How do radical right populist parties matter? The influence of the Swiss SVP on policy-making.

How do radical right populist parties matter? The growing success of radical right populist parties revives the need to precisely understand the role of radical right populist parties in democracy. How do they behave in order to influence policy-making? They are often conflated with extremist parties but do they behave similarly, by developing undemocratic and/or unconstitutional strategies? Do they develop typical radical right populist strategies or do they behave exactly like any other political party when trying to influence policy-making ? Understanding the “how” question is crucial in order to understand if radical right populist parties can really be considered as a threat to democracy and, if so, to what extent. Using the process-tracing method, the research investigates the strategies developed by the ‘Schweizerische Volkspartei’ (SVP) in order to influence policy-making. A typology comprising classical strategies and more specific strategies results from the analysis of this ‘most likely case’. The article suggests that some strategies are more profitable during some stages of policy-making while others are more profitable during other stages. Because these strategies contain limits and drawbacks, only a genuine combination of several strategies can lead to a full influence of policy-making