Constituency map of the alternative for Germany (AfD) vote in 2017: analysing characteristic differences via multiple correspondence analysis

ABSTRACT

The Alternative for Germany (AfD) party achieved a striking success in the 2017 German federal election. Using structural constituency data, this article explores in which constituencies the AfD gained more votes and why. As it transformed from a single-issue, anti-Euro party with populist tendencies into a right-wing populist party, the AfD refined its position and focus. I argue that at the constituency level, the AfD vote was linked to the issue of immigration and the anti-establishment trend. The demands voiced by AfD voters can be linked to certain political and socioeconomic characteristics of their constituencies which made them susceptible to the AfD’s right-wing populist rhetoric. Applying the statistical technique of multiple correspondence analysis (MCA), I examine the relationship between these characteristics and the AfD vote share at the constituency level. The AfD was likely to win more votes in constituencies characterised by an anti-establishment trend and anti-immigrant/refugee sentiment, the latter of which was linked not to the actual immigration rate, but rather to a combination of a low level of education and a high level of macroeconomic development.

KEYWORDS:

• 2017 German federal election
• AfD
• right-wing populism
• constituency map
• multiple correspondence analysis

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Data availability statement

The data sets that are associated with the paper can be found on the website of the German Federal Returning Officer (Bundeswahlleiter):

https://www.bundeswahlleiter.de/en/bundestagswahlen/2017.html

https://www.bundeswahlleiter.de/en/bundestagswahlen/2013.html

Notes

1. The structural constituency data collected between 2011 and 2013 was released by the German Federal Returning Officer and the election results for each constituency were released after the 2013 federal election.

2. In the German Federal Election System, each has two votes. The first vote allows the voter to vote for a candidate in his/her constituency, while the second vote is cast for a party list. The distribution of seats in the German federal parliament is proportional to the numbers of the votes cast for the parties. Seats in the federal parliament are only given to parties that have gained more than 5% of the valid second votes. In this paper, the AfD vote share is counted based on the party votes cast for the AfD.

3. The political program of the AfD (2017) has been officially released online: https://www.afd.de/wp-content/uploads/sites/111/2017/04/2017-04-12_afd-grundsatzprogramm-englisch_web.pdf