Referendums and Intra-Party Conflict in Europe

The relationship between political parties and referendums has been investigated extensively through the lenses of processes external to parties. These usually include the referendum initiation, campaigning, or result implementation. We know very little about the effects of referendums on the internal life of parties. This paper addresses this gap in the literature and seeks to identify the circumstances under which intra-party conflicts are the result of referendums organized at national level. Referendums can create divisions in societies and they are likely to produce similar effects within parties. The analysis covers the referendums organized at national level between 2012 and 2022 in 10 European countries. It focuses on the political parties that gained parliamentary seats in the same time frame in those countries. We argue and test the explanatory potential of several variables at country (experience with referendums, support for referendums in society), referendum (topic, initiator) and party level (ideology, age, previous factionalism etc.).