ПРИЧИНЫ ФРАГМЕНТАЦИИ РЕГИОНАЛИСТСКИХ ПАРТИЙ В ЗАПАДНОЙ ЕВРОПЕ

Abstract

With the expanding representation of the regions and the emergence of new resources for the electoral struggle within political processes in the EU, the number of political parties is multiplying, and regionalist parties are no exception. Earlier most regionalisms had one historically established regionalist party as a representative (for example, SNP in Scotland or Sardinia Action Party in Sardinia). Now, however, the number of regionalist parties within the region may reach up to 10 or higher (Valley D'Aosta, Sardinia). That said, this trend is not obvious: in some cases, there is no fragmentation of regionalism, and regionalism is still represented by one party (for example, Bayernpartei in Bavaria). What is the reason behind the fragmentation of regionalist parties in some cases and absence of it in others? What are the conditions for the emergence of a "second" regionalist party? The research is devoted to answer these questions. Based on 24 cases of Western European regionalism, an attempt was made to explain the factors of regionalist parties fragmentation using the QCA methodology. The structural parameters of the institutional, identity and party orders were used as factors. The study found that structural factors do not directly determine the presence or absence of fragmentation of regionalist parties.