Suchergebnisse

"This book explores how the multiplicity of nationalist parties across the European Union have embraced or refused the process of European integration and made it a platform for transnational coordination in the European arena. The author analyzes how opposing pro-European minority nationalist parties and Eurosceptic populist nationalist parties have diversely politicized European integration over the past three decades and engage in different patterns of Europeanization. Tracing their divergent trajectories of transnational coordination, the book examines the common challenges these opposing nationalist party families face and their systematic fragmentation in the European arena. The book offers a novel approach to understanding the conditions for the emergence of truly European nationalist party families, based on the interaction of ideological, strategic and institutional variables that underpin the Europeanization of heterogeneous nationalisms. Nationalisms in the European Arena will be of interest to students and scholars across a range of disciplines including sociology and political science. It contributes to the increasing literature on identity politics in the European Union and reveals the mechanisms behind why the European arena is adverse to the political translation and organization of domestic nationalisms as distinctive European actors."--

"Some scholars have defined autonomist parties - as well as green and radical right parties - as `niche' parties (Meguid 2005; Adams et al. 2006). Niche parties exhibit three main characteristics: the absence of traditional politics, the novelty of the issues they espouse, and the politicisation of a restricted set of issues in electoral competition (Meguid 2005: 347-348). Although appealing, this categorisation is of limited utility for understanding autonomist parties. Some of these parties, for example, can be considered as mainstream parties, or as 'intrinsically catch-all parties' in the politicisation of issues and competitive dynamics (De Winter 1998: 223). Whether autonomist parties can be treated as 'niche' or 'mainstream' parties in their lifespan also depends on context and political opportunity structures. Many autonomist parties alternate between being niche and mainstream dynamics. For example, autonomist parties can behave as mainstream parties at the regional level of representation while they retain characteristics of niche parties at other levels of representation. Institutionalisation and 'normalisation' in party systems also involves many challenges and trade-offs. Some autonomist parties have been electorally very successful, and have managed to cross the thresholds of representation and relevance. However, achieving other goals, such as passing the threshold of government, may be more difficult, and may have significant implications for internal party dynamics. The Bloque Nacionalista Galego (BNG) is an interesting case for examining some of the tensions autonomist parties experience between being 'niche' and 'mainstream' parties at different stages of development and at different territorial levels. The BNG evolved from being a marginal antisystem force in the early 1980s to being a moderate coalition partner in the Galician government more than two decades later. Over a near thirty-year period, the BNG followed a linear trajectory that distanced the party from its ideological and organisational origins and gradually changed party internal dynamics and goals. The aim of this chapter is to examine this trajectory from marginality to party consolidation and eventually government, and to explain why and how the BNG evolved from its birth in 1982 to the present." (author's abstract)

¿Cómo se explica la evolución de un partido nacionalista minoritario, de la marginalidad política al gobierno? La tercera ola de movilización nacionalista en Europa definió un nuevo espacio político para partidos nacionalistas sin representación política previa. Este artículo analiza esta trayectoria, desde los fracasos iniciales hasta el gobierno, utilizando el caso del BNG en Galicia. Se define, en primer lugar, el «ciclo vital» del partido en sus distintas fases de desarrollo, desde las posiciones antisistema hasta su participación en el gobierno autonómico. Posteriormente, se explica el impacto de estos procesos, tanto en las dinámicas internas y organizativas, como en los objetivos perseguidos por el partido a lo largo de su trayectoria. En síntesis, las decisiones sobre los objetivos partidistas fueron decisiones «blandas» de adaptación gradual al contexto político e institucional, pero transformaron la identidad y la dinámica organizativa del partido. ; What implications does the evolution of minor nationalist parties from marginality to government for party internal dynamics? The third wave of nationalist mobilization in Europe defined a new political space for nationalist parties without previous political representation. This article analyzes this specific trajectory, from initial failures to government, using the case of the Galicia BNG. It explains the impact of expanding political space for internal party dynamics and organization, as well as reshaping party objectives over time. In short, decisions about party objectives were 'soft', of gradual adaptation to the institutional and political context, yet they radically transformed the identity and organizational dynamics of the BNG.

Résumé En Italie, le succès de la Lega Nord illustre de manière saillante le mélange original entre quête identitaire et thématiques de la nouvelle droite en Europe. En quelques années, la Lega Nord est passée du statut d'organisation marginale à celui d'acteur incontournable du nouveau système de partis italien. Le développement récent de ce parti s'est caractérisé par la gestion de contradictions profondes entre mouvement qui se définissait contre le "système" et qui a finalement participé au gouvernement dirigé par Silvio Berlusconi. Ainsi, l'institutionnalisation de ce nationalisme du nord de l'Italie illustre l'une des évolutions possibles de la nouvelle droite en Europe.

As the introduction to this special issue highlights, the Great Recession, along with the more recent phenomenon such as the refugees' crisis and the Brexit referendum, has contributed to the success and strengthening of populist Eurosceptic parties across European party systems. The loss of legitimacy of governments and European institutions has opened a window of opportunity for parties expressing anti-establishment positions and populist orientations and criticizing the political-economic arrangements prevailing in Europe. Our study focuses on the rise of a specific left-wing populist Euroscepticism linked with the impact of the Great Recession and austerity measures in Portugal and Spain and the party system transformations. Thus, economic issues, bailouts, and, above all, anti-austerity measures were the main driving forces behind the transformations of Iberian party systems. The increase in populist reactions in both countries after the economic crisis and the implementation of austerity had to do with the transformation of the radical left emphasizing distributive issues in Eurosceptic populist directions. Finally, the analysis shows the distinctiveness of the populist Euroscepticism of the new challenger, Podemos, which illustrates the opportunities afforded with the economic crisis for the rise of new challenger parties exhibiting the contemporary link between populism and Euroscepticism in the radical left.

Résumé L'Esquerra Republicana de Catalunya (ERC) est à la fois le parti nationaliste catalan le plus ancien mais aussi le plus mal connu. Parti dominant tout au long de la Seconde République espagnole, il connaît un parcours plus chaotique depuis la transition démocratique coincé sur sa gauche par le parti socialiste catalan et sur sa droite par Convergencia i Unio. Cependant au prix d'une refonte idéologique et stratégique, ce parti nationaliste de gauche ne cesse depuis la fin des années 1990 de développer son implantation au point d'apparaître comme le faiseur de roi depuis les élections autonomiques de 2003. Puisant tout à la fois dans un catalanisme "pur et dur" et dans une tradition sociale-démocrate, ERC est aujourd'hui une force incontournable de l'espace politique catalan.