THE STRENGTH OF THE PARTISAN COMPONENT OF LEFT-RIGHT IDENTITY - A COMPARATIVE LONGITUDINAL-STUDY OF LEFT-RIGHT PARTY POLARIZATION IN 8 WEST-EUROPEAN COUNTRIES

This article examines left-right party polarization among the mass pub lics in a longitudinal comparative perspective. The analysis comprises eight countries - Belgium, Britain, Denmark, France, Germany, Ireland , Italy and the Netherlands - and trends are analysed from the early 1 970s to the early 1990s. The strength of the relationship between part y choice and left-right self-placement is analysed by three different measures: a standardized measure and two alternative unstandardized me asures. The standardized measure produces a high degree of stability i n the strength of the partisan component, while the unstandardized mea sures show that the partisan component has declined. The analysis show s that party voters locate themselves, quite consistently, more centri st. It is the changing left-right location of voters for the larger es tablished parties in the party system that accounts for most of the ch ange in the partisan component. The centrist tendency is particularly large for voters of the larger established parties in Belgium, France, Italy and the Netherlands.