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First published online: 22 July 2019 ; Several scholars in the United States have recently addressed an increased partisan animosity between Democrats and Republicans, and have termed this phenomenon 'affective polarisation'. This surge in partisan affective polarisation is perceived to be highly problematic, as it has been found to have a negative impact on the functioning of the party system and even society at large. The aim of this article is to study the concept of affective polarisation in European party systems. It introduces the Affective Polarisation Index (API) that allows for measuring and comparing levels of affective polarisation also in multiparty systems. This novel measure is applied to 22 European democracies and the United States between 2005 and 2016. The results indicate that affective polarisation is acutely present in European party systems, as partisans are often extremely hostile towards competing parties. The most affectively polarised countries are in Central Eastern and Southern Europe where the degree of affective polarisation is notably higher than it is in the United States, while Northwestern European countries are more moderate in terms of partisan feelings. Further analysis reveals that affective polarisation is significantly correlated with ideological polarisation, but the relationship between the two appears to be conditional: in some Western European political systems ideological polarisation does not lead itself to strong interparty hostility, while in Central Eastern Europe a high degree of affective polarisation can be present even in ideologically centrist party structures. These findings validate the claim that ideological and affective polarisation are two distinct aspects of polarisation, and that the latter also merits additional attention.

This paper studies the salience of and government positions towards differentiated integration (DI) in the European Union in Estonian politics. As the keyword analysis reveals, conceptual debates over DI occur very rarely in Estonia and are usually invoked by specific events, such as ratifying the Lisbon Treaty, joining the eurozone or holding the European Council presidency. On the level of specific DI instances, the salience was much higher, often reflecting the importance of certain policies in Estonian foreign policy agenda or a high level of internal polarization over some specific DI policy. Regarding government's position towards DI, there has been a notable improvement over the years. In the first years after joining the EU in 2004, Estonian politicians very clearly negative towards DI, mostly due to apparent fear of remaining into the slower less integrated group of countries. After joining the eurozone in 2011, the government made a swift change in their position and started showing much more optimism towards certain forms of DI. This rather positive position remained mostly unaltered throughout the last decade, although the government politicians have always emphasised that their first preference is for an EU that moves on together with all the Member States. ; This working paper is part of the InDivEU project which has received funding from the European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under grant agreement number 822304

AbstractSeveral scholars in the United States have recently addressed an increased partisan animosity between Democrats and Republicans, and have termed this phenomenon 'affective polarisation'. This surge in partisan affective polarisation is perceived to be highly problematic, as it has been found to have a negative impact on the functioning of the party system and even society at large. The aim of this article is to study the concept of affective polarisation in European party systems. It introduces the Affective Polarisation Index (API) that allows for measuring and comparing levels of affective polarisation also in multiparty systems. This novel measure is applied to 22 European democracies and the United States between 2005 and 2016. The results indicate that affective polarisation is acutely present in European party systems, as partisans are often extremely hostile towards competing parties. The most affectively polarised countries are in Central Eastern and Southern Europe where the degree of affective polarisation is notably higher than it is in the United States, while Northwestern European countries are more moderate in terms of partisan feelings. Further analysis reveals that affective polarisation is significantly correlated with ideological polarisation, but the relationship between the two appears to be conditional: in some Western European political systems ideological polarisation does not lead itself to strong interparty hostility, while in Central Eastern Europe a high degree of affective polarisation can be present even in ideologically centrist party structures. These findings validate the claim that ideological and affective polarisation are two distinct aspects of polarisation, and that the latter also merits additional attention.

Currently, very little is known about the individual level foundations of affective polarization outside the US context. This paper addresses this research gap by exploring the predictors of affective polarization in Sweden, using nationally representative survey data. From 2010 till the 2018 elections, the Swedish multiparty system was divided into two affectively converged mainstream party blocs that were moderately polarized between each other, and an asymmetrically polarized populist right party that invoked significantly more hostility from the supporters of mainstream parties than vice versa. To unpack the foundations of affective polarization in such a tripolar configuration, we employ a methodological approach that distinguishes not just between in‐ and outparties but also in‐ and out‐blocs, and separates different conflict dimensions. We find that: (1) voters with stronger partisan identities and more extreme political attitudes exhibit higher levels of affective polarization. The latter, however, is a better predictor of direct dislike towards political opponents; (2) the effects of political attitudes correspond to the tripolar nature of the party system: while affective polarization between the centre‐right and ‐left blocs is mostly driven by socioeconomic positions, the hostility towards Sweden Democrats links predominantly to cultural issues, most notably immigration; (3) institutional trust has a two‐edged relationship with affective polarization: populist right voters that trust the country's central institutions more, are less polarized towards mainstream blocs, whereas among centre‐right voters, higher trust associates with stronger animosity towards Sweden Democrats. We believe that these findings could have broad implications for affective polarization research in multiparty systems.

This study compares the spatial positioning of over 200 political parties across 28 European Union (EU) member states intwo cross-national voting advice applications (VAAs) developed for the 2014 European elections: EUvox and euandi. Wefind that the two VAAs show highly similar results in terms of party positioning on the cultural liberal-conservative andpro-anti EU dimensions, while economic left–right placements converge less, especially concerning right-wing parties. Ouranalyses reveal that the higher overlap on the cultural and EU dimensions is a result, at least partially, of the inclusion ofsimilar items used to measure these concepts, while most of the systematic divergence between the two VAAs in left–right placements stems from problematic issue-statements used in the dimensional calculations. We demonstrate howcertain items can cause bias in the placements of specific party families by (1) not aligning with other statements thatmeasure the same latent construct; (2) tapping into other latent constructs, in addition to the one they are supposed tomeasure; and (3) not inducing sufficient polarization between parties

This study compares the spatial positioning of over 200 political parties across 28 European Union (EU) member states in two cross-national voting advice applications (VAAs) developed for the 2014 European elections: EUvox and euandi. We find that the two VAAs show highly similar results in terms of party positioning on the cultural liberal-conservative and pro-anti EU dimensions, while economic left–right placements converge less, especially concerning right-wing parties. Our analyses reveal that the higher overlap on the cultural and EU dimensions is a result, at least partially, of the inclusion of similar items used to measure these concepts, while most of the systematic divergence between the two VAAs in left–right placements stems from problematic issue-statements used in the dimensional calculations. We demonstrate how certain items can cause bias in the placements of specific party families by (1) not aligning with other statements that measure the same latent construct; (2) tapping into other latent constructs, in addition to the one they are supposed to measure; and (3) not inducing sufficient polarization between parties.

This research note investigates the scope of regional variations in levels of affective polarization across Europe and contrasts it with national scores to highlight the theoretical and empirical interest of a disaggregated approach. Using all waves of the Comparative Study of Electoral Systems (CSES) dataset, we compute an affective polarization score for 143,857 individuals and aggregate these scores in 190 regions nested in 30 countries, across a period ranging from 1996 to 2019, covering 105 elections. We map variations in affective polarization across regions, both cross-sectionally and longitudinally. Our results reveal that the range of scores is larger across regions than between countries and that approximately half of the variation in affective polarization scores can be attributed to within-country heterogeneity. Second, we find that some countries display rather homogeneous regional patterns, while others display heterogeneous scores. Third, we show how the increase in the affective polarization scores over time at the national level can be driven by sharp changes in some regions only, while other regions remain stable. Overall, these results point to the added value of adopting a regional approach to the study of affective polarization.

AbstractThis research note investigates the scope of regional variations in levels of affective polarization across Europe and contrasts it with national scores to highlight the theoretical and empirical interest of a disaggregated approach. Using all waves of the Comparative Study of Electoral Systems (CSES) dataset, we compute an affective polarization score for 143,857 individuals and aggregate these scores in 190 regions nested in 30 countries, across a period ranging from 1996 to 2019, covering 105 elections. We map variations in affective polarization across regions, both cross‐sectionally and longitudinally. Our results reveal that the range of scores is larger across regions than between countries and that approximately half of the variation in affective polarization scores can be attributed to within‐country heterogeneity. Second, we find that some countries display rather homogeneous regional patterns, while others display heterogeneous scores. Third, we show how the increase in the affective polarization scores over time at the national level can be driven by sharp changes in some regions only, while other regions remain stable. Overall, these results point to the added value of adopting a regional approach to the study of affective polarization.

Research indicates that affective polarization pervades contemporary democracies worldwide. Although some studies identify party leaders as polarizing agents, affective polarization has been predominantly conceptualized as a product of in-/out-party feelings. This study compares levels of party affective polarization (PAP) and leader affective polarization (LAP) cross-nationally, using data from the Comparative Study of Electoral Systems. Applying like–dislike scales and an identical index to both concepts, we reveal that while the two strongly correlate, LAP is systematically lower than PAP. The United States emerges as an exceptional case, being the only country where LAP significantly exceeds PAP. Drawing on regime input/output and institutions as theoretical building blocks, we explore cross-national variations and show that the relative strength of LAP vis-à-vis PAP is increased by presidential regime type, poor government performance, and low party system fragmentation. The findings of this study contribute to the thriving research on affective polarization and personalization of politics.

First published online: 02 July 2020 ; This data article provides a descriptive overview of the "EU Profiler/euandi trend file (2009–2019)" dataset and the data collection methods. The dataset compiles party position data from three consecutive pan-European Voting Advice Applications (VAAs), developed by the European University Institute for the European Parliament elections in 2009, 2014 and 2019. It includes the positions of 411 parties from 28 European countries on a wide range of salient political issues. Altogether, the dataset contains more than 20 000 unique party positions. To place the parties on the political issues, all three editions of the VAA have used the same iterative method that combines party self-placement and expert judgement. The data collection has been a collective effort of several hundreds of highly trained social scientists, involving experts from each EU member state. The political statements that the parties were placed on, were identical across all the countries and 15 of the statements remained the same throughout all three waves (2009, 2014, 2019) of data collection. Because of the unique methodology and the large volume of data, the dataset offers a significant contribution to the research on European party systems and on party positioning methodologies.

This data article provides a descriptive overview of the "EU Profiler/euandi trend file (2009–2019)" dataset and the data collection methods. The dataset compiles party position data from three consecutive pan-European Voting Advice Applications (VAAs), developed by the European University Institute for the European Parliament elections in 2009, 2014 and 2019. It includes the positions of 411 parties from 28 European countries on a wide range of salient political issues. Altogether, the dataset contains more than 20 000 unique party positions. To place the parties on the political issues, all three editions of the VAA have used the same iterative method that combines party self-placement and expert judgement. The data collection has been a collective effort of several hundreds of highly trained social scientists, involving experts from each EU member state. The political statements that the parties were placed on, were identical across all the countries and 15 of the statements remained the same throughout all three waves (2009, 2014, 2019) of data collection. Because of the unique methodology and the large volume of data, the dataset offers a significant contribution to the research on European party systems and on party positioning methodologies.