Reshaping European Party Competition: The Impact of Integration on Left and Right
Stephen Whitefield
Department of Political and International Relations and Pembroke College
Oxford University
Oxford OX1 1DW
UK
[email protected]
Robert Rohrschneider
Department of Political Science
The University of Kansas
Lawrence, KS 66045
USA
[email protected]
Abstract
Scholarship on European party competition has for some time accepted that issues are structured
along economic left-right and libertarian-authoritarian dimensions. While newly contested issues
connected with internationalism, such as European integration and migration, have become more
politically salient, much of the literature sees these as largely the domain of ideologically extremist
and ‘niche’ or ‘challenger’ parties. By contrast, building on work by Kriesi, this paper argues that
international issues have produced far greater sorting of party stances across the left-right spectrum
than the niche and extremist models suggest. Moreover, we seek to explain how contention over
integration has extended to include stances on national political institutions as a divide that cross-cuts
left and right. Our analysis employs expert surveys on the stances of all electorally significant parties
conducted in 24 European countries in 2013. The results have important implications for
understanding the impact of international issues on how parties appeal to voters.
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1. Introduction
Literature on European party competition has for some time accepted that issues are structured
along both an economic left-right dimension and a libertarian-authoritarian one (Mark et al 2006) or
some fusion of the two (Kitschelt 1994). There has also been recognition that new issues, such as
European integration and migration, have become more politically salient but these are often
viewed as largely orthogonal to the main dimensions (Brug and van Spanje 2009) as well as highly
disruptive to existing party alignments (Meguid 2005; Mair 2000; Hix and Marsh 2007). In line with
these perspectives, much recent literature that deals with these international issues has focused on
the role of ‘niche’ or ‘challenger’ parties and their entrepreneurial leaders who seek to make their
parties politically relevant by their appeal to votes almost exclusively on these new international
questions (Meguid 2005; Lynch and Whitaker 2012; Hobolt and Tilley 2016). Much of that literature
has concentrated in turn on the rise of ‘populist’ or ‘radical’ right wing parties (Norris 2005; Mudde
2007). In short, international issues from this perspective have largely been treated as extraneous to
the main dimensions of party competition (Mayer and Wagner 2013), the terrain of niche and/or
extremist parties.
This paper argues that international issues have been much more integrated into the
ideological fields of left and right across issue dimensions than the niche and extremist models
suggest and that contemporary party competition can be usefully understood in terms of political
fields in which international questions play a significant defining role within left and right camps.
Thus, we should consider viewing parties in terms of a combination of their domestic issue stances
on left-right ideology and their stances on international questions. In brief, parties may be of the
anti-integrationist right, the anti-integrationist left, but also the integrationist right, and the
integrationist left, with many parties of left and right still in an ambiguous, “muddy” position on the
integration issue. From the perspective we advance here, international issues do not comprise
simply a set of new challenges that remain unintegrated into mainstream party competition and
2
open to niche parties but are rather are a constitutive part of the issue space in which European
party politics as a whole now occurs.
We also note that contestation among these political fields appears increasingly to include
strongly critical views of national institutions among anti-integration parties of both left and right.
We that our perspective helps to clarify the strength of anti-establishment and anti-elite sentiment
that disagreements of integration gives rise to because the issue takes on not just economic and
cultural concerns but also questions about control – ‘rigged’ or otherwise – of national democratic
institutions.
Our argument builds on the work by Kriesi et al. (2006) that discusses how integration
became embedded into existing economic and cultural dimensions – while at the same time altering
their character. Kriesi et al. (2006) suggested that globalization has led to a new cleavage dimension
pitting winners against losers, but with different characteristics on the left and right. On the left,
opposition to integration take a more strongly economic protectionist stance. On the right, the promarket instincts of conservative parties collide with their culturally conservative stances, leading to
the potential for divisions over integration (and globalization) (Kriesi et al.2006 p. 924). However,
while Kriesi and his collaborators clearly recognize the dilemmas for mainstream right and left
parties, they also expect empirically a “strengthening of peripheral political actors, who tend to
adopt a ‘losers’ programme”. Peripheral actors on the right are expected to be culturally more
protectionist, and peripheral actors on the left to be socially and economically more protectionist
than their respective mainstream counterparts” (p. 928). In short, while integration has the potential
for shaking up party systems across the board, these authors expect the major changes to occur at
the “peripheral” end of party systems, just as the niche party literature argues.
This model surely captures part of the party system dynamic and also accounts for the
inertia of party positions that parties’ reputations produce. However, it also leaves a number of
questions unanswered. Most importantly, we argue that previous analyses neglect a crucial aspect
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that connects to the rise of contentiousness over integration. Why does opposition to integration
(and globalization) lead to such intense debates rather than being just one of many issues? We think
that in addition to the run-of-the-mill explanations—their crosscutting nature and novelty—there is
one missing aspect in previous accounts and it centres on the question: How do parties evaluate
those political institutions that helped to produce the rise of contentious issues in the first place?
Much has been made in the literature about the significance of ‘critical citizens’ (for comprehensive
recent reviews see Dalton 2004; Norris 2011; Hobolt 2012; Thomassen 2012). We now also witness
the rise of ‘critical parties’ (Rohrschneider and Whitefield 2017). While the rise of these parties is
clearly a complex phenomenon, we develop here the argument that part of the explanation lies in
the ways in which support for and opposition to integration has been brought into party
competition. The dominance of parties committed to integration may lead the anti-integrationist
left to argue that national institutions fail to deliver defences of economic welfare. In turn, the antiintegrationist right may highlight the failures of national institutions to defend cultural identity. The
institutional question, therefore, may also cut across left and right and connect with the pro/antiglobalization dimension in ways to reinforce those divisions that underlie their stances about
globalization. In other words, by relating institutional views to stances about globalization, we can
provide an explanation for why critics of globalization and integration often resort to anti-elitism
appeals, which provides a unique element of convergence of the “nationalist” left and right.
The dynamics of ‘anti-establishment’ politics that is significantly driven by the exclusion of
anti-integration parties from regime access is still clearly in flux. Our previous research
(Rohrschneider and Whitefield 2016) has pointed to relative stability in the stances of prointegration parties up until 2013 that, given strongly growing public Euroscepticism has given a
representational opening to ever more anti-integration and regime critical parties. In line with our
theory, in fact, lack of responsiveness of pro-integration parties of left and right is likely to further
fuel regime critical parties. While some signs are emerging of change in the integration stances of
parties that have historically had significant regime access, e.g., the British Conservative and Labour
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parties, raise the possibilities of a shift in the institutional dimension of party contestation also, for
the moment, however, that implications of that possibility for the strength of anti-establishment
politics remains speculative, though intriguing.
Our empirical analysis is based on expert surveys conducted by the authors in 24 European
countries in 2013 that included all electorally significant parties. Our findings show that prointegration parties on the ideological left are distinguished based on their extreme leftist economic
position. But on the cultural dimension, they are about as pro-liberal as pro-integration parties on
the left and the right. In contrast, the distinguishing feature of anti-integration parties on the right is
their extreme cultural conservatism whereas they are not particularly distinguished on the economic
dimension. However, what unites the nationalist left and right is their strongly negative views of the
performance of national democratic institutions. So, while anti-integrationist parties hark back to
days in which national institutions were sovereign – over the economy or national cultures – this
does not translate into a positive vision of how they currently perform. Rather, likely the control of
such institutions so far by pro-integration parties and governments is viewed by ‘critical parties’ as
evidence of democratic failure. Here we find that both the nationalist left and right are rather
critical of the performance of regimes which may explain why opposition to the EU coincides with
negative stances about the performance of a regime. Ultimately, this association may go some way
to shed light on the question why pro-nationalist policy stances prompt anti-establishment
strategies—because the ruling elite, which is largely pro-integration, uses institutions to advance
their policy agendas.
Our findings points to the importance of taking into account differences between both left
and right parties and parties that are pro- or anti-integration. Rather than framing integration issues
within the paradigm of challenger, niche or extremist parties, our analysis offers confirmation that
integration has already been substantially integrated into left-right politics across the whole range of
parties. In other words, we do not find that integration is associated with only economic or cultural
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stances (van der Brug and van Spanje 2009; Prosser 2016); rather it is associated with both as well as
with views of migration. Nor do we find that there is a new dimension of party competition that
simply pits liberal globalization winners against illiberal globalization losers. Rather, opposition to
integration comes from both liberal (left) and conservative (right) perspectives. At the same time,
we do find that parties on both the nationalist left and right that are strongly critical of national
democratic institutions and, especially, of the EU as well. In short, nationalist stances appear to have
become associated with institutional criticisms.
Our results have important implications for understanding the growing impact of
international issues on how parties appeal to voters, and why these policies appear associated with
a critique of national and EU institutions. While left (and right) parties offer similar and intelligible
positions on a number of dimensions that may make their cooperation – and voter choice – simpler,
they are also divided on the core question of international integration. Moreover, the intrusion of
anti-establishment issues as an orthogonal dimension that divides the left and right complicates
voter choice further.
2. Theorising international issues in party competition
There is widespread agreement that the nature of European party competition has altered over
recent decades. While it remains the case that this redistributive dimension is the most important
to party competition in Europe (Rohrschneider and Whitefield, 2012), new identity and lifestyle
issues, around women’s and later gay rights, personal autonomy and the choice or rejection of
‘unconventional lifestyles’ have reshaped the conflict space in advanced democracies (Inglehart,
1990; Dalton 2015). Over time, parties developed connections between economic and cultural issues
that largely fused economically left with culturally liberal positions and pro-market with culturally
conservative positions (Kitschelt, 1994; Knutsen 2006). And when established parties did not
accommodate these new preferences, the Greens formed and became so successful that they
became part of governing coalitions across Europe, notably in Germany. By the time that European
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integration awoke from a “sleeping giant” in the pre-crisis era (van der Eijk and Franklin 2004),
domestic conflict space formed the backdrop against which international crises emerged, from the
financial crash, the Euro crisis, to the migration crisis to Brexit.
For much of the pre-crisis era, international issues were not associated with divisions over
domestic issues because dominant mainstream parties staunchly supported integration. Accordingly,
for parties on the left, internationalism could be sold as supportive of a social market and control of
capital, as well as being culturally liberalising (Marks, Wilson, and Ray 2002). For parties of the right,
internationalism could be sold as a means of consolidating and liberalising the market system,
including the labour market, and developing trade, while they simultaneously appealed to
conservative family and lifestyle values as a means of preserving social cohesion in the face of
economic change. While such parties of left and right therefore differed in the details of how the
international system should operate and what it would deliver, both significantly converged on its
neo-liberal foundations: international integration was supposedly beneficial to their core
constituents. Nowhere was this more evident than in the elite consensus on the European Union.
We also see a strong permissive consensus in the East regarding the value of EU accession across
much of the political spectrum (Vachudova 2015).
Given the consensus among the mainstream in their pro-EU stances, most of prior analyses suggest
that integration issues remained largely unconnected to economic and cultural domestic issue
positions (van der Brug and Spanje 2009; Albright 2010). From this vantage point, anti-integration
policies were the purview of “niche” or ideologically extreme parties (Wagner 2012; Wagner and
Meyer 2013), whereas mainstream parties were largely portrayed as a bulwark for Europe’s
integration against its critics. In contrast to this view, some analysts did propose that integration
issues had become “embedded” (Kriesi et al. 2006, p. 924) into the domestic conflict dimensions
within mainstream parties by associating the pro-globalization stance with cultural liberalism and
the anti-integration stances with cultural conservatism (Kriesi et al.2006; Prosser 2016). However,
7
Kriesi et al. still expected empirically that the main lines of conflict would be restricted empirically to
what he terms “peripheral” versus mainstream parties. However, while we recognise that there are
strong reasons for pro-integration parties to remain committed to these stances for reputational and
strategic reasons (Rohrschneider and Whitefield 2016), there is reason to doubt that international
issues are the preserve of only extremist or niche parties nearly a decade into the economic and
other crises in Europe. There are clearly a growing number of Eurosceptical voter and office-seeking
parties should have incentives to pursue them (Hobolt and de Vries 2016). We find increasingly
clear evidence of this in cases such as the Conservative Party in the United Kingdom or Fidesz in
Hungary or PiS in Poland.
Political institutions have become linked to these contentious economic and cultural debates
over integration, for at least two reasons. First, anti-integration stances may become associated with
a more negative view about national institutions, especially among parties that are opposed to these
shifts in national power for policy reasons and that have often had limited regime access. Second,
much of the literature and public debate about this issue focuses strongly on the rise of populist
parties, again often framed from a “niche” or extremist perspective. However, as we have argued
elsewhere (Rohrschneider and Whitefield 2017), we see no little evidence that negative stances
regarding national institutions are the preserve of niche and/or extremist parties only. Thus, to the
degree that we see a split over integration stances emerge, we may well see that the same camps
differ in their evaluations over how well institutions work. For the left anti-integration parties,
national institutions no longer function to protect welfare or regulate corporate power. For the right
anti-integration parties, these institutions fail to protect national culture and identity. So, while
these critical parties may demand greater national control, they are highly critical of current national
democratic practice.
Accordingly, table 1 begins to outline various theoretical possibilities of how parties in each
of our theorised fields may respond. The left-most column lists four important policy domains that
8
are either historically established (economy, cultural issues) or that have recently become more
pressing (migration, regime evaluations). If our argument is correct, we expect that these issues
divide parties within the “left” and “right” into distinct camps based on their integration view. That
is to say, we would expect that the pro-EU left camp systematically associates a different position of
domestic policies than the anti-EU left. In addition, we would expect the pro-EU right camp to do the
same. The summary of our expectations about the stances of each field in Table 1 highlights this
logic. We indicate how parties of left and right will broadly share positions on the economy, culture,
and migration. We also indicate how the emergence of critical positions on national democracy and
the evaluations of EU institutions relates to these fields.
Table 1 about here
Following from this, we outline the following expectations about the positions taken by
party fields defined by ideology and views of integration. In each issue dimension, the first
expectation regards the relationship between an issue position and left and right; the second
incorporates the influence of nationalism on issues stances within the left and the right.
Economy:
1. The economic dimension pits left versus right regardless of stances on international
integration.
1a. Anti-integrationist parties of the left are most extreme on economic issues since they
advance their criticism of internationalism in its economic effects; anti-integrationist parties of the
right likely adopt a centrist (muddy) position because they appeal mainly on other issues and seek to
win support across social groups that have quite distinct views on the economy.
Culture:
2. The cultural dimension pits a liberal left versus conservative right regardless of stances on
international integration.
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2a. Within each ideological camp, integrationist parties will take more strongly liberal
positions because, on the left, these parties have strongly supported the cultural benefits of
liberalism, and on the right, because anti-integrationist parties have sought to play up the
liberalism’s negative cultural consequences.
Migration:
3. The migration dimension pits left versus right regardless of stances on international
integration.
3a. Migration is relatively more strongly supported within each camp by integrationists who
have seen it as essential to achieving the benefits of market integration and, among left
integrationists, because it also satisfies some social justice concerns; however, it is strongly opposed
especially by right anti-integrationists for both economic and cultural reasons; left antiintegrationists are less distinct from other left parties on this issue because they focus their criticism
of internationalism on capital rather than labour (or poor migrants).
National and EU regimes:
4. Stances on regimes’ democratic performance will cut across left and right camps. Prointegration parties see national and EU institutions as broadly delivering their programmes which
they have been able to pursue because they had regular regime access, which anti-integration
parties have (until very recently in some countries) been denied. Anti-integrationists on the left will
be critical because national institutions fail to deliver welfare and regulate corporate power; those of
the left see national institutions failing to protect national culture. Both anti-integrationist camps
will see EU institutions as responsible for policies that threaten their constituents.
3. The surveys and measurement of political fields
10
We test these hypotheses using expert surveys conducted in 24 European nations in 2013 which
cover all EU-member-states as of January 1, 2014 (except Croatia, Cyprus, Luxembourg, and Malta).
Given the significant number of small parties that exist in many party systems, we used two criteria
to determine their inclusion in this study: (1) they were represented in a national parliament; and/or
(2) they received at least 2% of the national vote in the last election. Overall, the 2013 CEE survey
covers 71 parties in 10 EU member-states in CEE; and the WE survey covers 108 parties in 14
countries, for a total of 179 parties in 24 nations. The appendix table A1 lists the parties and
countries included in the surveys, along with the number of experts for each country.
We recruited experts from a master list of scholars who published a peer-reviewed article or
book on her party system in the past ten years. Our search generated a list of names with over 1000
experts. For each country, we aimed to have ten completed questionnaires which we achieved for
most countries (see Appendix). We conducted several analyses following Steenbergen and Marks
(2007) and Coma and van Ham (2015) to check whether the variance decomposition of indicators in
our expert surveys parallels that found in other expert-surveys. Extensive validation analyses show
that our surveys produce empirical patterns that closely match those generated by other data
sources.1 Moreover, merging the 2014 Chapel Hill estimates with our 2013 data, we find that, on
general left-right ideology, estimates for party positions are virtually identical in the two surveys
(r=.97). The UNC cultural position indicator (“Gal-Tan”) is also closely related to a cultural issue
indicator based on migration, social policies, and civil liberties in our expert surveys (r=.93). Finally,
we find a strong relationship regarding parties’ position about European integration r=.93). All told,
these patterns suggest that these different expert surveys produce broadly identical estimates for
party positions.
To operationalize the theoretical interests in political fields defined by parties’ international
positions as we developed above, we first considered party stances on European integration using
1
For example, there is a high correlation between the ideological placement of parties in expert surveys and the
programmatic perceptions of parties by voters (see Dalton et al. 2011). We also validated the expert surveys
with extensive analyses (Rohrschneider and Whitefield 2012).
11
three measures included in the expert surveys (see the appendix for details on question wording).
These measure party positions towards economic, political, and general integration. Since we also
asked respondents to indicate the general left-right ideology of parties, with 1 denoting the extreme
left and 7 denoting an extreme right, combine the integration and ideology indicator by
dichotomizing the left-right scale at the mid-point; and by trichotomizing the integration scale. We
then combined them as follows (again, see the measurement table for more details)
Anti-integrationist right: parties are ideologically conservative and against integration;
Anti-integrationist left: parties are ideologically in the left half and against integration;
Integrationist left: parties are ideologically in the left half and support integration;
Integrationist right: parties are ideologically in the left half and support integration;
Muddy left: parties are ideologically left and in the middle of the integration indicator;
Muddy right: parties are ideologically on the right and in the middle of the integration
indicator.
Figure 1 about here
The resulting distribution of parties is shown in Figure 1. The formula for dividing parties
into fields depending on the combination of left-right ideology and stances on European integration
produces 19 anti-integrationist right parties, 14 anti-integrationist left parties, 37 integrationist left
parties, 46 integrationist right parties, 37 Muddy Left, and 31 Muddy Right. (Full details of parties
by field are found in the Appendix.) We note that at least one field is missing in all but one country
(Denmark) so clearly there are important country and regional differences at play that need to be
taken into account. Parties of the anti-integrationist left appear less frequently in Central and
Eastern Europe compared to the West and those of the integrationist right and muddy-right
somewhat more frequently. Anti-integrationist left parties are more likely to be present however in
countries affected by the economic crisis.2
2
Clearly, we are interested in explaining cross-national and cross-regional variation in the presence of each field
– as we are also in considering the impact of time on existing parties and on new entrants to each field. However
12
An approach of this sort to understanding the role of international issues in contemporary
party competition differs from the existing focus on mainstream versus niche parties, since the latter
are generally expected to take stances only on issues that are weakly connected to the main
dimensions of party competition over which mainstream parties dominate. It also seeks to advance,
though not replace, long-standing conceptualisation of party families (Mair and Mudde, 1998) as
well as to simplify the range of fields in which parties are arrayed. The key thing about the party
family approach is that it relies not only on a left-right ideological spectrum but that it makes
judgements about family status on the basis of parties’ stances on almost entirely national domestic
issues: the economy and culture. But, we argue, if international issues have become a significant
sorting factor for parties, then the party family approach is inadequate since we would expect that
the existing party family typology would be cut across to a significant degree by the intrusion of
international issues.
Accordingly, table 2 cross-tabulates each field defined by internationalism stances with party
family. Not surprisingly since our measure incorporates ideological stances, we find considerable
overlap between fields and party families (Cramer’s V = .51). This is most pronounced, gratifyingly,
with respect to the anti-integrationist party families on left and right. Parties of the antiintegrationist left are mainly drawn from the Communist, Socialist and Green families (though
notably from all three of them). But we also see that parties of the integrationist left may also be
drawn from Socialists, Greens, Centrists/Liberals and even one Christian-democratic party, as well as
(mainly) from Social-democrats. Similarly, the integrationist right includes Conservative, Christiandemocrats, as well as many Centrists and Liberals. Our analytical goal, again, is not to suggest that
the concept of party family has no meaning in a domestic context, since party families conceptually
are linked to stances on domestic issues. Rather, we suggest that stances on integration will only
imperfectly fit with domestic lines of division and the evidence suggests that integration does indeed
this goes beyond the focus of the current paper and so in the analysis which follows we introduce controls for
both national characteristics.
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divide parties of the left and the right into distinctive camps in ways that evidence only about party
family does not show.
Table 3 about here
4. Fields of party politics
We next turn to the ways in which political fields defined by ideology and stances towards
integration issues relate to parties’ positions on a range of other issue dimensions. Thus, in line with
the theoretical expectations presented in Table 1, we expect parties of the right to take similar views
on the many issues – economy, culture, migration - but to be quite distinctively located on others –
especially national and EU institutions. The same will hold true of parties of the left.
We start then by considering the stances of parties in each field on a range of economic
issues.3 These items were combined a scale that reflects stances on the economy from support for
government intervention and redistribution (low score) to support for free markets (high score).
Figure 2 about here
The results shown in Figure 2 are roughly in line with our expectations but nonetheless
throw up some surprises. While left parties are clearly more pro-redistributive, we observe
substantial differences within the left camp across the integration dimension. Anti-integrationist left
parties are considerably more leftist than the integrationist left across every single issue area. On
the combined scale, ranging from a minimum of 3 to a maximum of 21, the difference between the
anti and pro-EU left parties is fully 7.7 points (12.7 vs. 20.4). This suggests to us that the antiintegrationist left uses a distinct anti-market stance to appeal to critics of the EU’s neo-liberal
markets. Moreover, a comparison on the left also indicates that the muddy-left is also consistently
more supportive of redistributive policies than the integrationists, though the difference (2 points) is
33
The measurement table in the appendix describes the wording for each item.
14
not as pronounced. A similar pattern appears on the right, where parties as a group are clearly more
economically pro-market, but here integrationist right parties are much more so than the antiintegrationist right, which are rather close to the muddy on almost all economic items. So, it
appears that the effect of left-right ideology remains in understanding the broad stances of parties
on the economy, but integration positions divide left and right internally.
Next, we consider the stances of each field on items associated with the liberal-conservative
dimension. Again, on the basis of several indicators, we created a summary indicator gauging where
parties stand on social issues, the environment, and civil liberties (appendix table).
Figure 3 about here
As with economic issues, Figure 3 shows that the integration fields are both as expected and
also differentiated in interesting ways on liberal-conservative issues. The left on liberalism issues
appears to be fairly united: anti-integrationist, integrationist and muddy-left parties are broadly
liberal in their views, with no more than a 1-point difference on the combined scale. This suggests
that the left does associate cultural issues with pro and anti-EU stances, even though the
integrationist left stands out as the relatively most liberal party on these issues. On the right
however a rather clear difference emerges: the anti-integrationist right is clearly more conservative
culturally than the integrationist right on the summary scale and even more so when their relatively
centrist position on the environment is set aside: on a 7-point scale (with 7 = conservative position),
anti-integrationist right parties overall score 5.63 on social liberalism and 6.32 on law and order,
compared to 3.78 and 4.29 respectively for integrationist right parties (more than 4 points difference
on the 20 point scale). Again, therefore, it appears that standard expectations about where parties
stand on liberal-conservative questions are met when we view party systems overall from extreme
left to right, but that integrationist parties are driven in a more liberal direction by comparison with
other parties within the left and right camps.
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Finally, in light of our theoretical expectations, we consider three further questions that
may be relevant to each party field: migration and the performance of national as well as EU
democratic institutions. The first of these taps into an issue of great contemporary salience, with
migration often seen as a particularly central issue to the anti-integrationist right. The second two
tap into concerns of many critics of ‘establishment’ politics.
Figure 4 about here
As Figure 4 shows, anti-integrationist right parties are very clear (anti-migration) outliers.
Indeed, the anti-integrationist and muddy-right are the only fields that adopts a negative (less than 4
on the 7-point scale) migration stance, which accords with our expectations about the integrationist
camp – the integrationist right in fact is broadly positive about migration. Regarding the antiintegrationist left, however, our expectations are not fully met, since these parties are only slightly
less supportive of migration than the integrationist left. Again, it appears that positive stances on
integration associate with stances of both left and right in a more pro-migration direction.
Figure 5 about here
Finally, as Figure 5 shows, evaluations of national and especially EU regimes’ democratic
performance by party field show sharp divisions between anti-integrationist parties of left and right,
on the one hand, and integrationist parties of both ideological persuasions, on the other. The most
positive evaluations, however, come from the integrationist and muddy-right and the most negative
from the anti-integrationist left, which if anything appears even more committed to ‘antiestablishment politics’ than the anti-integrationist right.
Summary: Grouping parties by a combination of their stances on international issues and
their ideological position appears to map them in distinctive ways on the main dimensions of party
competition – the economy and liberalism-conservativism issues. Two main points emerge. First, we
show differences within left and right camps that appear to relate systematically to integration
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stances. Second, only with regard to views of national democratic institutions do anti-integrationist
parties of left and right appear to converge in a distinctively critical stance.
5. Multivariate analysis
The patterns revealed in the bivariate analysis are suggestive of the importance of where parties
stand on international issues for their broader policy perspectives on the main dimensions of party
competition as well as other issues. However, in themselves they do not allow us to conclude that it
is the party fields that are of relevance, since it is possible that what is driving the variance we
observe are other features of parties or country-level differences. We need first, therefore, to
introduce country-level controls to the analysis. Two contextual characteristics likely impact on the
distribution of fields. First, and obviously, the quality of national democratic institutions may incline
parties to take more critical stances regarding the quality of national democratic institutions.
Countries with poor quality institutions may also give rise to concerns about core elements of
liberalism – political and social rights – and high levels of corruption may increase (or undermine)
support for redistributive policies. Second, the level of affluence of a country may similarly incline
parties to adopt more or less welfare supportive or economically liberal stances or shift parties
towards greater support for post-material culturally liberal values. We therefore specific a multilevel
multivariate model that controls for these country differences.
Theoretically, we see two main challenges to the usefulness of the concept of party fields
that are sorted by left and right and stances on integration. First, we control for the possibility that
differences between party fields is simply an effect of ideological extremism – in other words, that
the fields do in fact identify differences in parties within the broad left and right camps, including
those that are relatively ideologically centrist. We examine this by including a dummy variable
gauging whether a party is in the left/right most ten percent on the ideology scale. Second, we
control for the possibility that differences are the result of the stances taken by niche parties driven
by political entrepreneurs that have emerged specifically to compete by taken extreme positions on
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one or more ideological dimensions. Hence, we also control for party age and whether a party is a
new entrant to the electoral market after 2008. Together, the variables of extremism and party age
controls for the mainstream-challenging party dimension in European politics and thus assures that
our typology does not just duplicate information contained by this dimension.
Figures 6-9 about here
The findings in Figures 6-9 are strikingly similar to the bivariate picture that emerged above
for each of the four issue dimensions. Perhaps the most important takeaway, therefore, is that the
utility of the concept of fields defined by stances on integration and left-right is not removed either
by the country controls or by the two main alternative accounts of the differences discussed above.
These are not effects simply of ideological extremism or niche status but are evident even when
both of these are taken into account. Our findings regarding the associations between our
international typology and domestic issue positions remain robust. Stances on integration and
domestic issue positions appear to define distinctive positions within left and right and not just on
the ideological extremes or new parties seeking to establish themselves in a unique set of issue
positions. In short, as we have argued above, incentives to parties to offer alternatives to voters
within left and right camps, appears to mean that integration is integrated into party positions
across all party types.
The relationships we observed earlier also stand up. Left and right continue to strongly
define ideological camps on most dimensions; the left as a whole is more left on the economy, more
liberal on culture, and more supportive of migration than the right. The scheme we adopt,
moreover, shows the ongoing utility of separating the left and right centrist parties on integration
stances, since left-muddy are much more like other leftist parties on most dimensions than they are
like right ones. However, our scheme also points to the value of understanding integration stances
for positions within left and right camp. The more pro-integration the party within each camp, the
more likely it is to be more right-wing on the economy, more liberal on culture, and more supportive
18
of migration. These findings are absolutely consistent across these policy dimensions. Antiintegrationist parties are not like one another on any of these dimensions.
There is one issue, however, on which integration stances appear strongly to shape party
stances independently of their left-right ideology, namely on the question of the performance of
national democratic institutions. Here, again controlling for extremism and niche status, both the
anti-integrationist right and especially the left are strongly negative and all other parties are more
positive, especially the (right) integrationist ones. As we predicted, since national institutions do not
protect the economic agendas of the left or the cultural agendas of the right, so critical parties have
emerged in both camps.
7. Conclusions
This paper has built on some previous work, especially by Kriesi, and argued for the need to take
international issues as a defining factor in contemporary party competition. Rather than seeing
questions such as economic integration, culture, and migration, as challenging but largely orthogonal
to the ideological space, we suggest that these issues have already largely been incorporated
systematically into the politics of left and right.
Our perspective and evidence, however, runs quite counter to much of the literature that
points to the orthogonality of integration to one or both of the main lines of political division – the
economy and culture – or that integration reframes only the cultural dimension in a new way based
on winners and losers from globalization. Moreover, our findings remain even when we control for
extremism and new entrant parties as well as party age. Thus, while our analysis therefore largely
supports Kriesi’s conceptual expectations, we observe that the sorting of parties on the left and right
by stances on integration goes beyond niche and extreme parties. Rather, it has an impact in
shaping the positions of all parties across the ideological spectrum.
19
It is a significant new finding of the paper, however, that the issue of national democratic
institutions, emerges as a clearly orthogonal dimension on which the anti-integrationist left and right
converge in their evaluations. We argue that this is because pro-integrationist parties have been
able successfully to control national institutions for their purposes and thus their opponents have
come to see both that these institutions fail to deliver on welfare or cultural defences of nations and
that such parties have been excluded from access to institutions. For this reason, cultural and
economic issues of integration have become embedded in issues of democratic control. Those in
control, in these circumstances can be more easily labelled elites or the establishment. The
politicisation of integration on this dimension may be new newest and most contentious aspect of
contemporary party competition.
Whether it remains so, is a matter of considerable interest. The continued exclusion of
these parties may entrench their anti-establishment hostility. But we can envisage two ways in
which anti-integration stances may become decoupled from regime critical politics. First, as we
observe in the Hungarian (and likely) Polish examples, electoral victories by previously strongly
critical and anti-integrationist parties such as Fidesz and PiS can be accompanied by strongly positive
shifts in their stances on national institutions as they gain the power to reshape them in power. In
these cases, however, the switch to pro-regime stances is likely to be accompanied by strongly
negative shifts in the institutional evaluations of their pro-integration and liberal opponents.
Second, as might be the case in the United Kingdom, an anti-integrationist switch by parties
(Conservative and Labour) that have had long-standing access to government and with historically
positive views of national institutions may weaken the regime critical aspect of anti-integration
politics. Whether, therefore, a schism over democratic institutions will take on the character of a
sustained and deep divide in European party competition remains an open question. Nonetheless,
as in the Hungarian example, it is not difficult to see the potential that this might result.
20
We believe that at least some of the public discussion of relationship between antiintegrationist parties of left and right is clarified by this analysis. Take the following stylised (but
hopefully accurate) example of the positions of Bernie Sanders and Donald Trump in the US
presidential campaigns. Both opposed free trade and globalization and were strongly critical of
domestic economic and political elites. But Sanders was clearly left in his economic policy, since his
criticisms of the international order were mainly economic in character, while Trump’s position was
much less rhetorically clear in economic terms and much more based in cultural fears. Antiintegrationists of left and right have quite different profiles. They do not appear to be fishing in the
same pool of voters, except with regard to their strong criticisms of domestic democratic
institutions.
Clearly, there are numerous questions emerging from this investigation. We have dealt here
with only a few party-level factors associated with each political field. We have also considered the
role of national context in a relatively narrow fashion - essentially as controls. However, we expect
that there is likely to be considerable influence on the likelihood of party fields emerging in different
national contexts. Moreover, we have not considered here the further likelihood that national
contexts have a significant impact on how party-level factors affect each field. These are important
questions for further research.
21
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23
Appendix A1: Measurement of Variables
Concept
Party stances on
European integration
Question wording and coding
General integration: ‘What about the parties’ positions on integration with
Europe?’
Political integration: ‘Regardless of the specific form that integration may
take, where do parties stand on creating a politically unified Europe? Do they
strongly support a politically unified Europe?’
Economic integration: ‘Where do the parties in [country] stand on creating a
Europe-wide, integrated market for the European Union?’
Experts used 1 = strongly opposing integration and 7 = strongly supporting it.
We created one additive scale, (alpha=.94) and divided it by three to retain the
original 7 point indicator.
Party left-right ideology
“In [country], parties may be located to the left or the right of the political
spectrum. In general terms, please locate each party on the ideological
spectrum in [country], with 1 standing for left wing, and 7 standing for right
wing.”
Parties on the conservative half of the ideology scale and are equal or score
less than 3 on the 7-point integration indicator.
Parties on the left half of the ideology scale and are equal or score less than 3
on the 7-point integration indicator.
Parties on the conservative half of the ideology scale and are equal or score
more 5 on the 7-point integration indicator.
Parties on the left half of the ideology scale and are equal or score more 5 on
the 7-point integration indicator.
Parties on the left half of the ideology scale and in the middle of the
integration indicator (greater than 3 and less than 5).
Parties on the right half of the ideology scale and in the middle of the
integration indicator (greater than 3 and less than 5).
Redistribution and welfare: ‘With regard to redistributional issues (for
example, tax levels, welfare state spending), where does [party x] stand?’ 1 =
strongly pro-welfare and redistribution; 7 = strongly pro-market and antiredistribution.
Anti-integrationist right
Anti-integrationist left
Pro-integrationist right
Pro-integrationist left
Muddy left
Muddy right
Re-distribution
Inequality
‘What position does [party x] take on social inequality in [country]?’ 1 = social
inequality is unjustified and undesirable; 7 = justified (because of incentives,
justice etc.) and desirable.
Taxation and spending
‘What position does [party x] take on taxation?’ 1 = favors raising taxes to
increase public spending; 7 = favors cutting public spending to cut taxes.
Minimum wage
‘What stance does [party x] take on the minimum wage?’ 1 = strongly favor, 7
= strongly oppose. (NB. The scale is reversed here from the survey wording in
order to make it fall in the same direction as the other items.)
Welfare benefits
‘What stance does [party x] take on welfare benefits?’ 1 = strongly favor
universal benefits, 7 = strongly support means-tested benefits.
Health care
‘Does the party advocate for government provision of universal free health
care or for expenses being paid by individuals who would pay from private
24
health insurance?’ 1 = strongly support universal free health care; 7 = strongly
support private provision through health insurance.
Higher education
Summary indicator
economic stances
‘Does [party x] support free higher education for all with qualifications or that
higher education should be paid by individuals via savings and loans?’ 1 = free
for all qualified; 7 = paid by individuals.
This scale includes all 7 economic items. Alpha = .97. Scale ranges from 8-45.
Social liberalism
‘Does [party x] favor liberal policies such as abortion, equal opportunities for
women, homosexuality or euthanasia or does it oppose them’. 1 = support; 7
= oppose
Environment
Does [party x] support protection of the environment, even at the cost of
some economic growth or support economic growth, even at the cost of
damage to the environment. 1 = support protection; 7 = support growth.
Civil liberties
Does [party x] support policies to promote civil liberties, even when this
hampers efforts to fight crime and promote law and order (or support tough
measures to fight crime and promote law and order, even when this means
curtailing civil liberties. 1 = support civil liberties; 7 = support law and order.
Summary indicator
cultural stances
This scale includes all three items. Alpha = .86. Scale ranges from 3-20, with a
low score indicating a more liberal stance. The results are shown in Table 7.
Migration
‘What position does [party x] take on migration of people in and out of
[country]?’ 1 = oppose; 7 = support.
“What about the party’s view of how well democracy works in [country]? Do
parties hold positive (7) or negative views (1)?”
“And on the whole, how satisfied are you with the way democracy works in
[country]?” where 0 denotes an extremely dissatisfied citizens and 10 an
extremely satisfied one. We recoded the original variable to range from 0 to 1
by dividing the original score by 10.
New significant party since 2008
Party stances on
Regime Performance
Parties’ evaluations of
Regime Performance
New party
Party Age
Extremism
Institutional quality
Parties in the most extreme 10% on the left and most extreme 10% on the
right
Additive index of 2012 World Bank scores on corruption, rule of law, and
electoral integrity (http://info.worldbank.org/governance/wgi/index.aspx#faq2; accessed October 2, 2014).
GDPcap
Source: IMF/Eurostat, 2012
25
Table 1. General Expectations
Left
Economy
Culture
Migration
National Democracy
EU Democracy
Right Economy
Culture
Migration
National Democracy
EU Democracy
Anti-Integrationist
Interventionist
Liberal
Pro-migrant
Critical
Critical
Centrist
Strongly illiberal
Strongly opposed
Critical
Critical
Integrationist
Market friendly but pro-welfare
Strongly liberal
Strongly pro-migrant
Positive
Positive
Strongly pro-market
Illiberal
Supportive
Strongly positive
Positive
26
Table 2. Integration fields by party family (Cramer’s V = .51***; significant at .000)
AntiIntegrationist Muddy Muddy Integrationist AntiIntegrationist left
left
right
Right
Integrationist
left
Right
Communists
5
Socialists
4
Greens
1
Social
Democrats
0
0
0
0
0
0
1 8
0
0
0
7
7
1
0
0
16
13
1
1
0
Centrist/Liberal 1
6
6
4
17
0
Christian
Democrats
0
2
1
9
9
1
Conservatives
0
0
2
12
17
5
Nationalists
1
0
0
4
1
13
27
Figure 1. Party fields by integration stances and left-right
28
Figure 2: Mean score of integration fields on economic issues
0
10
20
30
Economic Stances by Nationalism-Internationalism
Nat Left
Int left
Centre left Centre right Int Right
Nat Right
29
Figure 3: Mean scores of integration fields on liberal-conservative issues
0
5
10
15
20
Cultural Stances by Nationalism-Internationalism
Nat Left
Int left
Centre left Centre right Int Right
Nat Right
30
Figure 4: Mean scores of integration fields on migration and performance of national democratic
and European institutions
0
1
2
3
4
5
Migration Stances by Nationalism-Internationalism
Nat Left
Int left
Centre left Centre right Int Right
Nat Right
31
Figure 5: Mean Scores of National and EU Institutional Evaluations
0
1
2
3
4
5
National/EU Regime Evaluations by Nationalism-Internationalism
Nat Left
Int left
Centre left Centre right Int Right
Nation
EU
Nat Right
32
Figure 6. Party stances on the economy controlling for country characteristics (HDI and
Corruption) and for ideological extremism, party age and new entrants.
10
15
20
25
30
35
Economic Issues (8 left 45 right)
Nat Left
Int left
Centre left Centre right
intnat6
Int Right
Nat Right
Figure 7. Party stances on cultural liberalism controlling for country characteristics (HDI and
Corruption) and for ideological extremism, party age and new entrants
8
10
12
14
16
18
Cultural Liberalism (3) Conservatism (21)
Nat Left
Int left
Centre left Centre right
intnat6
Int Right
Nat Right
33
Figure 8. Party stances on migration controlling for country characteristics (HDI and Corruption)
and for ideological extremism, party age and new entrants
3
4
5
6
7
Migration (1 Pro 7 Oppose)
Nat Left
Int left
Centre left Centre right
intnat6
Int Right
Nat Right
34
Figure 9. Party stances on performance of national and EU democratic institutions controlling for
country characteristics (HDI and Corruption) and for ideological extremism, party age and new
entrants
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
National Democracy (1 Poor 7 Strong Performance)
Nat Left
Int left
Centre left Centre right
intnat6
Int Right
Nat Right
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
EU Democracy (1 Poor 7 Strong Performance)
Nat Left
Int left
Centre left Centre right
intnat6
Int Right
Nat Right
35
Appendix: Parties in the survey and by field
Country: WE Party Name in RW survey
Austria
Social Democratic Party of Austria
Austrian People's Party
The Greens
Freedom Party of Austria
Alliance for the Future of Austria
Team Stronach
Acronym
SPO
OVP
GRUNE
FPO
BZO
TS
Field
Cntr.Left
Int.Right
Int.Left
Nat.Right
Cntr.Right
Nat.Right
Belgium
Christian-Democratic & Flemish
New Flemish Alliance
Reform Movement
Flemish Interest
Flemish Liberals and Democrats
Socialist Party
Socialist Party. Different
Humanist Democratic Muddy
Ecologists
List Dedecker
The Flemish Greens
CDV
N-VA
MR
VB
VLD
PS
SPA
CDH
ECOLO
LDD
GROEN
Int.Right
Cntr.Right
Int.Right
Nat.Right
Int.Right
Cntr.Left
Cntr.Left
Int.Left
Cntr.Left
Cntr.Right
Cntr.Right
Denmark
Denmark's Liberal Party
Social Democracy
Danish People's Party
Socialist People's Party
Conservative People's Party
Radical Liberals
Unity List - The Red-Greens
Liberal Alliance
V
S
DF
SF
KF
RV
EL
NA
Int.Right
Cntr.Left
Nat.Right
Cntr.Left
Cntr.Right
Int.Left
Nat.Left
Cntr.Right
Finland
Finnish Muddy
National Coalition Party
Finnish Social Democratic Party
Left Alliance
Green Alliance
Finnish Christian Democrats
Swedish People's Party in Finland
True Finns
KESK
KOK
SDP
VAS
VIHR
KD
SFP
PS
Cntr.Right
Int.Right
Int.Left
Cntr.Left
Cntr.Left
Cntr.Right
Int.Right
Nat.Left
France
Union for a Popular Movement
Socialist Party
Democratic Movement
National Front
The Greens
New Muddy
Radical Party of the Left
Radical Party
Left Front
Centrist Alliance
UMP
PS
MoDem
FN
VERTS
NC
PRG
PR
FDG
AC
Int.Right
Int.Left
Int.Right
Nat.Right
Int.Left
Int.Right
Int.Left
Int.Left
Nat.Left
In.Right
36
Germany
Christian Democracy Union
Christian Social Union
Social Democratic Party of Germany
Free Democratic Party
The Left (Party of Democratic Socialism, PDS)
Alliance 90/The Greens
Piratenpartei
CDU
CSU
SPD
FDP
DIE LINKE
GRUNE
Piraten
Int.Right
Cntr.Right
Int.Left
Int.Right
Cntr.Left
Int.Left
Cntr.Left
Greece
New Democracy
Panhellenic Socialist Movement
Communist Party of Greece
Coalition of the Radical Left
Independent Greeks
Golden Dawn
Democratic Left
ND
PASOK
KKE
SYRIZA
ANEL
XA
DIMAR
Int.Right
Int.Right
Nat.Left
Cntr.Left
Nat.Right
Nat.Right
Int.Left
Ireland
Fianna Fáil
Fine Gael
Labour Party
Sinn Fein
Green Party
Socialist
People Before Profit Alliance
FF
FG
LAB
SF
GP
SP
PBP
Cntr.Right
Int.Right
Cntr.Left
Nat.Left
Cntr.Left
Nat.Left
Nat.Left
Italy
Left Democrats
League North
The People of Freedom
Union of the Muddy
Five Star Movement
Civic Choice
Left_Dem
LN
PDL
UDC
M5S
SC
Int.Left
Nat.Right
Cntr.Right
Int.Right
Nat.Left
Int.Left
Netherlands Christian Democratic Appeal
Labour Party
Socialist Party
People's Party for Freedom and Democracy
Freedom Party
Green Left
Christian Union
Democrats 66
Party for the Animals
Reformed Political Party
50 Plus
CDA
PvdA
SP
VVD
PVV
GL
CU
D66
PvdD
SGP
50+
Cntr.Right
Cntr.Left
Nat.left
Cntr.Right
Nat.Right
Int.Left
Cntr.Left
Int.Left
Cntr.Left
Nat.Right
Cntr.Left
Portugal
Socialist Party
Social Democratic Party
Portuguese Communist Party
Democratic Social Muddy
Left Bloc
PS
PSD
PCP
CDS-PP
BE
Int.Left
Int.Right
Nat.Left
Cntr.Right
Cntr.Left
Spain
Spanish Socialist Workers' Party
PSOE
Int.Left
37
People's Party
United Left
Initiative for Catalonia Greens
Convergence and Union of Catalonia
Basque National Party
Union, Progress, and Democracy
Amaiur
PP
IU
ICV
CiU
EAJ-PNV
UPyD
AMAIUR
Int.Right
Cntr.Left
Int.Left
Int.Right
Int.Right
Int.Right
Cntr.Left
Sweden
Social Democratic Workers' Party
Moderate Rally Party
Muddy Party
Liberal People's Party
Christian Democrats
Left Party
Environment Party The Greens
Sweden Democrats
SAP
M
C
FP
KD
VP
MP
SD
Cntr.Left
Int.Right
Cntr.Right
Int.Right
Cntr.Right
Nat.Left
Nat.Left
Nat.Right
UK
Labour Party
Conservative Party
Liberal Democrats
Scottish National Party
Plaid Cymru
UK Independence Party
LAB
CON
LD
SNP
PC
UKIP
Cntr.Left
Nat.Right
Int.Left
Cntr.Left
Cntr.Left
Nat.Right
38
Country CEE Party Name in RW survey
Bulgaria
Bulgarian Socialist Party
GERB
Movement for Rights and Freedoms
National Union Attack
Democrats for a Strong Bulgaria
Movement “Citizen’s Bulgaria”
Acronym
BSP
GERB
DPS
ATAKA
DSB
DBG
Field
Cntr.Left
Int. Right
Cntr..Left
Nat.Right
Int.Right
Int.Right
Czech Rep.
Civic Democratic Party
Czech Social Democratic Party
Communist Party of Bohemia and Moravia
Christian and Democratic Union
Green Party
Public Affairs
Traditional Responsibility Party
Party of Civic Rights
ODS
CSSD
KSCM
KDU-CSL
SZ
VV
TOP09
SPOZ
Cntr.Right
Int.Left
Nat.Left
Int.Left
Int.Left
Cntr.Right
Int.Right
Cntr.Left
Estonia
Estonian Reform Party
Estonian Muddy Party
Pro Patria and Res Publica Union
Social Democratic Party
Estonian Greens
Conservative People’s Party
RF (RE)
EK
IrL
SDE
ER
EKRE
Int.Right
Cntr.Left
Int.Right
Int.Left
Cntr.Left
Nat.Right
Hungary
Hungarian Socialist Party
Fidesz – Hungarian Civic Union
Politics Can Be Different
Movement for a Better Hungary
Together 2014
MSZP
FIDESZ
LMP
JOBBIK
Egyutt
Int.Left
Nat.Right
Int.Left
Nat.Right
Int.Left
Latvia
Union of Greens and Peasants
Harmony Muddy
Reform Party
Unity
National Alliance
Latvian Green Party
ZZS
SC
RP
V
TB/LNNK
LZP
Cntr.Right
Cntr.Left
Int.Right
Int. Right
Cntr.Right
Cntr.Right
Lithuania
Lithuanian Social Democratic Party
Fatherland Union
Order and Justice - Liberal Democrats
Liberal’s Movement of the Republic of Lithuania
Labour Party
Lithuanian Poles' Electoral Alliance
Lithuanian Peasant and Greens Union
Way of Courage
Lithuanian Green Party
LSDP
TS-LK
TiT
LrLS
DP
LrA
LVZS
DK
LLZP
Int.Left
Int.Right
Cntr.Right
Int.Right
Cntr.Left
Cntr.Left
Cntr.Left
Int.Right
Cntr.Left
Poland
Law and Justice
Civic Platform
PIS
PO
Nat.Right
Int. Right
39
Democratic Left Alliance
Polish People's Party
United Poland
Palikot’s Movement
LiD
PSL
SP
RP
Int.Left
Cntr.Right
Cntr.Right
Int.Left
Romania
Social Democratic Party
Democratic Liberal Party
National Liberal Party
Conservative Party
Democratic Alliance of Hungarians in Romania
Christian Democratic National Peasant’s Party
New Republic Party
Civic Force
People’s Party-Dan Diaconescu
PSD
PDL
PNL
PC
UDMR
PNTCD
PNR
FC
PP-DD
Int.Left
Int.Right
Int.Right
Cntr.Right
Int.Right
Int.Right
Int.Right
Int.Right
Nat.Left
Slovakia
Christian Democratic Movement
Slovak Democratic and Christian Union
Direction - Social Democracy
Party of the Hungarian Coalition
Slovak National Party
Ordinary People and Independent Personalities
Bridge
Freedom and Solidarity
New Majority Party
KDH
SDKU
Smer
MKP
SNS
OL’aNO
MH
SAS
NV
Cntr.Right
Int.Right
Int.Left
Int.Right
Nat.Right
Cntr.Right
Int.Right
Cntr.Right
Cntr.Right
Slovenia
Slovenian Democratic Party
Social Democrats
Slovenian People's Party
New Slovenia - Christian People's Party
Democratic Pensioners' Party of Slovenia
Positive Slovenia
Civic List
SDS
SD
SLS
NS
DSUS
PS
DL
Cntr.Right
Int.Left
Cntr.Right
Cntr.Right
Cntr.Left
Cntr.Left
Int.Right