The centre-right versus the radical right: the role of migration issues and economic grievances

ABSTRACT

Radical right parties are strong competitors of the centre-right in many party systems. In this article, we first show that the centre-right’s overall stability in terms of vote share masks clear patterns of competition between these two party groups. We then study the attitudinal determinants of the choice between centre-right and radical right parties, paying particular attention to the impact of the economic crisis of 2008 and the migration crisis of 2015. Using European Social Survey data from 2002 onwards, we show that the role of anti-migration views and economic grievances as predictors of the choice for radical right versus centre-right parties has strengthened over time. We then examine whether accommodating positional shifts by centre-right parties are successful in attracting potential radical right voters. Our analyses of voter transitions using election study data show that this is not the case.

KEYWORDS:

• Centre-right
• party strategies
• radical right
• vote choice

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1 AT, BE, CH, DE, DK, FI, FR, GB, NL, NO, SE. Because of a lack of consistent coverage in the ESS we do not include Italy in the vote choice analysis.

2 We construct an additive measure out of 3 items in the ESS measuring cultural, economic and general attitudes toward immigration.

3 Wording: ‘Should governments reduce differences in incomes?’

4 Wording: ‘Feeling about household’s income nowadays’.

5 Using a linear time trend for all years instead indeed shows that there is a linear decline throughout all class groups.

6 We include all parties of the Conservative and Christian Democratic party families, as well as select members of the liberal party family, that attract at least 5% of the vote in a given election. For details, see Table A4 in the Online Appendix.

7 Our immigration measure is based on four items: per601 (National way of life: positive), per602 (National way of life: negative), per607 (Multiculturalism: positive) and per608 (Multiculturalism: negative). Following Bakker and Hobolt (2013), we use a broad economics measure that combines eight ‘rightist’ and twelve ‘leftist’ items on the regulation of the economy, welfare services, and labor relations. We construct logit scales for party positions as suggested by Lowe et al. (2011).

8 Party system salience scores are averages of party-specific log salience scores, where each party’s contribution to the party system average is weighted by its vote share. To avoid endogeneity issues, we only include non-radical right parties for the construction of these measures.