Crisis and convergence: how the combination of a weak economy and mainstream party ideological depolarisation fuels anti-system party success

Thesis

When do radical parties gain support?

Previous studies cite the importance of economic hardship and mainstream party ideological convergence. Responding to earlier inconsistent findings regarding these two factors, I provide evidence for an interactive approach to understanding the growth of ‘anti-system parties’. These radical outsiders are most likely to succeed when mainstream parties are simultaneously presiding over an ailing economy and failing to provide the diversity of political opinion necessary for the electorate to meaningfully challenge the policies associated with this malaise, through which dissatisfaction with the status quo could otherwise be channelled. The mainstream party establishment is most vulnerable when it is no longer supplying valued outputs or inputs to the political process.

This thesis presents four empirical studies designed to test this ‘crisis and convergence’ model. First, drawing on data from over 350 elections in 22 advanced Western democracies across an extended time period, I demonstrate that the anti-system vote is greatest during times of negative economic growth and widespread mainstream party ideological depolarisation. Second, using a combined individual-level dataset of over 70 national election surveys, I show that personal perceptions of mainstream party convergence are themselves more closely related to anti-system voting when the macroeconomy is sickly. Mainstream party homogeneity radicalises the economic vote and strengthens anti-system challengers. The final two studies corroborate these findings by explicitly testing the crucial underlying assumption that individuals’ perceptions of the uniqueness of mainstream parties are not mere products of partisan rationalisation. Evidence from a multiyear panel dataset in Britain and an original survey experiment conducted in Germany suggests that perceptions of mainstream party similarities are as, if not more, likely to cause a reduction in one’s strength of feeling towards mainstream parties than be caused by this dealignment.

This thesis concludes with a thorough summary of these results, as well as a discussion of potential caveats and grounds for future research. The ‘crisis and convergence’ model is judged to be worthy of consideration in future conversations about the factors that have led to our current political climate of volatile voters and stuttering centrist parties.

Authors: Grant, Z

• DOI: 10.5287/ora-ppgb7njjx
• Type of award: DPhil
• Level of award: Doctoral
• Awarding institution: University of Oxford
• Language: English
• Keywords: Elections and Public Opinion; Radical Political Parties; Comparative Politics; Economic Voting
• Subjects: Elections and Public Opinion; Politics and government; Political science