Extreme Parties Research Articles

Czeskie i słowackie ugrupowania radykalnej i ekstremalnej prawicy politycznej i ich stosunek do Unii Europejskiej

The collapse of the Soviet Union in the early 1990s was accompanied by the revival of the idea of sovereignty of states previously belonging to Moscow’s sphere of influence in Central Europe. Regaining freedom enabled the development of various political ideas, accompanied by the emergence of groups expressing radical and extreme nationalist views. In the case of the radical right, we are dealing with opposition to the system of liberal democracy and the federal idea of the European Union (EU). Extreme parties most often refer to neo-fascist or neo-Nazi ideas and reject membership in the EU. Some of these groups are represented in the parliaments of their own countries and in the European Parliament. Most of them do not have coalition capabilities, while others have found themselves outside the governing structures of their own countries. The subject of this analysis is the attitude towards the EU of radical and extreme right parties originating from two countries established in 1993 after the breakup of Czechoslovakia - the Czech Republic and the Republic of Slovakia.

The politics of military assistance: Italian parties’ positions on the war in Ukraine

ABSTRACT In recent years, a research agenda on the party politics of military interventions has flourished. However, considerably less attention has been devoted to analysing party positions on the decision to provide military assistance to an actor involved in the conflict. This article focuses on Italy’s support for Ukraine after the 2022 Russian invasion. Triangulating quantitative and qualitative data, we examine party positions and how they evolved from the Draghi to the Meloni government. We find that moderate parties have generally been more supportive than extreme parties except Brothers of Italy, whose stance is still coherent with its own peculiar core values.

Assessing the Relationship Between Compulsory Voting and the Over-Representation of Extreme Parties

In this paper, we address the issue of partisan bias in compulsory voting systems. Given the current global trends – declining trust in mainstream political parties, rising support for left- and right-wing radicals, growing populism and anti-elite sentiment – we seek to determine how they manifest themselves in an environment where citizens are required to vote by law. To answer this question, a quasi-experimental design is proposed. The data show that forced activity does not affect either extreme forces support rates (from a cross-country perspective) or the rationality of their voters (from an individual-level perspective). As far as we know, this is the first attempt to generalize the role of compulsory voting in extreme politics, as well as the first one to refute this role with ample evidence.

Ideological ambiguity and political spectrum

This study examines the relationship between ambiguity and the ideological positioning of political parties across the political spectrum. We identify a strong non-monotonic (inverted U-shaped) relationship between party ideology and ambiguity within a sample of 202 European political parties. This pattern is observed across all ideological dimensions covered in the data. To explain this pattern, we argue that centrist parties are perceived as less risky by voters compared to extremist parties, giving them an advantage in employing ambiguity to attract more voters at a lower cost. We support our explanation with additional evidence from electoral outcomes and economic indicators in the respective party countries.

Party-System Polarization and Individual Perceptions of Party Differences: Two Divergent Effects on Turnout

AbstractIn this article, we argue that party-system polarization and subjective perceptions of ideological party differences are conceptually and empirically distinct phenomena that affect electoral participation differently. Looking at 84 elections worldwide, we show that party-system polarization, and the sharp conflicts associated with it, depresses turnout because many citizens are put off by extreme party positions and unrewarding polemics. By contrast, the individual perception of differences between parties increases turnout because more citizens can find a party that is close to their own position and identify others as being further away. These opposite effects are possible because party-system polarization leads only some individuals to perceive differences between parties but leads others to avoid the emotionalized political arena. Moreover, individuals' ability to recognize differences between parties is not necessarily a consequence of party-system polarization. The contradictory findings in previous research are due to a conceptual and empirical blurring of these two essentially different aspects.

The banning of political parties in post-Yugoslav states. Croatian and Serbian experience in using militant democracy

ABSTRACT The aim of this paper is to explore the effectiveness of a classical militant democracy instrument, as banning of extremist parties since the beginning of the political transition in 1990s in post-Yugoslav states. Comparative studies are based on Croatian and Serbian experiences, when since political transition new types of political regimes started developing as part of a boom for national parties that could guarantee consolidation of the state. The methods employed for the analysis are the qualitative analysis of sources. Corpus of sources includes national legislation, official documents, NGOs’ reports, and media content related to banning political entities. Conclusions from the study provide knowledge fill the gap in the state of art about circumstances for dissolving anti-democratic entities in the post-Yugoslav states. Moreover, they allow to verify relevant approaches and models of anti-democratic organizations, encompassing the specific types of political culture in Croatia and Serbia.

Links among Intellectual Terrorism, Religious and Political Dissent

The unusual rapid change of globalization process, winning of extreme right parties in some countries, who ask for racism and refuse other nationalities and races makes the world unstable and coexistence among various nations is in dangerous. All these things does not come to exist without any plan of some extremist parties, subversive activities in different places. Physical terrorism and terrorist acts are semi controlled, but the extreme groups nowadays found other ways to terrorize societies, frighten and threaten people intellectually. There is an exploiting of different ideas, different views of parties in a country and change it to an intellectual terrorism just for specific and private interests or to take power in a country. Under the name of rights there is a huge deface on religion through deception and mislead people and push them to take unusual habits and acts which leads to anger some people without taking into account of other religion through burning the religious book, abusing religious characters and all these acts consider to be intellectual terrorism and spreading hatred among different religions who were living in peace before without any crucial and serious big problem. To this devastating end, the extremist parties and their elements try to use any way of means to reach their dirty and bad intentions. Even we live in a media revolution nowadays which if anything happens in the farthest part of the world will be known in other parts in a way or another, make them to have hostile ideas against who are not in their religion, ethnic, nationality or language, even some of high officials and ranks clearly mention in front of their assembly and spread hostile idea. It has nothing to do with the freedom of expression. It is some kind of terrorism, not physical but intellectual and it is stupidity of people through their bad planned ideas, their political orientation and their trade in the blood of others. Unfortunately there are still many who believe in such things and terrorism and terror belongs to specific religion or ideology without having a minimum information on it. We all together need to face intellectual terrorism and stop them otherwise the situation goes worse than it is.

Walking into the extremes

This paper investigates the relationship between the “extreme vote” and the percentage of foreigners in a selected group of European Union (EU) countries. The study explores the hypothesis that an increase in the foreign population within an EU country positively influences support for extreme parties, particularly on the far-right side. Quantitative methods, including OLS regression models, are employed to analyse the electoral support for far-right and far-left parties. The study considers variables such as the total number of newly arrived foreign population (divided into EU and non-EU categories), the percentage share of foreigners in the total population, and the variation of these metrics over time. Geographical location is also taken into account using binary variables representing regional groupings. Data are sourced from Eurostat, national government departments, and the Chapel Hill Expert Survey. The analysis focuses on a group of 14 EU member states with varying levels of immigration between 2013 and 2019, aiming to shed light on the complex relationship between immigration and extreme voting tendencies.

The Political Costs of Austerity

Abstract Using a novel regional database covering over 200 elections in several European countries, this paper provides new empirical evidence on the political consequences of fiscal consolidations. To identify exogenous reductions in regional public spending, we use a Bartik-type instrument that combines regional sensitivities to changes in national government expenditures with narrative national consolidation episodes. Fiscal consolidations lead to a significant increase in extreme parties' vote share, lower voter turnout, and a rise in political fragmentation. We highlight the close relationship between detrimental economic developments and voters' support for extreme parties by showing that austerity induces severe economic costs through lowering GDP, employment, private investment, and wages. Austerity-driven recessions amplify the political costs of economic downturns considerably by increasing distrust in the political environment.

The crime of genocide, the stages of its implementation and prevention of the genocide of Anfal and the Yazidi Kurds, for example

This research entitled (Genocide, Stages of Implementation and Prevention. Genocide of Anfal and Yazidi Kurds as Examples), attempts to present the concept of genocide as one of the most serious crimes against humanity, committed by oppressive regimes and extremist parties with the intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group. This paper presents the process of genocide and its stages of implementation based on the theory of international genocide expert Gregory H. Stanton and shows the most important policies and mechanisms of genocide against the Kurdish people in Iraqi Kurdistan and in the region. This paper also attempts to discuss the international efforts to combat the crime of genocide, especially by the United Nations, as well as the most important mechanisms and measures that can be followed to prevent the occurrence or repetition of genocide. This study examines two examples of genocide against the Kurdish people, namely the Anfal genocide against the Kurdish people in 1988 in Iraqi Kurdistan by the Baath regime and the genocide of the Yezidi Kurds in Sinjar in 2014 by of the Islamic State

Crime of Genocide, Stages of Implementation and Prevention of Anfal Genocide (Example of Yazidi Kurds)

This research entitled (Genocide, Stages of Implementation and Prevention. Genocide of Anfal and Yazidi Kurds as Examples), attempts to present the concept of genocide as one of the most serious crimes against humanity, committed by oppressive regimes and extremist parties with the intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group. This paper presents the process of genocide and its stages of implementation based on the theory of international genocide expert Gregory H. Stanton and shows the most important policies and mechanisms of genocide against the Kurdish people in Iraqi Kurdistan and in the region. This paper also attempts to discuss the international efforts to combat the crime of genocide, especially by the United Nations, as well as the most important mechanisms and measures that can be followed to prevent the occurrence or repetition of genocide. This study examines two examples of genocide against the Kurdish people, namely the Anfal genocide against the Kurdish people in 1988 in Iraqi Kurdistan by the Baath regime and the genocide of the Yezidi Kurds in Sinjar in 2014 by of the Islamic State.

The Political Costs of Austerity

Abstract Using a novel regional database covering over 200 elections in several European countries, this paper provides new empirical evidence on the political consequences of fiscal consolidations. To identify exogenous reductions in regional public spending, we use a Bartik-type instrument that combines regional sensitivities to changes in national government expenditures with narrative national consolidation episodes. Fiscal consolidations lead to a significant increase in extreme parties' vote share, lower voter turnout, and a rise in political fragmentation. We highlight the close relationship between detrimental economic developments and voters' support for extreme parties by showing that austerity induces severe deconomic costs through lowering GDP, employment, private investment, and wages. Austerity-driven recessions amplify the political costs of economic downturns considerably by increasing distrust in the political environment.

Once More, with Feeling! Digital Campaigns and Emotional Candidacies in X in Andalusia and Castilla y León

In 2022, two regional elections were held that initiated a new electoral cycle in Spain. The first, in February, took place in Castilla y León where, for the first time, the extreme right-wing party, VOX, formed a coalition in a regional government with the right-wing Partido Popular, while, simultaneously, the extreme left-wing party Podemos was barely left with parliamentary representation. The second, in June in Andalusia, led to VOX increasing its representation by two seats and beginning its national level electoral growth; the far-left that was split in two parties, finding that the dynamic that began in Castilla y León also affected them as they lost 10 representatives. This article seeks to compare the emotional strategies of these extremist parties in the 2022 regional elections, focusing especially on leaders’ and parties’ communication strategies on X, formerly Twitter, during the electoral campaign. We expect to find differences between political parties but also between regions. To test this, we carried out an ‘X account content analysis’. We selected those accounts representing the candidates to the regional President and also the main political party accounts in the regions: namely VOX in both regions, Podemos in Castilla y León, and Adelante Andalucía and Por Andalucía in Andalusia.

Unpacking second-order elections theory: The effects of ideological extremity on voting in European elections

The proposition that extreme parties should perform better in second-order national contests when compared to adjacent, first-order, national elections has so far received scant attention from scholars. Correspondingly, it lacks a developed theoretical framework and systematic empirical testing. This study strives to fill these lacunae, offering a comparative analysis of all European and adjacent national elections in the last six decades. Contrary to expectations, I find a negative effect of ideological extremity on party performance in (second-order) European elections. Moreover, the effect of ideological extremity is also conditional upon party size and the temporal distance of the European election to the last national election. However, these effects are at odds with theoretical expectations of existing research. These findings have broader implications, especially in terms of transformations of European politics. For instance, they can be indicative of shifts in voter motivations and the electoral costs of governing for extreme parties.

Preferences and Institutions in European (Dis)Integration

In this article, we present a game-theoretical model of political (dis)integration, and the incentives voters and politicians face during integration processes. We apply the model to the European Union. Preference homogeneity and economies of scale do not suffice to explain European integration. Rather, integration decisions are taken within an institutional setting that involves politicians with interests that may diverge from those of the voters they represent. Such politicians may take integration decisions that are not in line with their voters’ interests as a result. We show that voters can in some circumstances prevent integration by strategically electing representatives who are farther away from them. The model provides novel insights into the process of European (dis)integration and the voter–politician dynamics that determine it. In addition, our model offers an alternative explanation for the relative success of extremist parties in the European Union.

POPULISM IN CONTEXT. A CROSS-COUNTRY INVESTIGATION OF THE FACEBOOK USAGE OF POPULIST APPEALS DURING THE 2019 EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT ELECTIONS

Recent scholarship demonstrated that Facebook is a convenient space for populist political communication as its unmediated and viral nature make populist appeals highly efficient in voters’ mobilization (Engesser et al., 2017). However, less attention has been paid to the way these populist messages appear on political actors’ communication, and what post- and page-level factors they are associated with. We investigate these questions in the context of the 2019 European Parliament (EP) election based on a unique cross-national dataset covering 12 European countries. In our research project we categorized more than 8,074 Facebook posts published on the main pages of 67 parties. Our findings show that the three dimensions of populist communication are used strategically different way and appear in different communication context. Anti-elitist messages are articulated in relation to economy, labor and social policy and immigration mostly by extreme parties. People-centrism is frequently used in relation to labor & social policy, and in European- and mobilization-focused posts all over the political landscape. Out-group messages appear in immigration-related posts and in far-right parties’ communication.

How not to respond to populism

Although the nature and definition of populism are a source of considerable disagreement, there seems to be a minimal consensus by now that populism poses a number of threats to liberal democracy, and that public authorities should therefore act in defence of the latter. In searching for appropriate responses, however, most scholars draw from strategies for combatting anti-democratic or extremist parties, without considering the important differences between populist parties and these other political actors. We argue that the two central types of democratic defence—the ‘intolerant’ militant democratic defence and the ‘tolerant’ defence—do not offer satisfying responses to populist parties precisely because they were conceived and developed as responses to different phenomena. For public authorities to successfully address populism, responses need to contain its most egregious characteristics, yet salvage its productive side.

Sozioökonomische Determinanten Extremistischer Wahlerfolge in Deutschland: Das Beispiel Der Europawahlen 1994 Und 1999

Empirical research on the determinants of right and left-wing extremist election successes is still dominated by descriptive statistical methods. The existing literature in political economy and political science mainly relies on interviews and survey results as well as on qualitative analyses of party organizations and programs. Contrary to this approach, in this study we try to identify significant, structural socio-economic factors which determined the vote for the right-wing Republikaner party and the left-wing Party of Democratic Socialism (PDS) in the two recent elections of the European Parliament in Germany. We use a new data set on the level of German counties (Kreise) that is analyzed econometrically by a FGLS random effects panel model. The results we obtain are partly in stark contrast to empirical findings discussed in the mainstream literature and in the public. The resulting, most important areas of political action against extremist parties seem to be education, a differentiated labor market policy, social work with adolescents, and the maintenance of a generous system of social security and welfare.

Ideological Talk, Strategic Vote: German Parties’ Positions on the Military Intervention in Afghanistan in Parliament

ABSTRACT Existing literature has examined party positions on several military interventions across various countries, mostly using manifestos and expert surveys as sources of data. This article employs a different approach by analysing German parties’ positions on one mission only: the Afghanistan intervention (2001–2021). We extract positions from parliamentary speeches through the automated text scaling method Wordfish and compare them with voting data to check public speech against behaviour. We find that moderate parties were more in favour of the intervention than extreme parties. We also highlight the presence of a strong government/opposition conflict. This dynamic was amplified in the votes as both government and opposition parties have more incentives to act strategically, while surprisingly, we find little evidence of differences in positioning across missions. Other than being the first comprehensive assessment of parties’ positions on the intervention in Afghanistan in any country, this article offers a methodological contribution to the study of the party politics of peace and security operations.

Iconography of persuasion

South Africa’s 2019 elections, like others before, will be remembered for the historical significancearound the ANC ruling party’s sharp decline in polls, the surging and re-emergence of theideologically extreme parties, the Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF) and the Freedom Front Plus(VF+). This election, for the first time since the rebranding of the main opposition, the DemocraticAlliance, saw that party losing its momentum, culminating in the eventual resignation of the party’sfirst black leader, Mmusi Maimane. This study examines how the three dominant parties in SouthAfrica contest with each other in the race to attract potential voters through poster advertising andcampaigns. Going into the 2019 election, the three dominant political parties were – the AfricanNational Congress (ANC), the Democratic Alliance (DA) and the Economic Freedom Fighters (EFF).Specifically, the paper examines messages on the posters, the parties’ manifestos and speechesat different rallies before the elections. Drawing on our analysis, we make a claim in this paperthat the 2019 election in South Africa for the ANC, DA and EFF was largely about “unresolvedquestions”.