Globalization and the transformation of the national political space: Six European countries compared

Abstract

Abstract. This article starts from the assumption that the current process of globalization or denationalization leads to the formation of a new structural conflict in Western European countries, opposing those who benefit from this process against those who tend to lose in the course of the events. The structural opposition between globalization 'winners' and 'losers' is expected to constitute potentials for political mobilization within national political contexts, the mobilization of which is expected to give rise to two intimately related dynamics: the transformation of the basic structure of the national political space and the strategic repositioning of the political parties within the transforming space. The article presents several hypotheses with regard to these two dynamics and tests them empirically on the basis of new data concerning the supply side of electoral politics from six Western European countries

Towards the median economic crisis voter? The new leftist economic agenda of the Front National in France

“…This second dataset elaborates on the principles of the 'confrontational' approach to manual content analysis (Pellikaan et al, 2003;Kriesi et al, 2006). Here, the basic coding unit is the individual policy proposal or pledge.…”

The Paradox of Well-being: Do Unfavorable Socioeconomic and Sociocultural Contexts Deepen or Dampen Radical Left and Right Voting Among the Less Well-Off?

“…First, they could support them because they agree with these parties' main ideological messages. It has been shown that when it comes to radical right voting, the effect of someone's socioeconomic position is strongly a function of, or mediated by, attitudes toward immigration (see Ivarsflaten, 2008;Kriesi, Grande, Lachat, Dolezal, & Bornschier, 2008;Kriesi et al, 2006;Van der Brug, Fennema, & Tillie, 2000, 2005. In particular, those who experience economic difficulties are likely to have anti-immigration attitudes and in turn, and therefore, vote for a radical right party.…”

Exploiting the Cracks: Wedge Issues in Multiparty Competition

“…We test our expectations in Western Europe as this allows us to examine wedge issue competition within a set of stable and democratic multiparty systems over three decades. The literature on Western European party competition has identified several issues that constitute wedge issues, such as European integration and immigration (see Green-Pedersen and Krogstup 2008;Kriesi et al 2006;Marks and Wilson 2000;Meguid 2005;Taggart 1998). Ideally, we would test our hypotheses by looking at more than a single wedge issue.…”