In: The SAIS review of international affairs / the Johns Hopkins University, the Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS), Band 27, Heft 1, S. 49-62
Abstract This study acknowledges Kitschelt's inspiration by understanding party linkage as a mechanism closely pertaining to the relationships of accountability and responsiveness between political parties and voters. Three key linkages – programmatic, charismatic and clientelistic – are scrutinized. The authors identify the "link-age profiles" of relevant political parties in the history of Slovak party competition and use the results of an experts' survey (from the DALP project) as a (limited) test of the authors' expert judgement. The study then reflects on the latest developments in political linkages in a period when anti-establishment and anti-system political parties are gaining strength. The paper concludes that clientelism as a linkage played a significantly smaller role than predicted in the 1990s, while charisma – even though we define it differently from some mainstream approaches – manifested a stronger than expected influence on party competition. Also, combinations of charismatic and programmatic linkages seem to be attractive for a number of relevant Slovak parties. Finally, programmatic competition informed Slovak politics for longer and more successfully than Kitschelt's model would suggest.
This article reviews certain trends in popular support for political parties – especially new ones – as they manifested themselves prior to and during the 2020 parliamentary elections. It summarizes the ways in which demand for change was expressed before and during the election through the election results and the data on party supporters. It concludes that the thesis on the radicalization of new generations of party-political challenges in the Slovak polity did not hold true in 2020. The main research question regards the possibility of conceptualizing the rise of two new moderate political parties, PS/Together and For the People, as a counter-mobilization against the previous emergence of radical anti-establishment and anti-systemic challengers within the party system.
In: European journal of political research: official journal of the European Consortium for Political Research. Political data yearbook, Band 53, Heft 1, S. 273-280
In: European journal of political research: official journal of the European Consortium for Political Research. Political data yearbook, Band 52, Heft 1, S. 208-216
In: European journal of political research: official journal of the European Consortium for Political Research. Political data yearbook, Band 51, Heft 1, S. 280-287