Old Left, New Left, Centrist, or Left National? Determinants of Support for Different Social Democratic Programmatic Strategies

In this chapter, we study voter preferences for different social democratic programmatic strategies. In line with the theoretical framework of the volume, we suggest that there are four different strategies social democratic parties could currently pursue: Old Left, New Left, Centrist, or Left National. In original surveys conducted in six European countries (Austria, Denmark, Germany, Spain, Switzerland, and Sweden), we present these four strategies to respondents in the form of tabular vignettes. Evaluations of these vignettes are used to examine which programmatic strategies resonate with, on the one hand, the general electorate, and, on the other hand, the potential social democratic electorate. We also study support for the different programmatic strategies across subgroups of voters, and we analyze the determinants of voters’ choice between particular social democratic strategies and matched competitor party programs. Our findings show that while in the overall electorate, Centrist Left and Left National programmatic profiles enjoy high levels of support, potential social democratic voters on average more strongly support Old Left and New Left programs. We find that from the perspective of voters, there might be less of a trade-off between “redistribution and recognition” policies than public debates would have us think. In line with these findings, we show that choices between social democratic parties and their direct competitors are responsive to programmatic supply within the left bloc. However, the choice between social democratic parties and parties of the Right is much less strongly affected by social democratic positioning.