The Role of Gender Attitudes and Gender Salience in Explaining Support for the Populist Radical Right
P6-S150-3
Presented by: Giuseppe Carteny
Existing research suggests that those who hold gender-traditional or sexist attitudes are more likely to support populist radical right (PRR) parties in Europe, although most existing studies focus on single-country cases. Meanwhile, emerging evidence highlights the presence of 'sexually modern nativists' - voters who support gender equality but oppose immigration - as a significant PRR constituency. At the same time, while PRR parties are generally more gender-traditional than mainstream parties, there is substantial variation across Europe in the extent to which these parties emphasise gender issues and the positions they take on them. In this paper, we conduct a comparative analysis to examine the relationship between gender attitudes and PRR party support across the region. Specifically, we investigate whether this relationship varies depending on the salience attached to gender and the position taken by PRR parties. To do so, we exploit data from the Horizon Europe funded UNTWIST project. We match novel data from automated coding of European party manifestos – capturing the salience and positions on gender issues - with survey data on gender attitudes from cross-national surveys such as the EVS, ISSP, and ESS. This approach allows us to assess the extent to which PRR parties across Europe attract support from voters with specific attitudes on gender issues, and whether this is moderated by the extent to which gender is politicised by the parties themselves.
Keywords: gender attitudes, issue salience, populist radical right, vote choice, comparative politics