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The Populist Nationalist Party Family and the European Cleavage

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Nationalisms in the European Arena

Part of the book series: Palgrave Studies in European Political Sociology ((PSEPS))

Abstract

Populist nationalist parties epitomize the rise of Euroscepticism in the European Union. Populist nationalist parties have both ideological and strategic reasons for embracing Euroscepticism. Ideologically, the rejection of European integration is built upon the defense of national sovereignty and its opposition to the erosion of national identities. Strategically, populist nationalist parties pursue their political and electoral objectives by presenting themselves as the only defenders of national sovereignty and culture, both threatened by the process of European integration and globalization. This chapter examines the evolution of the politicization of populist nationalist parties, the Eurosceptic positions adopted despite underlying pan-European views, and the paralleled increasing importance of European integration for the party family.

Je suis de Bretagne, je suis de France, mais je suis d’Europe aussi

Jean Marie Le Pen, 1973

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Notes

  1. 1.

    The notable exception was Mudde’s chapter in his book on the populist radical right in Europe (Mudde 2007: 158–183).

  2. 2.

    Populist parties such as the French Front National adopted a master frame combining ethnopluralist xenophobia and anti-political establishment populism later developed by other political parties such as the Danish People’s Party (Rydgren 2005; Van Hauwaert 2013).

  3. 3.

    Populism is here included as a thin ideology and not as a style of mobilization (Mudde 2004: 543).

  4. 4.

    Some authors argue that populist parties have shifted their position to the left and that they have refused to define themselves along the left-right dimension (Spektorowski 2010: 112).

  5. 5.

    His words were: ‘the gas chambers are a detail in the history of the Second World War’ extract from the transcriptions from the resolution of the European parliament removing his parliamentary immunity, Rapport 23 September 1998.

  6. 6.

    To the point that he was first suspended from the party and finally expelled from the party in August 2015. He had retained his role of honorary president of the FN after a period of disagreements with his daughter.

  7. 7.

    Jean Marie Le Pen made another remark on a video on the FN’s website of making an oven load of artists. This time an insulting reference to the Jewish singer Patrick Bruel and other artists (and which can be, and was, interpreted as a reference to the furnaces used by Nazis to dispose of victims). FN leaders, including Marine Le Pen herself, condemned it as ‘a faute politique’ (Le Figaro 8/6/2014).

  8. 8.

    Marine Le Pen compared Lyon Muslims prayers in the street with the occupation of the country. Her words were, «les prières de rue» des musulmans à une forme «d’occupation», sans «blindés» ni «soldats», mais d’»occupation tout de même».

  9. 9.

    A political discourse that rejects traditional views on biological racism and racial exclusion while denying the mixing of races (Schori Lang 2007: 7).

  10. 10.

    As the figure shows, very few parties escape the association between the location on the left-right dimension and the position on European integration (the Bulgarian Ataka , the Finnish Rural party SMP, the Italian Movimento 5Stelle M5S, The Finnish Firjava Puole KIPU, the Bulgarian NOA, the Austrian Samobroona S, the Austrian Martin, and the Macedonian Democratic Party for National Unity, VMRO).

  11. 11.

    The conceptions of populist nationalist parties differ on several aspects of European integration: constituent members, degrees of integration, geographical borders and reasons for European cooperation (Mudde 2007: 167).

  12. 12.

    The adscription of the Polish PiS to this party family is controversial as Chap. 1 already noted.

  13. 13.

    The latter states: ‘the only way to regain control is to leave the European Union. Use May 22nd as the EU Referendum the other parties have denied you and vote UKIP to leave the EU’ (UKIP National Manifesto 2014 European elections).

  14. 14.

    Mudde’s criticism of the typology by Csergo and Goldgeir (2004) that distinguishes between four types of nationalisms and two types of EU is based on the combinations and syntheses of different visions of European integration (Mudde 2007: 167).

  15. 15.

    The declaration gathered individual MEPs from nine countries. The overlap of political parties between these two declarations included three parties: VB , FN and FPÖ.

  16. 16.

    The results of Scott and Steenbergen show that systemic salience, the weight that other parties in a country give to the issue, is very important to predict party salience (Scott and Steenbergen 2004: 187–188).

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  1. Universidad Nacional de Educación a Dist, Madrid, Spain

    Margarita Gómez-Reino

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Gómez-Reino, M. (2018). The Populist Nationalist Party Family and the European Cleavage. In: Nationalisms in the European Arena . Palgrave Studies in European Political Sociology. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-65951-0_3

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-65951-0_3

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