201102 - Why do People Support Radical-Left parties in Western Europe? with Luis Ramiro, UNED and Visiting Associate Professor at Sciences Po, CEE

Key Theme "Strains on Democratic Representation" Seminar

Monday 2 November 2020, 12.30 – 1.30 pm, Sciences Po, via Zoom (compulsory registration)

The seminar introduces Luis Ramiro's’ work to the Sciences Po community, starting from his book manuscript “ Voting for the Radical Left in contemporary Western Europe”.
 
Radical left parties are commonly present in most West European party systems. These parties have experienced serious political, organizational, and electoral crises, as well as many environmental challenges and changes. They have gone through periods of electoral demise — notably during the 1980s — and expansion — the most recent during the 2010s. They have maintained a significant presence in many West European parliaments through periods that the scholarship qualifies as of dealignment, of changes in the cleavage structure and in the political dimensions of conflict, and of realignment. This seminar will present the key findings of a book manuscript co-authored with Raúl Gómez (University of Liverpool) where we analyse the factors that help to explain the support that these radical left-wing parties receive from the contemporary electorates of Western Europe. The main goal is to offer the first comprehensive study of the factors that drive the vote for these parties, as well as to identify the various contextual circumstances that foster the electoral support for the radical left nowadays. These analyses allow us to establish the degree to which contemporary radical left parties in Western Europe share a common social base across countries and to what extent we can judge them as electorally anchored in the dimensions of conflict structuring European politics. Our analyses examine the role of a varied set of variables, measured both at the individual level and at the country level, that contribute to explaining radical-left voting.

Speaker:

Luis Ramiro, UNED and Visiting Associate Professor at Sciences Po, CEE

Luis Ramiro's fields of expertise are the analysis of political behavior, political organizations and political attitudes. His research has been published, among other journals, in West European Politics, Party Politics, Political Studies and European Political Science Review.

Discussion:

Romain Lachat, Sciences Po, CEVIPOF

Chairs:

Caterina Froio, Sciences Po, CEE & Jan Rovny, Sciences Po, CEE & LIEPP

Compulsory Registration 

For more information: caterina.froio@sciencespo.fr: