Sexism and the Far‐Right Vote: The Individual Dynamics of Gender Backlash

Abstract

This article contends that sexism plays a fundamental role in the electoral rise of the far right, both as a predisposition and as a changing attitude. Using panel data from Spain, we show that modern sexism is indeed among the most important attitudinal predictors of voting for the far‐right party Vox. The results also show that internal individual changes in levels of modern sexism impact far‐right voting. Backlash attitudinal change, defined as increases in sexism occurring in a context of feminist momentum, contributed significantly to the recent emergence of the radical right. Our findings indicate that sexism is not a crystalized attitude but rather susceptible to showing short‐term changes with important political consequences. This highlights the importance of understudied context‐dependent individual dynamics of gender backlash in far‐right voting.

Antifeminist Sentiments and Marital Desire among Young Men: Evidence from South Korea

“…Younger men have a higher tendency to believe that society discriminates against men over women in the United Kingdom (Green and Shorrocks 2023) and Korea (Ministry of Gender Equality and Family 2021). Recent scholarly work has also established a connection between antifeminist sentiments and recent political trends, including the support for Donald Trump in the United States (Carian and Sobotka 2018;Glick 2019;Godbole, Malvar, and Valian 2019), Yoon Seok-yeol in South Korea (Kim and Lee 2022), Brexit in the United Kingdom (Green and Shorrocks 2023), and the populist radical right party in Spain (Anduiza and Rico 2022;Coffe et al 2023).…”

“…In high-income countries, the traditional notion of an overtly sexist statement that denies women's competency and equal opportunity in the public sphere is now considered politically "incorrect," which has led many to abandon the open endorsement of traditional antifeminism (Ekehammar, Akrami, and Araya 2000;Spence and Hahn 1997). In contrast, modern antifeminist discourse places significant emphasis on the subjugation of men and is often expressed in a more subtle manner, thereby rendering it more socially acceptable than traditional forms of antifeminism (Anduiza and Rico 2022;Becker and Sibley 2016). This approach facilitates the coexistence of antifeminist claims with a professed commitment to gender equality, as modern antifeminists employ the principle of gender equality to legitimize their criticisms of feminism, which they perceive as exhibiting a bias toward women over men.…”

Transformation of the political space: A citizens’ perspective

“…These parties find disproportionate support among the economically vulnerable and culturally alienated, including those who lack the educational qualifications to compete in the knowledge economy, semi‐skilled workers threatened by automation, those living in towns by‐passed by the information revolution and men who feel their status is threatened by GAL values (Abou‐Chadi & Kurer, 2021; Im et al., 2019; Pardos‐Prado, 2020). TAN parties are reactionary, and like reactionary movements of the past, these parties and their supporters are defined by what they reject: in this case, immigration, European integration and the mainstreaming of ecological, feminist and libertarian values (Abou‐Chadi et al., 2022; Anduiza & Rico, 2022; Beramendi et al., 2015; Hooghe & Marks, 2018). Correspondingly, these parties tend to have an ‘anti‐establishment identity’ (Melendez & Kaltwasser, 2019).…”

Inviting the Populists to the Party: Populist Appeals in Presidential Primaries

“…Populism tends to be destabilizing to democracy (Cohen et al 2022; Lee 2019). Populist candidates and parties mobilize constituencies predisposed against compromise (Bakker, Schumacher, & Rooduijn 2021) and higher in discriminatory attitudes (Anduizo & Rico 2022). Once mobilized, populism tends to be dispositional and blame-oriented (Busby, Gubler, & Hawkins 2019; Hameleers, Bos, & de Vrees 2017), emphasizing the types of simple and quick solutions that can attract attention but are unlikely to truly address systemic problems.…”