Spanish Far-Right Party “Vox”: Its Role in Shaping of the EU Regional Agenda

Abstract

The “Vox” party has turned into an influential actor of the European politics due to its electoral success; institutional and ideological adaptation to the country’s changing party landscape; attempts to create its own institutional, organizational, informational, and creative resources; as well as its policy of forming strong alliances with European and American rightwing conservative forces. Based on the spatial approach (categories of political space and political identity) and discourse-analysis, the author tries to comprehend the policy guidelines of “Vox”; determines the place of the party in the political system and the media sphere of Spain; defines the role that “Vox” plays in shaping the regional agenda of the EU. The study focuses on the political and institutional aspects of how “Vox” strengthens its relations with similar EU parties based on partisan and ideological identity, designing alternative projects of European integration, and establishing a new, ideologized format for the relations of Spain (and more broadly - the EU) and the Ibero-American countries. The author concludes about the structuring and the formal institutionalization of communications and political interactions between the far-right political elites which carries risks for the EU’s efforts to create a macropolitical identity and the metanarrative of memory, therefore, potentially leading to political divisions in the EU.