Voting Radical Right in Western Europe and Radical Right: Voters and Parties in the Electoral Market

Extract

Voting Radical Right in Western Europe. By Terri E. Givens. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2005. 188p. $65.00.

Radical Right: Voters and Parties in the Electoral Market. By Pippa Norris. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2005. 366p. $70.00 cloth, $24.99 paper.

Among the most distressing features of contemporary politics within many older and nascent democracies is the surge of popular and/or electoral support for radical right political parties (RRPs). Oftentimes referred to as the “new right,” “extreme right,” “neopopulist right,” or other similar labels, these illiberal agents have proliferated especially across Western Europe since the 1980s, precipitating considerable consternation among mainstream political parties and elites wherever they have taken root. Although none are on the threshold of achieving a major electoral breakthrough, RRPs currently exercise influence over public political discourse and/or the policy agenda in most of the major immigrant-receiving countries within the region.