ORIGINAL RESEARCH article
Front. Polit. Sci.
Sec. Elections and Representation
Volume 7 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/fpos.2025.1500403
The Quantitative and Qualitative Allocation of Ministerial Portfolios to European Radical Right Parties
Provisionally accepted
- Tohoku University, Sendai, Japan
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This paper examines the ministerial portfolio allocation of European Radical Right Parties (RRPs) in coalition governments, focusing on both quantitative and qualitative aspects. Ministerial portfolio allocation, essential for policy implementation and government stability, typically follows the proportionality principle, aligning ministerial portfolios with seat share. Meanwhile, traditional mainstream parties often secure ministerial portfolios that match their electoral programs. This study investigates whether RRPs-long regarded as "pariah parties," despite their increasing participation in coalition governments since the early 21st century, often entering as weak junior partners and maintaining a hostile stance toward liberal democracy-follow these allocation patterns. Our analysis shows that while RRPs exhibit a proportional seat-to-portfolio share relationship, their allocations are more strongly influenced by bargaining power. Moreover, RRPs often fail to obtain ministerial portfolios aligned with their electoral priorities. Thus, while RRPs appear normalized in terms of quantitative allocation, they continue to face significant qualitative challenges.
Keywords: European Radical Right Party, Ministerial Portfolio Allocation, Proportionality principle, Bargaining power, Policy salience, Mainstreaming, normalization
Received: 23 Sep 2024; Accepted: 08 May 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Tan. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence: Tian Tan, Tohoku University, Sendai, Japan
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