Swen Hutter is Lichtenberg-Professor in Political Sociology at Freie Universität Berlin, and Vice Director of the Center for Civil Society Research, a joint initiative of Freie Universität and the Wissenschaftszentrum Berlin für Sozialforschung. Hutter is the author of Protesting Culture and Economics in Western Europe (2014) and co-editor of Politicising Europe (Cambridge, 2016). Hanspeter Kriesi holds the Stein Rokkan Chair in Comparative Politics at the European University Institute, Florence. He was the director of a Swiss national research programme on 'Challenges to democracy in the 21st century' from 2005–12. Currently, he is the principal investigator of the ERC project 'Political Conflict in Europe in the Shadow of the Great Recession'.

• Part I. Theoretical Framework and Context: 1. Crises and the transformation of the national political space in Europe Hanspeter Kriesi and Swen Hutter; 2. Economic and political crises: the context of critical elections Hanspeter Kriesi and Swen Hutter; 3. The media content analysis and cross-validation Swen Hutter and Theresa Gessler; Part II. Country Studies: 4. Spain – out with the old: the restructuring of Spanish politics Guillem Vidal and Irene Sánchez-Vítores; 5. Greece – punctuated equilibrium: the restructuring of Greek politics Argyrios Altiparmakis; 6. Italy – the end of bipolarism: restructuration in an unstable party system Johannes Karremans, Giorgio Malet and Davide Morisi; 7. Portugal – a tale of apparent stability and surreptitious transformation Frederico Ferreira da Silva and Mariana S. Mendes; 8. Hungary – a Hungarian crisis or just a crisis in Hungary? Theresa Gessler and Anna Kyriazi; 9. Poland – 'modern' versus 'normal': the increasing importance of the cultural divide Paulina Salek and Agnieszka Sztajdel; 10. Romania – polity contestation and the resilience of mainstream parties Endre Borbáth; 11. Latvia – an ever-wider gap: the ethnic divide in Latvian party politics Edgars Eihmanis; 12. Austria, France, the Netherlands and Switzerland: old and new winning formulas of the populist radical right Jasmine Lorenzini and Mathilde van Ditmars; 13. Restructuring British and German party politics in times of crisis Björn Bremer and Julia Schulte-Cloos; 14. Ireland – limited restructuration in the poster child of austerity Swen Hutter and Giorgio Malet; Part III. Conclusions: 15. Diverging Europe: the political consequences of the crises in a comparative perspective Swen Hutter, Argyrios Altiparmakis and Guillem Vidal; 16. Conclusion: a critical juncture for the structuration of party systems? Hanspeter Kriesi.

'This is a comprehensive analysis of how the Great Recession has shaped the politics of Europe. Employing original data for fifteen countries, the authors provide an invaluable guide to the structure of democratic competition and the rise of a cultural cleavage over the past decade. The result is an compelling analysis that is required reading for students of Europe and democratic politics more generally.' Gary Marks, Burton Craige Professor of Political Science and Robert Schuman Fellow, European University Institute