”It’s not just the economy, stupid!”: En komparativ studie av den nya och etablerade sydeuropeiska radikala vänsterns positionering och betoning utifrån kvantitativ data

Sammanfattning: Spain, Portugal, and Greece have experienced a rise of challenger radical left-wing parties alongside an already established radical left-wing in the 2000’s. This prompts the question how the new and established radical left differ in positioning and salience on the economic and cultural policy dimension. Using quantitative empirics from the Chapel Hill Expert Survey and the Manifesto Project Database, this study employs a quantitative measure in its comparison of the parties. Furthermore, it adds the parties’ GALTAN positioning as a studied variable, in a field primarily concerned with the parties’ economic policies. Utilizing the theory of Political Opportunity Structures to formulate hypotheses, the study spawns a descriptive comparison between the new and established left’s positioning and salience. The new radical left unanimously combine an economic radical left positioning with a culturally liberal GAL-positioning. The established radical left in Portugal and Greece both adhere to an economic left-wing positioning, whilst being constrained to the middle of the GALTAN-scale. In Spain, both radical left parties have similar extreme economic and GAL-positioning. Regarding salience, all radical left-wing parties emphasize economic questions more than culturally liberal ones. There is not enough evidence that the new radical left emphasizes GAL-questions more in the studied period.