RRP. If an anti-system orientation matters, we furthermore argue, its effect can be expected to depend on an RRP’s anti-system credentials. Thus, the more established an RRP, the less it will be able to attract citizens that desire radical system change; and this especially concerns economically leftist citizens as these have few other reasons to vote for RRP.

To study the role of those potential explanatory factors, we examine why citizens identify with RRP in five continental European countries that all have successful RRP: Germany, France, the Netherlands, Austria, and Switzerland. Using data from the European Social Survey wave of 2016, we study the following three aspects. First, we probe how much policy preferences and specifically a welfare chauvinist stance foster support of RRP. Second, we test how much an anti-system stance matters and how this stance is distributed over ideology-based voter segments. Finally, we examine whether the effect of an anti-system stance depends on the credibility of RRP as an anti-system party among its competitors.

The analysis has important implications for understanding the sources of support of RRP. A citizen attraction based on welfare chauvinist policies would mean that these parties can generally sway voters with strong redistribution preferences through a suitable framing of their anti-immigration stance in economic terms. An anti-system stance, in contrast, is a more fundamental attitude that may override policy consideration, such as economic policy preferences. This could mean that citizens with strong redistribution preferences, who also on average show lower political support, might support RRP for reasons that are not related to policy. However, it also implies that as RRP become more established, their support among economically leftist voters is likely to wane.

Our results indeed indicate that the success of RRP, especially among economically leftist voters, has little to do with protection of the vulnerable, but more with a desire for radical change. It seems that fiscal conservatism, austerity and welfare cuts are likely to foster preferences for redistribution - and thus a demand for far-left parties; but it also bolsters support for far-right parties, not because they promise to prevent a transfer of wealth and benefits to outgroups but rather because their anti-system stance appeals to voters who have given up on democratic politics.

Authors