Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item: https://hdl.handle.net/10419/21081 
Year of Publication: 
2000
Series/Report no.: 
IZA Discussion Papers No. 234
Publisher: 
Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA), Bonn
Abstract: 
Empirical research on the determinants of right and left-wing extremist election successes is still dominated by descriptive statistical methods. The existing literature in political economy and political science mainly relies on interviews and survey results as well as on qualitative analyses of party organizations and programs. Contrary to this approach, in this study we try to identify significant, structural socio-economic factors which determined the vote for the right-wing ?Republikaner? party and the left-wing Party of Democratic Socialism (PDS) in the two recent elections of the European Parliament in Germany. We use a new data set on the level of German counties (Kreise) that is analyzed econometrically by a FGLS random effects panel model. The results we obtain are partly in stark contrast to empirical findings discussed in the mainstream literature and in the public. The resulting, most important areas of political action against extremist parties seem to be education, a differentiated labor market policy, social work with adolescents, and the maintenance of a generous system of social security and welfare.
Subjects: 
Elections
political extremism
labor market policy
welfare policy
JEL: 
D72
I28
J60
D60
P16
Document Type: 
Working Paper

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