The emergence of the radical right on the Spanish political scene: towards a spatial perspective

Abstract

This paper unveils the reasons behind the irruption of the radical right-wing populist party VOX in the region of Andalusia, breaking the immunity to that political trend in Spain. The empirical analysis is based on data from the 2018 Regional Election at municipal level (778 municipalities), revealing that geographical location matters from two perspectives: because VOX outcome in a municipality is closely related to that in its neighbors (spatial dependence) and since the influence of the main explanatory factors varies between municipalities (spatial nonstationarity). Furthermore, it uncovers that the share of votes won in the previous regional election by the most important right-wing party (namely PP) is the most decisive factor explaining the new support for VOX, closely followed by the percentage of the foreign population. Other important explanatory variables are age, income and size. Finally, the results reveal the existence of some geographical clusters characterized by different spatial patterns.