FACTORS DEFINING POSITIONS OF LEFT PARTIES ON THE IMMIGRATION ISSUE

In this article, we study factors defi ning left party’s policy positions on the immigration issue. This theme is not so popular in  political science despite of plenty of works devoted to that problem  in the context of far-right and mainstream parties. Therefore in this  paper, we propose our own models that takes into account two kinds of factors: endogenous (organizational) traits and exogenous (enviromental) arrangement. Proposed models try to explain the  position and saliency of immigration issue in the manifestos of  socialdemocratic, green and new left parties. We pay more attention  on several independent variables, such as electoral competition (we  operationalize it through the notion of effective number of parties  offered by Laakso and Taagepera), migration rate, popularity of far- right party, party’s nicheness, organizational traits (that we consider in terms of leaders-activists relations). We have two dependent  variables which called (1) party position on the immigration issue  and (2) saliency of this issue. In order to estimate necessary links  between variables we use regression analysis of time-series-cross- section data. As units of our research we present political party’s  moves in 10 Western European countries between 1975 and 2010.  We conclude that organizational peculiarities with its link to the  electoral competition make infl uence to the dependent variable.  Niche parties tend not to concentrate their attention on the issue of immigration, but if they do that greens and new lefts demonstrate proimmigrant positions. Social-democrats try to act less forthrightly  in order to maximize their electoral support.

1. Abou-Chadi, T. Niche Party Success and Mainstream Party Policy Shifts – How Green and Radical Right Parties Differ in Their Impact // British Journal of Political Science, 2016, Vol. 46, Issue 2, pp. 417-436.

2. Adams, J.; Clark, M.; Ezrow, L.; Glasgow, G. Are Niche Parties Fundamentally Different from Mainstream Parties? The Causes and the Electoral Consequences of Western European Parties’ Policy Shifts, 1976-1998 // American Journal of Political Science, 2006, Vol. 50, No. 3, pp. 513-529.

3. Akkerman, T. Immigration Policy and Electoral Competition in Western Europe: A Fine- Grained Analysis of Party Positions over the Past Two Decades // Party Politics, 2015, Vol. 21, No. 1, pp. 54-67.

4. Alonso, S.; Claro da Fonseca S. Immigration, Left and Right // Party Politics, 2011, Vol. 18, No. 6, pp. 865-884.

5. Beck, N.; Katz, J.N. What to Do (and not to Do) with Time-Series Cross-Section Data // The American Political Science Review, 1995, Vol. 89, Issue 3, pp. 634-647.

6. Belanger, E.; Meguid, B. Issue Salience, Issue Ownership, and Issue-Based Vote Choice // Electoral Studies, 2008, No. 27, рр. 477-491.

7. Bischof, D. Towards a Renewal of the Niche Party Concept: Parties, Market Shares and Condensed Offers, 2015. Mode of access: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/277010804_Towards_a_Renewal_of_the_Niche_Party_Concept_Parties_Market_Shares_and_Condensed_Offers

8. Bornschier, S. The New Cultural Divide and the Two-Dimensional Political Space in Western Europe, 2010. Mode of access: http://www.zora.uzh.ch/41247/1/wep_bornschier.pdf

9. De Winter, L.; Swyngedouw, M.; Dumont, P. Party System(s) and Electoral Behavior in Belgium: From Stability to Balkanisation // Western European Politics, 2006, Vol.29, No. 5, pp. 933-956.

10. Hooghe, L.; Marks, G.; Wilson, C. Does Left/Right Structure Party Positions on European Integration? 2002. Mode of access: http://www.cesruc.org/uploads/soft/130221/1-130221191A6.pdf

11. Inglehart, R.; Welzel, К. Modernizaciya, Kulturnye Izmeneniya I Demokratiya: Posledovatelnost chelovecheskogo razvitiya (Modernization, Cultural Change and Democracy: The Human Development Sequence). Мoscow: Novoe izdatelstvo, 2011. 464 p.

12. International Migration Database of The Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development. Mode of access: http://stats.oecd.org/Index.aspx?DataSetCode=MIG

13. Keith, D.; McGowan, F. Radical Left Parties and Immigration Issues, 2014. Mode of access: https://www.sussex.ac.uk/webteam/gateway/fi le.php?name=workingpaper-132.pdf&site=266

14. Kitschelt, H. Diversifi cation and Reconfiguration of Party Systems in Postindustrial Democracies, 2004. Mode of access: http://library.fes.de/pdf-fi les/id/02608.pdf

15. Kitschelt, H. The Transformation of European Social Democracy. London: Cambridge University Press, 1994. 365 p.

16. Laakso, M.; Taagepera, R. Effective Number of Parties: A Measure with Application to West Europe // Comparative Political Studies, 1979, Vol. 12. No. 2, pp. 3-27.

17. Laver, M.; Ben Hunt W. Policy and Party Competition. London: Routledge, 1992. 256 p.

18. Lundell, K. Determinants of Candidate Selection. The Degree of Centralization in Comparative Perspective // Party Politics, 2004, Vol. 10, No. 1, pp. 25-47.

19. March, L.; Rommerskirchen, C. Out of Left Field? Explaining the Variable Electoral Success of European Radical Left Parties // Party Politics, 2015, Vol. 21, No. 1, pp. 40-53.

20. Meguid, B. Competition Between Unequals: The Role of Mainstream Party Strategy in Niche Party Success // Annual Political Science Reciew, 2005, Vol. 99. No. 3, pp. 347-359.

21. Meyer, T.; Miller, B. The Niche Party Concept and Its Measurement // Party Politics, 2015, Vol. 21, No. 2, pp. 259-271.

22. Petrocik, J. Issue Ownership in Presidential Elections, with a 1980 Case Study // American Journal of Political Science, 1996, Vol. 40, No. 3, pp. 825-850.

23. Poguntke, T. Green Parties in National Governments: From Protest to Acquiescence? / in Green Parties in National Governments, ed. by Ferdinand Muller-Rommel and Thomas Poguntke. London: Portland OR, 2002. Pp. 133-145.

24. Reynolds, A.; Reilly, B.; Ellis, A. Electoral System Design: The New International IDEA Handbook. Mode of access: http://www.citizensassembly.gov.on.ca/en-CA/docs/Intermediate/IDEA%20Handbook.pdf

25. Schumaher, G.; De Vries, C.; Vis, B. Why Political Parties Change Their Positions: Enviromental Incentives & Party Organization // The Journal of Politics, 2013, Vol. 75. No. 2, pp. 464-477.

26. Solovey, T. Institucional’naya transformaciya sovremennyh politicheskih partij (Institutional Transformation of Modern Political Parties), 2009. Mode of access: http://www.elib.bsu.by/bitstream/123456789/89019/1/3.PDF

27. Taggart, P. The Populist Turn in the Politics of the New Europe, 2003. Mode of access: http://aei.pitt.edu/2962/1/165.pdf

28. Volkens, A. Manifesto Coding Instructions (Second Revised Edition), 2002. Mode of access: http://www.poltext.org/sites/poltext.org/files/iii02-201.pdf

29. Wagner, M. Defi ning and Measuring Niche Parties // Party Politics, 2011, Vol. 18, No. 2, pp. 845-864.