Abstract

Peculiarities of the process of electoral preferences radicalization in the European Union countries are characterized. The factors that contribute to this phenomenon are distinguished and special attention is paid to one of the most important prerequisite for growth of far right political parties support in Europe –migration level increase. In order to identify presence or absence of causal links between increase of migration rate and electoral appeal of the far right, relevant statistical data has been collected and analyzed. To determine the migration level, the numbers of asylum seekers in 2013-14 and 2014-15 were used. Three countries with the highest positive and negative difference of the asylum seekers numbers for each period were determined. They include Austria, Denmark, Lithuania, Malta, Poland, Slovenia, Hungary, Finland, Croatia. In each country, the strongest far right political party has been identified and its position has been determined on the basis of electoral support during European Parliament elections of 2009 and 2014 and national elections in 2006-2016. The study found no causal relationships between the number of asylum seekers and the electoral appeal of the largest far right political party in the country, so, despite the undeniable impact of migration on the radicalization of electoral preferences, there is no direct correlation.