Why Is The Support For The Extreme Right Higher In More Open Socities?

Nejat Anbarci (nejat.anbarci@durham.ac.uk), Hasan Kirmanoglu and Mehmet A. Ulubasoglu
Additional contact information
Hasan Kirmanoglu: Murat Sertel Center for Advanced Economic Studies, Istanbul Bilgi University
Mehmet A. Ulubasoglu: School of Accounting Economics and Finance, Deakin University

No 201003, Working Papers from Murat Sertel Center for Advanced Economic Studies, Istanbul Bilgi University

Abstract: We investigate the support for extreme right across societies of different levels of openness in Europe. Societal openness is defined as a greater tendency to accept universal vis-àvis traditional values, and is expected to catalyze and filter the socioeconomic factors that affect the vote shares of extreme right (i.e., neofascist and populist parties). We establish that, in more open societies the direct effect of openness on neofascist votes is, as expected, negative. Paradoxically, however, openness increases the neofascist support indirectly through immigration and unemployment. We explain this with socioeconomic dynamics whereby vulnerable native segments of a more open society, i.e., a society manifesting higher welcoming sentiments towards immigrants, turn to neofascists as immigration and unemployment start threatening their material welfare. Moreover, we find that openness has no direct effect on the support for populist parties, but has indirect positive effects through unemployment. Our results establish strong links among openness, immigration and unemployment in determining the sources of neofascist and populist support in Europe

Pages: 39 pages
Date: 2007-05
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
http://repeck.bilgi.org.tr/RePEc/msc/wpaper/mscent ... _for_the_Extreme.pdf First version, 2007 (application/pdf)

Related works:
Working Paper: Why is the support for extreme right higher in more open societies? (2007)
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:msc:wpaper:201003

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in Working Papers from Murat Sertel Center for Advanced Economic Studies, Istanbul Bilgi University Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Cankut Kuzlukoglu (belis@bilgi.edu.tr this e-mail address is bad, please contact repec@repec.org).