Radical Right Party Voting in Western Europe. Examining Interactions Between Individual-Level and Party-Level Characteristics

Why do radical right parties (RRP) attract electoral support to cross-nationally varying extents even though aggregate electoral demand is vastly similar across Western Europe? Due to the prevalent disjuncture between the literatures on the cross-national comparison of success and failure of RRP and on the electoral sociology and preferences of their electorate, this question remains widely unanswered. This paper examines the repercussions of contextual variation in cross-national patterns of political competition on individual voting behavior in a multi-level framework. The legislative weight and legitimacy of RRP moderate the effects of ideological proximity and political dissatisfaction: Parties with negligible parliamentary representation and poor legitimacy offer few strategic incentives to ideologically proximate voters and merely attract a portion of those who are also disaffected by the political system. Where RRPs are strong and established, however, radical right voters are primarily and strongly attracted by ideological convictions and political frustration is almost irrelevant.