What's left after right-wing extremism? The effects on political orientation

Harry Pickard, Georgios Efthyvoulou and Vincenzo Bove

QAPEC Discussion Papers from Quantitative and Analytical Political Economy Research Centre

Abstract: Does radical right political violence favour or hinder public support for right-wing stances? Numerous existing studies have demonstrated that Islamic terrorism provokes a conservative shift, increases nationalism and induces negative sentiments towards immigration. However, little is known about the consequences of far-right terrorism, despite its incidence in Western societies. We leverage four waves of the British Election Study (BES) and use a quasi-experimental design to analyse individual political orientations shortly before and after terrorist attacks. We find that respondents distance themselves from the ideology associated with the perpetrator and shift away from ideological positions at the right end of the political spectrum. Furthermore, respondents are less likely to report nationalistic attitudes and immigration skepticism, core tenets of extremist right-wing political ideologies. Our findings suggest that the characteristics of the perpetrators and their driving goals are crucial factors shaping the impact of terrorism on public sentiments

Keywords: Far-right extremism; terrorist attacks; political opinion; political ideology; quasi-experimental design. (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2021
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-cdm, nep-isf and nep-pol
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:wrk:wqapec:06

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