Party system nationalization in Estonia
This article explores the Estonian ‘integration’ project, which was launched in the early 1990s to bridge the differences between ethnic Estonians and ethnic Russians by assimilating the latter with the former. Since the project will soon turn thirty, it is timely to ask whether it has been a succes...
| Main Authors: | , |
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
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Immanuel Kant Baltic Federal University
2020-03-01
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| Series: | Baltic Region |
| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | https://journals.kantiana.ru/eng/baltic_region/4418/13006/ |
| _version_ | 1818778036054523904 |
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| author | Lanko D. A. Lantsova I. S. |
| author_facet | Lanko D. A. Lantsova I. S. |
| author_sort | Lanko D. A. |
| collection | DOAJ |
| description | This article explores the Estonian ‘integration’ project, which was launched in the early 1990s to bridge the differences between ethnic Estonians and ethnic Russians by assimilating the latter with the former. Since the project will soon turn thirty, it is timely to ask whether it has been a success. This article employs Grigorii Golosov’s index of political party nationalization to understand whether the ‘integration’ project has helped to narrow the ideological divide between ethnic Estonians and ethnic Russians. In other words, the study asks whether ethnic Estonians and ethnic Russians vote for the same political parties in comparable proportions or there are ‘Estonian’ and ‘Russian’ parties in the country. The analysis of the outcomes of four local and four parliamentary elections that took place in Estonia in 2005—2019 shows that by the mid-2000s Estonia achieved a considerable level of political party system nationalization at both national and local levels. At the national level, political party system nationalization remained high in 2007—2019 despite significant changes in the country’s political party system. At the local level, however, political party system nationalization has been diminishing since 2013, leading one to conclude that the Estonian ‘integration’ project has failed to close the ideological divide between ethnic Estonians and ethnic Russians. |
| first_indexed | 2024-12-18T11:38:20Z |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj.art-5803c8a8b042439296eca686c4bdf06c |
| institution | Directory Open Access Journal |
| issn | 2079-8555 2310-0524 |
| language | English |
| last_indexed | 2024-12-18T11:38:20Z |
| publishDate | 2020-03-01 |
| publisher | Immanuel Kant Baltic Federal University |
| record_format | Article |
| series | Baltic Region |
| spelling | doaj.art-5803c8a8b042439296eca686c4bdf06c2022-12-21T21:09:28ZengImmanuel Kant Baltic Federal UniversityBaltic Region2079-85552310-05242020-03-01121163110.5922/2079-8555-2020-1-2Party system nationalization in EstoniaLanko D. A. 0https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4089-7962Lantsova I. S. 1https://orcid.org/0000-0001-5480-6227Saint Petersburg State UniversitySaint Petersburg State UniversityThis article explores the Estonian ‘integration’ project, which was launched in the early 1990s to bridge the differences between ethnic Estonians and ethnic Russians by assimilating the latter with the former. Since the project will soon turn thirty, it is timely to ask whether it has been a success. This article employs Grigorii Golosov’s index of political party nationalization to understand whether the ‘integration’ project has helped to narrow the ideological divide between ethnic Estonians and ethnic Russians. In other words, the study asks whether ethnic Estonians and ethnic Russians vote for the same political parties in comparable proportions or there are ‘Estonian’ and ‘Russian’ parties in the country. The analysis of the outcomes of four local and four parliamentary elections that took place in Estonia in 2005—2019 shows that by the mid-2000s Estonia achieved a considerable level of political party system nationalization at both national and local levels. At the national level, political party system nationalization remained high in 2007—2019 despite significant changes in the country’s political party system. At the local level, however, political party system nationalization has been diminishing since 2013, leading one to conclude that the Estonian ‘integration’ project has failed to close the ideological divide between ethnic Estonians and ethnic Russians.https://journals.kantiana.ru/eng/baltic_region/4418/13006/comparative politicspolitical partiesparty systemsnationalization |
| spellingShingle | Lanko D. A. Lantsova I. S. Party system nationalization in Estonia Baltic Region comparative politics political parties party systems nationalization |
| title | Party system nationalization in Estonia |
| title_full | Party system nationalization in Estonia |
| title_fullStr | Party system nationalization in Estonia |
| title_full_unstemmed | Party system nationalization in Estonia |
| title_short | Party system nationalization in Estonia |
| title_sort | party system nationalization in estonia |
| topic | comparative politics political parties party systems nationalization |
| url | https://journals.kantiana.ru/eng/baltic_region/4418/13006/ |
| work_keys_str_mv | AT lankoda partysystemnationalizationinestonia AT lantsovais partysystemnationalizationinestonia |