Dynamics of protest and electoral politics in the Great Recession

This article links the consequences of the Great Recession on protest and electoral politics. It innovates by combining the literature on economic voting with social movement research and by presenting the first integrated, large-scale empirical analysis of protest mobilisation and electoral outcomes in Europe. The economic voting literature offers important insights on how and under what conditions economic crises play out in the short-run. However, it tends to ignore the closely connected dynamics of opposition in the two arenas and the role of protests in politicising economic grievances. More specifically, it is argued that economic protests act as a ‘signalling mechanism’ by attributing blame to decision makers and by highlighting the political dimension of deteriorating economic conditions. Ultimately, massive protest mobilisation should, thus, amplify the impact of economic hardship on the electoral losses of incumbents and mainstream parties more generally. The empirical analysis to study this relationship relies on an original semi-automated protest event dataset combined with an updated dataset of electoral outcomes in 30 European countries from 2000 to 2015. The results indicate that the dynamics of economic protests and electoral punishment are closely related and point to a destabilisation of European party systems during the Great Recession.     

BORROKA—The Legitimation of Street Violence in the Political Discourse of Radical Basque Nationalists

The present article analyzes the discourse employed by the left-wing nationalist movement in Spain's Basque Country to legitimize the use of street violence for political ends. I distinguish four “faces” of legitimation (“ex ante” vs. “ex post,” “for us” vs. “for others”) and argue that in a situation of radicalization of politically inspired (terrorist) violence, the discourse developed to justify violent action is principally meant for the organization's own following, and less to communicate with the outside world. Basque militants claimed that their strategy of political and military radicalization in the 1990s had been responsible for recent political successes of their movement.     

Old and new politics: The Dutch peace movement and the traditional political organizations

Abstract. On the basis of data on the Dutch peace movement, we study the relationship between traditional organizations of political intermediation such as parties, unions and churches with a new social movement on the local level. After having argued for the relevance of the institutional context, the general structure of new social movements and the particular structure of the movement under consideration with regard to this relationship, we first present evidence confirming our claims that we are dealing with new social movement. Then we show that the relationships in question are quite elaborate confirming the hypothesis that political activity within traditional organizations and new social movements is to some extent cumulative. More generally, the results imply that the development of the peace movement and other new social movements in the Netherlands is not indicating a diminishing legitimacy of the Dutch political parties.     

Action repertoires in contentious episodes: What determines governments’ and challengers’ action strategies? A cross-national analysis

This paper studies the interactions between governments, challengers and third party actors in the context of 60 contentious policy episodes in 12 European countries during the Great Recession. More specifically, we focus on the endogenous dynamics that develop in the course of these episodes. Based on the combination of a new event dataset, which allows for the construction of action sequences, and a novel method (contentious episode analysis) to study the impact of actor-specific actions on subsequent actions within a sequence, we test a set of hypotheses on the determinants of actors’ overall action repertoires within specific contexts. Overall, our results are more supportive of the interdependence of cooperation than of the interdependence of conflict: the repression-radical mobilisation-external legitimation of conflictive behaviour nexus is weaker than the concession-cooperation-mediation nexus. While the literature tends to focus on conflict dynamics, we find that there is a more systematic dynamics of cooperation in the course of contentious episodes.     

Globalization and the transformation of the national political space: Six European countries compared

Abstract.  This article starts from the assumption that the current process of globalization or denationalization leads to the formation of a new structural conflict in Western European countries, opposing those who benefit from this process against those who tend to lose in the course of the events. The structural opposition between globalization 'winners' and 'losers' is expected to constitute potentials for political mobilization within national political contexts, the mobilization of which is expected to give rise to two intimately related dynamics: the transformation of the basic structure of the national political space and the strategic repositioning of the political parties within the transforming space. The article presents several hypotheses with regard to these two dynamics and tests them empirically on the basis of new data concerning the supply side of electoral politics from six Western European countries (Austria, Britain, France, Germany, the Netherlands and Switzerland). The results indicate that in all the countries, the new cleavage has become embedded into existing two-dimensional national political spaces, that the meaning of the original dimensions has been transformed, and that the configuration of the main parties has become triangular even in a country like France.     

The electoral consequences of the financial and economic crisis in Europe

The electoral consequences of the Great Recession are analysed in this article by combining insights from economic voting theories and the literature on party system change. Taking cues from these two theoretical perspectives, the impact of the Great Recession on the stability and change of Western, Central and Eastern European party systems is assessed. The article starts from the premise that, in order to fully assess the impact of the contemporary crisis, classic economic voting hypotheses focused on incumbent parties need to be combined with accounts of long‐term party system change provided by realignment and dealignment theories. The empirical analysis draws on an original dataset of election results and economic and political indicators in 30 European democracies. The results indicate that during the Great Recession economic strain was associated with sizable losses for incumbent parties and an increasing destabilisation of Western European party systems, while its impact was significantly weaker in Central and Eastern European countries, where political rather than economic failures appeared to be more relevant. In line with the realignment perspective, the results also reveal that in Western Europe populist radical right, radical left and non‐mainstream parties benefited the most from the economic hardship, while support for mainstream parties decreased further.