Party Competition in Migration Debates: The Influence of the AfD on Party Positions in German State Parliaments

Atzpodien DS

Abstract

In recent years, with the events of the so-called ‘refugee crisis’ and the transformation of the German Alternative for Germany (AfD) into an anti-migration party, the issue of migration has developed into a highly salient topic. That was not always the case. This novel analysis conducts a large comparative study of the influence of the AfD in the German federal states’ parliaments in the policy field of migration from 2011 to 2018 by using Wordscores to measure party positions from parliamentary debates. It contributes to a broader literature by connecting to both the methodological research on measuring party positions from texts and the research on the influence of radical right parties (RRPs) on party competition in the policy field of migration. The results of the analysis show that in most of the federal states, the entry of the AfD is followed by polarisation of party competition. In many cases a greater convergence of the position of the mainstream parties with the AfD can be observed. In all cases, the AfD positions itself apart from the mainstream parties and significantly extends the political dimension in which the parties compete with each other.