Fringe political parties or political parties at the fringes? The dynamics of political competition in post-communist Europe

Introduction

The party politics literature in post-communist Europe focused extensively on the (lack of) consolidation of mainstream, the fragmentation of the political spectrum, the openness and availability of the electorate reflected in volatility and the rise and fall of single issue parties (including radical right with a strong nationalistic agenda and the ethnic parties) (Biezen, 2003; Gherghina, 2014; Grzymala-Busse, 2007; Kitschelt et al., 1999; Lewis, 2001; Tavits, 2013). This has generally been studied in terms of the ‘threats from the fringes’ to mainstream. What exists at the fringes is either unclear or treated as a general challenge for the mainstream. The emphasis lies on the relationship between the fringe and mainstream parties and little is known about what happens at the fringes, what are the features of politics at the fringes and when this type of politics becomes mainstream. This symposium moves beyond the notion of the fringe versus mainstream dichotomy: it is more ‘granular’ in its approach and seeks to differentiate between different forms of ‘fringe’ parties. The contributions aim to explore how and whether the fringe in post-communist countries changes in an age of populism and illiberalism. To this end, they represent an important attempt to take the fringe as a feature of politics that is not necessarily transient or a manifestation of the ‘growing pains’ of post-communism.

The analysis proposed by this symposium is embedded in the broader research agenda in the region. In an attempt to understand the existence of challenges and developments, and to explain their causes and consequences, existing research on post-communist politics focuses extensively on two components: political actors and external influences. First, politics is almost entirely limited to political parties and their elites in these countries (Gherghina, 2014; Grzymala-Busse, 2007; Webb and White, 2007). There are only isolated instances whereby non-partisan politicians or experts are appointed or elected to key positions and it usually happens on a temporary basis (e.g. technocrat caretaker governments). Most of the time, even those who start out as independents in politics either end up joining an existing party, or they establish their own. With few exceptions, research has focused extensively on mainstream political parties and their organizations, actions and elites. Mainstream parties have been traditionally defined in the literature in terms of their issue positions (centre-left and centre-right), size and availability for or prominence in government/opposition coalitions (Meguid, 2008; Pytlas, 2016; Sartori, 1976). The second major strand of the literature looks at the influence of the European Union on these political actors. The focus has been on how Europeanization has shaped these countries not only in terms of policy processes but also the behaviour of political parties with some impact on party systems. The most visible effect is on the internal organizational dynamics of national political parties both in Western and Eastern Europe (Gherghina and von dem Berge, 2017; Poguntke et al., 2007).

In this context, the political parties and movements ‘at the fringes’ and the ways in which they change and impact upon political competition have been viewed in rather narrow terms. As each of the articles in this symposium highlights, the impact of the crises has seemingly fuelled populism within the mainstream and the fringe, currently challenging the conventional model of consensus politics. These developments correspond to the third post-communist decade and have led to the emergence of political parties located outside the primary dimension of competition, which initially attracted the support of a small proportion of the electorate. This seems to be a critical development: the parties and issues that were once located at the fringes and beyond the realm, largely, of government – opposition competition now operate in the mainstream, with the centrist parties in some cases relegated to the fringes. This necessitates taking these parties and issues more seriously whether because they create more of a threat, or because they matter politically and procedurally. At the same time, it necessitates a different understanding of the fringes, that is, instead of seeing it as a repository of the insignificant, extremists and so on maybe we now need to recognize that what emerges at the fringes can become mainstream and vice versa. In other words, the spotlight shifts. A more provocative way of expressing this would be to ask whether the fringe had become the new mainstream, for example, as a way of characterizing the populist illiberal shift in Croatia, Hungary, Poland or Romania.

So far, most studies reflecting upon fringe political parties in post-communist Europe focused mainly on the populist or radical right (Mudde, 2000; Pirro, 2015; Pytlas, 2016; Stanley, 2017; van Kessel, 2015). However, other types of political party operating at the fringes (e.g. ethnic parties) have not been investigated in relation to the mainstream parties, nor have their internal structures, leadership, aetiology and developmental trajectories been properly explored. This symposium seeks to advance existing knowledge by investigating why, and under what conditions do fringe political parties move away from the fringes of politics. Before explaining how this is achieved through the contributions, the following section discusses the differences between the fringe parties and the parties at the fringes.

Fringe parties and politics at the fringes

The symposium nuances the common understanding and conceptualization of fringe parties and of the politics at the fringes. Fringe political parties have invariably been defined (1) in opposition to mainstream parties, which embody a stable and durable locus of competition in a party system, and (2) linked to specific ideological positions. First, following a spatial conception of party competition, there is a dichotomy in the existing literature between fringe and mainstream parties, with the possibility of a bidirectional dynamic. On the one hand, fringe parties may move towards the mainstream based on a rational strategy of vote maximization according to which most voters are aligned to the already established cleavages or social divisions. As such, it may be easier for political parties to emerge at the fringes because the political space is less populated, but their electoral performance is likely to improve when competing in the more crowded political space. In essence, the fringe parties move away from the fringes in order to try to maximize their support. This tendency has been observed for the radical right-wing populist parties across several European countries (Akkerman et al., 2016; Gherghina and Miscoiu, 2014; Wodak, 2015). On the other hand, there is research speaking about the contagion effects from fringe parties to mainstream parties, with the latter moving towards the fringes to mobilize alienated electorates. Several studies analysed how mainstream parties adjust their positions in response to the existence and rhetoric of fringe parties (Abou-Chadi, 2016; Bale et al., 2010; Meguid, 2005; Meijers, 2017; Schnabel, 2014) or how the mainstream values have been radicalized (Mudde, 2013).

However, the political reality is more diverse and includes parties that may also strive to remain fringe and not move towards the mainstream. In this sense, whether they gradually become more mainstream (and if so, why and at what cost) is only one of the available options. Some fringe parties wish to stay at the fringes because, contrary to the assumption within the existing literature, their fringe quality and the issues on which they focus actually maximize their electoral support. This could be a consequence of their populist turn. Moving away from the fringes could mean losing the support of their initial voters without the certainty of support from other voters. For example, the ethnic parties attract the support of a small but very stable proportion of the electorate (Chandra, 2013; Ishiyama and Breuning, 2011). In post-communist Europe, the ethnic parties are the least electorally volatile political parties because they constantly address the concerns of a particular segment of society (Gherghina, 2014). By staying fringe and not competing directly against mainstream parties, the ethnic parties become available partners for government coalitions across the political space (Gherghina and Jiglau, 2016). Another example is that some of the fringe parties are populist actors with anti-elite and anti-establishment rhetoric (Barr, 2009; Mair, 2002; Mudde, 2007). If they become part of the mainstream, the credibility of their discourse against the establishment gets weaker. The political reality of some post-communist countries indicates that some former mainstream parties move towards the fringes in a process of radicalization of their discourses against the other political competitors, for example, Fidesz in Hungary (Rupnik, 2012) or the social democrats in Romania.

Another reason to remain at the fringes is that such a position allows political parties to suggest alternative dimensions of competition. For example, the Pirate Party in Sweden used its position at the fringes to create an explicit identity on the sociopolitical cleavages in the modern information society (Demker, 2014). In Romania, at the 2012 national elections, the People’s Party Dan Diaconescu (PPDD) – discussed in detail in one of the contributions to this symposium – brought the issue of diaspora into the mainstream by remaining at the fringe in the political space (Gherghina and Miscoiu, 2014). Since then, the idea of encouraging people in diaspora to return to the country has been used by several mainstream parties. Most recently, this discourse has been used in the 2019 European elections by the Liberals and the newly created PlUS USR Alliance, several years after the PPDD vanished from the political scene.

The politics of the fringe in post-communist states is more complex than the existing literature tends to assume also because the fringe space is usually characterized by a high degree of political and electoral volatility. Politics at the fringes does not remain the same, there are developments that can prove decisive for a thorough understanding of the political processes. For example, if fringe parties move towards the mainstream, they could face competition from the political parties that have emerged to populate their previous position at the fringes.

An extensive body of literature considers fringe parties as associated with various political ideologies or values. A series of studies associated the fringe parties with a strong Eurosceptic position departing from the premise that, in their quest for electoral support, such parties contest the idea of European integration and thus restructure the dimensions of competition to oppose the mainstream parties that traditionally favor the EU (Aspinwall, 2002; Taggart, 1998). When including opposition to European integration as part of the broader radical ideology, there is a situation in which fringe radical right and radical left parties have made Euroscepticism as central tenet of their rhetoric (March, 2011; Mudde, 2007). Earlier research often considers the radical right and left parties as fringe due to their nationalist, anti-migration or anti-capitalist discourse that go against the general values displayed by the other actors in the party system. Nevertheless, their actions are not confined to the fringes and in post-communist Europe the interaction of the radical right with mainstream parties produced important effects for the policy agenda (Minkenberg, 2015). Fringe parties have been most commonly associated with populists. Since populism is a thin ideology (Stanley, 2008) or at best conceived as a discursive frame (Aslanidis, 2016), the populist rhetoric is the one positioning these actors at the fringes. With a discourse based on the dichotomy between the people and the elites, the populists deliberately distinguish themselves from the mainstream. Things get complicated when populists end up in government, their position at the fringes is threatened and their strengths from the period in opposition have a boomerang effect (Heinisch, 2003).

There are other types of parties that are fringe and are not confined to an ideology. For example, ethnic or religious parties have as their main feature the representation of a specific ethno-national or religious minority, without using a particular ideology. In fact, they resemble a catch-all party because they have to accommodate the broad array of demands and needs emanating from the in-group members. Another example is the existence of regionalist political parties, which are fringe at the national level. This party type does not always share the ideological features mentioned above. For example, a study about the Scottish National Party indicates that its elites favour European integration because it creates a more favourable political opportunity structure for their subnational autonomy movements (Jolly, 2007). Similarly, the newly emerged niche parties (the Pirates) promote the direct involvement of citizens in the decision-making process, increased freedoms and liberties, that is, freedom of information and free speech, and higher transparency. Their rhetoric can sometimes take a populist shape – especially when addressing the corruption and involvement of people in politics – but their general values make it a specific political genre beyond the people-elite divide.

As a result of all these nuances, in the context of this symposium we conceptualize fringe political parties as those that are either at the extremes of the predominant political cleavage or parties that specifically represent particular (minority) segments of society. These segments can be an ethno-national minority, a territorial or religious constituency or ideologically based groups. Thus, such parties include, but are not limited to, regionalist parties, radical left and right parties, ethnic parties and religious (e.g. Muslim) parties. They do not usually manage to mobilize more than low levels of mainstream support, yet many political parties at the fringes retain a constant constituency and may be quite resilient or progressive.

Contributions to the symposium

The fundamental question to which this symposium seeks an answer is whether there is a set of core features that characterize fringe parties across post-communist Europe or do we observe very different political parties that happen to be operating away from the mainstream? The key issue is whether and how there is a dynamic at the fringes in general and vis-à-vis the mainstream in particular. The symposium includes both single and comparative case studies, and contributions based on quantitative analyses (based on electoral data from national polls) and qualitative analyses (based on content analysis, party histories or organizational developments). At the same time, contributions address both the supply (party organization, type of leadership and discourse) and the demand (voters) sides of fringe political parties. The geographic coverage is broad and includes the EU Member States in post-communist Europe (including the Baltics), Republic of Moldova and the countries in the Western Balkans. Several contributions adopt a longitudinal approach and assess the developments of fringe political parties over time.

The symposium includes a combination of theoretical and empirical contributions with a particular focus on the following elements: the effect of fringe political parties on the political and party system in which they activate (Heinisch et al. and Pirro et al.), the importance of leadership and organizational structure for the electoral performance of fringe political parties (Gherghina and Soare; Ishiyama and Stewart), the conditions under which political parties move away from the fringes of politics (Stanley et al.) and the reasons why parties at the fringes appeal to potential voters (Buzogany).

The first contribution from Heinisch et al. investigates the effect of radical right fringe parties on mainstream parties with an analysis based on data from the Comparative Manifesto Project. The article examines the relationship between the policy programmes of the two types of parties in Central and Eastern Europe. The findings indicate that the sociocultural issues in the fringe party manifestos do not systematically relate to the changes in mainstream party manifestos regarding those issues. On these dimensions, the power of the fringe parties to influence the policy agenda remains limited and partially contradicts earlier results from the region (Minkenberg, 2015; Pirro, 2017).

From the perspective of Hungary, Pirro et al. interrogate the spatial understanding of ‘what goes on at the fringe’ and conclude that focusing on the interaction between fringe and mainstream parties only partially captures the complexity, fluidity and dynamism of far-right politics. They argue that an analysis of far-right politics must be centred around a deeper exploration of the interaction between fringe parties and extra-parliamentary organizations. What their longitudinal study of the interaction between Jobbik and the network of far-right organizations illustrates is how this dynamic is critical in explaining moderation at the structural level – and, thus, incomparably valuable to assess a distancing from the fringe beyond discourse alone. Their data also highlight the precarity of assuming that any shift between mainstream and fringe constitutes deradicalization of fringe actors, and suggest that any such claims ‘must be interrogated both relationally and thematically’.

If the case of Hungary endorses the assertion that strong networks are important in sustaining far-right parties and enabling a certain fluidity between the fringe and mainstream, Buzogany’s article, which adopts a demand-side perspective, shows that voting for parties of the radical right (PRR) is driven by lower levels of associational membership and social trust, and by higher political participation. Focusing on PRR party voters in seven Eastern European EU member countries between 2004 and 2014, the article finds no clear signs of increased civic engagement among the voters of such parties. Indeed, the findings call into question assertions in the recent broader literature on PRR that suggests such parties or social movements increasingly rely on specific social capital, foster interpersonal trust and have dense associational interlinkages, and that this ‘new type’ of PRR parties is also present in Central and Eastern Europe (CEE). While the discussion on social capital, civil society and PRR voting has mainly remained focused on Western Europe, this contribution shows that evidence for this conjunction remains weak in CEE countries.

From the perspective of Poland, Stanley et al. seek to answer the opposite question to Pirro et al: why do fringe parties fail to transform and move towards the mainstream? Employing a demand-side approach, their puzzle is to explain why fringe parties that seek to represent other marginal groups or ideological niches have failed to establish themselves in the Polish party system, which is open to newcomers. The conclusion they reach is that fringe parties in Poland are squeezed between mainstream parties that are capable of attracting the natural constituencies of fringe parties, and the greater propensity of potential fringe voters to abstain from participating in elections.

Focusing on Bulgaria, Moldova and Romania, Gherghina and Soare analyse the extent to which particular types of leadership and party organization influence the rise and electoral performance of three fringe parties with a similar profile. Their central argument is that while strong leadership allows these parties to gain visibility and achieve good electoral results, it is solid party organizations that help maintain a level of popularity and enhance the parties’ continuous presence in the parliamentary arena. The authors introduce a new empirical dimension – the party organization – that is also the focus of Ishiyama and Stewart’s continuation that formulates a theoretical framework to examine the organizational characteristics of ethnic minority political parties to explain their electoral performance over time. They use data from 1991 to 2016 for 41 ethnic minority parties across 12 countries and 89 national legislative elections. The results indicate that party organizational capability is the main driver of electoral performance. Although these two contributions refer to different types of fringe parties and use different methods (qualitative and quantitative), the importance of the party organization is paramount in understanding the survival of fringe parties.