Immigration, Europe and the ‘new’ cultural dimension
2009/04/01 by Wouter Van Der Brug, Wouter van der Brug, Joost Van Spanje +1 · 558 citations
Social Sciences · #Cleavage (geology) #Democracy #Dimension (graph theory) #Economics #European Union Policy and Governance #Hofstede's cultural dimensions theory #Immigration #Law #Migration, Refugees, and Integration #Newspaper #Political economy #Political science #Politics #Populism, Right-Wing Movements #Positive economics #Representation (politics) #Right wing #Social science #Sociology
paper · doi:10.1111/j.1475-6765.2009.00841.x
published in European Journal of Political Research 48(3), 309-334 (Wiley)
openalex publication_date 2009/04/01 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/31
Abstract
Abstract Kriesi et al. announced the birth of a new cleavage in contemporary Western Europe, one dividing the winners and losers of globalisation. Their studies in 2006 and 2008 contain analyses of party positions in six countries, based on the contents of editorial sections of newspapers. This article challenges the main conclusion of Kriesi et al. by demonstrating − on the basis of two expert surveys − that party positions are mainly structured by one dimension. The structure detected by Kriesi et al. in their analysis of parties is not found, except concerning voter positions. A consequence of this article's findings is that large groups of citizens are not represented by any parties, in particular those who are left‐wing on socio‐economic issues and right‐wing on cultural issues. The article in its conclusion discusses possible causes for the differences between these findings and those of Kriesi et al., and the implications of these findings for democratic representation.
Citations
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