From Trivialized Neo-Nazis to Parliament: Explaining the Electoral Success of the Extreme Right Party ĽSNS in Slovakia

Abstract

ABSTRACT This paper analyzes factors facilitating the electoral success of the Slovak extreme-right party ĽSNS by examining contextual explanations of electoral support during in 2010–2016 national elections. Conducting regression analysis on aggregated data, we find that, during the 2010 and 2012 elections, the local presence of a Roma minority was important, and in the 2016 elections the party achieved success in more economically deprived micro-regions. These changes indicate that factors linked to perceived ethnic threat are insufficient to explain the electoral breakthrough of the party. We argue that the breakthrough was possible thanks to their increasingly anti-elite communication along with favorable contextual circumstances.