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The Regional Component of the Far-Right Vote: Evidence from Rural Greece

Extremism
Nationalism
Voting
Identity
Immigration
Qualitative
Southern Europe
Empirical
Sofia Tipaldou
Panteion University of Social and Political Sciences
Sofia Tipaldou
Panteion University of Social and Political Sciences

Abstract

Most studies on far-right voting have highlighted structural factors for the electoral rise of far-right parties in Europe focusing on the aggregate level. However, a more careful look at the regional level reveals a more complicated picture. Studies, for instance, have shown that micro-exposure to refugees at the municipality level can reduce support for far-right parties even if the effect of overall migration on the electoral rise of far-right parties may be positive. In Greece, a country that underwent a crisis on multiple levels (economic, political and socio-cultural) in the 2010s, an extreme-right party with neo-Nazi characteristics—Golden Dawn (GD)—made its way to the parliament. This attracted worldwide scholarly interest which, nevertheless, centered on the national level and used large-N samples. Such studies do not explain the paradox of Eastern Peloponnese (i.e. Lakonia and Argolida), a region with low immigration, no contact to refugees, low unemployment, and some of the highest percentages for Golden Dawn. Lakonia, in particular, was GD’s stronghold from 2012 to 2015. This paper shifts the focus from the national to the regional level and from the aggregate to the individual. Drawing on original data from open-ended interviews with GD voters from Eastern Peloponnese and Athens, it aims to unveil far-right voters’ perceptions regarding key issues, such as the influx of immigrants and unemployment. By so doing, it disaggregates major factors that were tested on the national level and adds nuance to existing explanations regarding the electoral behaviour of far-right voters. Some of its findings are that immigration is more important a factor than the economy in regions with low numbers of foreigners and that chauvinism is a central component of protest voting. The findings of the paper make a contribution to both the literature of far-right studies and Modern Greek studies by introducing the factor geography in the study of the Greek far right and by offering novel data from a population that is difficult to access.