Social Democratic Parties and the Working Class

Reviews / Votes

"This wide-ranging and thought-provoking book addresses a central issue that is both old and new in the politics of western democracies: the nature of the working class and its relationship to the political parties that typically provide its democratic representation. In her clearly-written, appealingly concise and none the less nuanced study of six countries over four decades, Line Rennwald considers how best to understand the contemporary multi-faceted working class and the strategies of social democratic parties. She elaborates on the insights of the notion of class developed by Daniel Oesch and on the benefits for representation of seeing a working class that stretches beyond traditional manual workers and includes areas of the growing service sector. In the face of rising working class support for parties on the radical right in recent years, Rennwald argues that a broad working class alliance with social democratic parties that have integrated socio-economic and cultural programmes can instead provide a more appealing and effective role for the working class in contemporary politics." (Geoffrey Evans, University of Oxford, UK)

"Why is social democracy in crisis? How has it lost its working class voters? Can it win them back? The answers are all in Line Rennwald's book. A brilliant contribution to the study of class politics, theoretically driven, empirically robust, questioning the strategy of European social democratic parties in the last thirty years. Political supply is the main factor. A must-read in a context of thriving populism and growing abstention." (Nonna Mayer, Sciences Po/CNRS, France)

"If you have ever wondered why social democracy has lost working-class support, look no further than this book: Line Rennwald delves into four decades of electoral surveys and shows the reasons behind this dealignment. A tour de force of political analysis." (Daniel Oesch, University of Lausanne, Switzerland)

"This timely and important book offers a welcome and well executed re-emphasising of class based analysis in party political research. Its analysis invites reconsideration of how we understand the working class and their relationship to social democracy. It is a well-structured and clearly focused intervention in debates about the politics and sociology of social democracy - offering a novel class schema and applying it a comparative European context. This engaging book will make for a valuable addition to the comparative politics of social democracy / electoral behaviour canon, helping scholars make sense of novel challenges facing social democratic parties. The changes in class composition of the electorates, party strategies and voting behaviours charted in this book offer one explanation for recent seismic political upheavals. I can see this volume having a long shelf life, of interest to a range of scholars interested in the changing electoral politics of the disaffected poorer and vulnerable groups in society has buffeted most European party systems." (Ben Clift, University of Warwick, UK)