Honors Theses

Date of Award

Spring 5-1-2021

Document Type

Undergraduate Thesis

Department

Croft Institute for International Studies

First Advisor

Miguel Centellas

Second Advisor

William Schenck

Third Advisor

Nidhi Vij Mali

Relational Format

Dissertation/Thesis

Abstract

This thesis analyzes reasons behind the current global growth of ethnoreligious nationalist parties through a cross-regional analysis of the Vox party in Spain and the Bharatiya Janata Party in India. It also looks at the shift in party domination as secularism has fallen in an era of globalization with the end of “Spanish Exceptionalism” and decline in the Indian National Congress. It utilizes the theory of constructivism to present how this current wave of identity-focused ethnoreligious nationalism is a socio-political construct where those from the majority ethno-religious identity feel the perception of threat by minority populations and multiculturalism and seek to reclaim their nation. It calls for the further need to assess the role of religious identity in nationalism. A most-different, similar outcomes research design is employed to compare two quite different Western and Eastern cases that have produced similar parties. Independent variables in three categories of economic, political, and socio-cultural factors are analyzed using Pearson’s r to gauge whether there is a correlation between certain variables and the rise of these parties. It was evaluated that socio-cultural factors had a stronger influence followed by economic then political factors, which ties into anti-minority and in particular anti-Muslim sentiment that permeates society and politics.

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Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 International License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 4.0 International License.

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