Caramani, Daniele / Mény, Yves (eds.)  
  Challenges to Consensual Politics vergrößerte Ansicht in neuem Fenster    
  Democracy, Identity, and Populist Protest in the Alpine Region  
  Régionalisme & Fédéralisme / Regionalism & Federalism, Band 6  
  257 pp., Bruxelles, P.I.E.-Peter Lang, 2005.  
  ISBN 90-5201-250-4 / US-ISBN 0-8204-6642-5  
   
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Contents

Notes on Contributors

Abstract

The book analyses the transnational Alpine region where historical, social, and geo-economic specificities have led to a distinctive type of democracy and identity. Differentialist identities, multi-level consociational accommodation, and corporatist intermediation are typical features of this region's «consensual politics», and the process of European integration adds further to this complexity. These forms of consensual politics are challenged today by large and persistent populist parties that express strong anti-elitist sentiments, local identities, and Euro-sceptic attitudes.
The book examines the defensive reaction of populist parties to the perceived threats of open borders (multi-culturalism and cheap labour) and elite negotiations (at all levels of governance). Protest attitudes translate into alternative views of European integration favouring proposals for an anti-assimilationist and labour protective «Fortress», as well as a religiously-based «Europe of the People». The book considers the possibility of a potential cleavage in the incipient European party system through alliances of «losers of integration» cutting across the left-right alignment and overlapping with ethno-linguistic, centre-periphery, religious, and rural-urban factors that survived in the Alpine region more than elsewhere.
An empirical analysis by a group of international experts focuses on the Alpine areas of Austria, France, Germany, Italy, Slovenia, and Switzerland in which parties like FPÖ, CSU, Lega Nord, and Schweizerische Volkspartei have recently become crucial actors.

Contents

Preface and Acknowledgements  
Tables and Figures  
Abbreviations  
Abstracts  
INTRODUCTION: The Alpine Challenge to Identity, Consensus, and European Integration
Daniele Caramani and Yves Mény
 
PART I : THE ALPINE CASE    
CHAPTER 1 Regionalism in the Alps: Subnational, Supranational, and Transnational
Michael Keating
 
CHAPTER 2 Populism as the Other Side of Consociational Multi-Level Democracies
Yannis Papadopoulos
 
CHAPTER 3 Natural Cultures: The Alpine Political Culture and Its Relationship to the Nation-State and European Integration
Daniele Caramani
 
PART I I: THE ALPINE CASES   
CHAPTER 4 Leadership, Ideology, and Anti-European Politics in the Italian Lega Nord
Patricia Chiantera-Stutte
 
CHAPTER 5 Right-Wing Populism Plus "X": The Austrian Freedom Party (FPÖ)
Anton Pelinka
 
CHAPTER 6 Mobilising Resentment in the Alps: The Swiss SVP, the Italian Lega Nord, and the Austrian FPÖ
Hans-Georg Betz
 
CHAPTER 7 Once Again the Deviant Case? Why the Christlich-Soziale Union Only Partially Fulfils the Image of an "Alpine Populist Party"
Claudius Wagemann
 
CHAPTER 8 The Südtiroler Volkspartei and Its Ethno-Populism
Günther Pallaver
 
CHAPTER 9 Multi-Level Populism and Centre-Periphery Cleavage in Switzerland: The Case of the Lega dei Ticinesi
Oscar Mazzoleni
 
References  
Quoted Primary Sources  
Notes on the Contributors  

Notes on Contributors

Hans-Georg BETZ is a senior research associate at the Canadian Center for German and European Studies at York University in Toronto. He has previously been associate professor at York University and at the John Hopkins University in Washington. He is the author of numerous comparative books and articles in international journals on right-wing populism, including Radical Right Wing Populism in Western Europe (Macmillan, 1994) and The New Politics of the Right (Macmillan, 1998) co-edited with S. Immerfall. He recently published La Droite Populiste en Europe (Autrement, 2004).

Daniele CARAMANI has recently joined the Department of Political Science and International Studies of the University of Birmingham, UK. During the making of this book he was a research professor at the Mannheim Centre for European Social Research. He holds a Ph.D. from the European University Institute (Florence), and has taught at the universities of Geneva and Florence. In 2000-02, he was "Vincent Wright Fellow in Comparative Politics" at the Robert Schuman Centre for Advanced Studies (EUI). He is the author of the book and CD-ROM Elections in Western Europe since 1815 (Palgrave, 2000) and The Nationalization of Politics (Cambridge University Press, 2004) which has been awarded the "Stein Rokkan Prize in Comparative Social Science".

Patricia CHIANTERA-STUTTE teaches history of political thought at the University of Bari. During 2001-02, she was a "Jean Monnet Fellow" at the Robert Schuman Centre for Advanced Studies (European University Institute, Florence). Her recent books include Julius Evola: Dal Dadaismo alla Rivoluzione Conservatrice (Aracne, 2001) and Von der Avantgarde zur Tradition: Die radikalen Futuristen im italienischen Faschismus (Campus, 2002). Further publications include articles in international journals among which "The Ambiguous Heritage of Mitteleuropa" (Law and Critique Journal, 2003), and "Cultures of Populism and the Political Right in Europe" (CLCWeb Comparative Literature and Culture, 2003, with Andrea Peto).

Michael KEATING is professor of regional studies at the European University Institute (Florence), and professor of Scottish politics at the University of Aberdeen. Previously, he taught at the Universities of Strathclyde (Scotland) and Western Ontario (Canada). He has published widely in urban and regional politics and minority nationalism. His recent works include Plurinational Democracy (Oxford UniversityPress, 2001), Culture, Institutions, and Development: A Study of Eight European Regions (Edward Elgar, 2003), and The Government of Scotland: Public Policy after Devolution (Edinburgh University Press, 2005).

Oscar MAZZOLENI is director of the Observatory for Political Research (USTAT) of the Canton Ticino (Switzerland) and lecturer at the Scuola Universitaria della Svizzera Italiana. He has previously been fellow researcher at the University of Turin and has taught at the University of Lausanne. His main research fields are citizens' behaviour and party politics. His last book is Nationalisme et Populisme en Suisse: La Radicalisation de la "Nouvelle" UDC (Presses polytechniques et universitaires romandes, 2003). He is the author of numerous articles on party politics and electoral behaviour in Switzerland.

Yves MÉNY is president of the European University Institute (Florence). Previously, he was the founding director of the Robert Schuman Centre for Advanced Studies (EUI) and professor at the Universities of Rennes, Paris 2, and the Institut d'Etudes Politiques (Paris). His main scientific interests are in the fields of comparative politics and policies, French politics, and state administration. His recent publications include Democracies and the Populist Challenge, co-edited with Yves Surel (Palgrave, 2002) translated in several languages, Par le Peuple, Pour le Peuple: Le Populisme et les Démocraties, co-authored with Yves Surel (Fayard, 2000), and The Future of European Welfare, co-edited with Martin Rhodes (Macmillan, 1998).

Günther PALLAVER is associate professor of political science at the University of Innsbruck (Austria). After a career as a journalist, he founded the media research institute Mediawatch in Innsbruck. He has published in the field of Italian and Austrian politics, ethnic minorities and parties, as well as political communication. He recently co-edited the volume Storia, Istituzioni e Diritto in Carlo Antonio de Martini (1726-1800) (Universitä degli Studi di Trento, 2002), 1992 - Fine di un Conflitto: Dieci Anni dalla Chiusura della Questione Sudtirolese (Il Mulino, 2003), and he is editor of the forthcoming volume Politische Kommunikation in ethnisch gespaltenen Gesellschaften: Theoretische Ansätze and Fallbeispiele (2004).

Yannis PAPADOPOULOS is professor of political science at the University of Lausanne and has been, among other appointments, visiting professor at the European University Institute (Florence) and at Sciences Po (Paris), as well as research director with the CNRS in France. He recently co-edited the Handbook of Swiss Politics (NZZ Publishing, 2003), and is co-editor (with Arthur Benz) of the forthcoming volume on Governance and Democracy (Routledge, 2005). He is the author of several articles in international academic journals.

Anton PELINKA is professor of political science at the University of Innsbruck and director of the Institute for Conflict Research (Vienna). He has taught previously in various German and American universities. He has published in the field of Austrian politics, comparative politics, and democratic theory. Among his most recent publications is Democracy Indian Style: Subhas Chandra Bose and the Creation of India's Political Culture (Transaction Press, 2003). On the theme of the present book, he has co-edited (with Ruth Wodak) The Haider Phenomenon in Austria (Transaction Press, 2002).

Claudius WAGEMANN is a researcher in the Department of Social and Political Sciences at the European University Institute (Florence), and teaches political science at Rutgers University in Florence. He was previously a researcher at the Max Planck Institute for the Study of Societies (Cologne). His research topics include interest groups, political parties, and research methodology. He has published on the CSU and its communication strategies Das Bild der SPD im "Bayernkurier": Die Berichterstattung seit dem Fall der Mauer (Deutscher Universitäts-Verlag, 2000) and on "Qualitative Comparative Analysis". His current work focuses on the changes of private interest governments in the dairy sector.