Electoral Contestability and the Representation of Regionalist and Nationalist Parties in Europe

The objective of this paper is to analyse the way in which the formal rules regulating electoral competition and political representation in some member-states of the EU have influenced the ‘contestability’ of elections and the representation of regionalist and nationalist parties.

The first goal is to establish and describe the formal rules regulating electoral contests that exist both across and within member-states, to examine their general political consequences for the format of party systems, and their specific effects on the representation of regionalist and nationalist parties.

The second goal is to examine how the effects of these formal rules have informed debates regarding the necessity of reform to administrative requirements, political party financing regulations and electoral rules.

The third objective is to undertake a comparative analysis of the contestability of elections in order to assess which types of rules have proven to be more detrimental or advantageous to the representation of regionalist and nationalist parties across different political systems.

The book looks, in detail, at the electoral systems in the United Kingdom, France, Spain, Greece, Italy, Belgium, Latvia and Romania.