How Mainstream Parties Frame Social Citizenship and the Inclusion of Immigrants in Germany, Switzerland and the United Kingdom
Type
conference paper
Date Issued
2014-01-30
Author(s)
Abstract
On the role of parties as important channels for people to voice their preferences there is a sound consensus in the literature. Traditionally, economic and redistributive concerns have been at the forefront of parties' cues. However, in the last decade culturally fought issues such as immigration have become important in daily politics. Indeed, the economic and cultural nature of socio-political conflicts in Western Europe is the focus of growing scholarly works which point to the transformed bi-dimensional structure of party competition and the resulting challenges for mainstream parties. While cultural concerns (anti-immigration) and fears of economic denationalisation are successfully mobilised by radical populist parties, mainstream parties find it more difficult to take up the new preferences, identities, and interests of their electorate.
This paper builds on these studies but it focuses on one question which is so far overlooked in this literature: how, if at all, are issues such as redistribution linked to growing discussions of immigration in party competition for votes? The primary aim of the analysis is to understand when and how parties combine issues about welfare state and immigration, both in terms of national regulations at the borders and the integration of settled immigrants into the society. Our expectation is that mainstream parties endorse different strategies (or perspectives) depending on the party competition, in particular the presence of a populist challenger. The analysis is based on mainstream parties in three Western European countries, namely Germany, Switzerland and the United Kingdom (1999-2011). In all of these countries politics is no longer around socio-economic issues only but it also involves a cultural dimension. However, the countries differ with respect to the populist challenge, which is not present in the British case. In the Swiss case there is a radical right wing party, while in the German case it takes the form of radical left wing party. Methodologically, we use a qualitative thematic analysis of party manifestos, because the research interest of this paper lies in how issues are framed by parties rather than the salience attributed by parties to issues. The analysis of the documents, which is based on the same coding scheme, allows us to describe parties' references to welfare and immigration. Based on Faist (1995) we distinguish three different perspectives, a social-democratic perspective combining restrictive immigration policies and inclusive immigrant policies, a cosmopolitan perspective linking liberal immigration policies and inclusive immigrant policies and a nationalist-populist perspective connecting restrictive immigration policies and exclusive immigrant policies. The results of the analysis indicate that variation is found among party families and the most dramatic discrepancy is discernible in the Left. Even though the purpose of the paper is not to "prove' that the populist challenge explains how the mainstream left-wing parties behave, the results allow nonetheless for interpreting mainstream parties' strategic combination of welfare and immigration issues as a response to anti-immigration and anti-integration issues raised by populist challengers.
This paper builds on these studies but it focuses on one question which is so far overlooked in this literature: how, if at all, are issues such as redistribution linked to growing discussions of immigration in party competition for votes? The primary aim of the analysis is to understand when and how parties combine issues about welfare state and immigration, both in terms of national regulations at the borders and the integration of settled immigrants into the society. Our expectation is that mainstream parties endorse different strategies (or perspectives) depending on the party competition, in particular the presence of a populist challenger. The analysis is based on mainstream parties in three Western European countries, namely Germany, Switzerland and the United Kingdom (1999-2011). In all of these countries politics is no longer around socio-economic issues only but it also involves a cultural dimension. However, the countries differ with respect to the populist challenge, which is not present in the British case. In the Swiss case there is a radical right wing party, while in the German case it takes the form of radical left wing party. Methodologically, we use a qualitative thematic analysis of party manifestos, because the research interest of this paper lies in how issues are framed by parties rather than the salience attributed by parties to issues. The analysis of the documents, which is based on the same coding scheme, allows us to describe parties' references to welfare and immigration. Based on Faist (1995) we distinguish three different perspectives, a social-democratic perspective combining restrictive immigration policies and inclusive immigrant policies, a cosmopolitan perspective linking liberal immigration policies and inclusive immigrant policies and a nationalist-populist perspective connecting restrictive immigration policies and exclusive immigrant policies. The results of the analysis indicate that variation is found among party families and the most dramatic discrepancy is discernible in the Left. Even though the purpose of the paper is not to "prove' that the populist challenge explains how the mainstream left-wing parties behave, the results allow nonetheless for interpreting mainstream parties' strategic combination of welfare and immigration issues as a response to anti-immigration and anti-integration issues raised by populist challengers.
Language
English
HSG Classification
contribution to scientific community
Refereed
No
Book title
Political Theory
Start page
31
Event Title
Annual Conference of the Swiss Political Science Association (SVPW) 2014
Event Location
Bern
Event Date
30.-31.01.2014
Subject(s)
Division(s)
Eprints ID
229183