The Evolution of Major Conflicts: A Diachronic Examination of Class and Transnational Cleavages

New structural changes and socio-economic crises have led to a proliferation of studies on cleavage theory. However, scholars have yet to reach consensus on standardised procedures to assess the social and political rootedness of cleavage structures (both classic and new). This article offers a new diachronic bi-dimensional procedure to check for the presence of a major conflict (or divide) to be labelled as a ‘cleavage structure’ – in particular the class and the transnational cleavages. Harmonising a wealth of Eurobarometer and European Election Study cross-sectional surveys spanning from 1982 to 2024, we reframe these two cleavages into empirically testable hypotheses and offer insights into the evolving political landscape of cleavage structures through the 20th and 21st centuries. Our findings suggest that while the class cleavage persists primarily through its capacity to mobilise ideological voter identities, the transnational cleavage has firmly taken root, both consistently structuring societal divisions along educational lines in relation to EU support and determining political parties’ organisational thickness to their corresponding constituency. The results also indicate that cleavage structures are regionally contingent, thus highlighting the complexity of contemporary European societies and politics, as new alignments form in inconsistent ways across European member states.