Chapter 17: Left-right ideological congruence in Southern Europe André Freire (ISCTE-IUL, University Institute of Lisbon, and CIES-IUL), Xavier Coller (The National Distance Education University), Andrea Pedrazzani (University of Bologna), Paolo Segatti (University of Milan), Emmanouil Tsatsanis (National Centre for Social Research-EKKE) Abstract: This chapter looks at left-right ideological congruence in Southern Europe (Greece, Italy, Portugal and Spain), between members of Parliament and their constituents, in comparative perspective since the late 2000s, with a special emphasis on the period before and after the Great Recession. Looking at ideological congruence, Greece appears as an outlier with the lowest level of congruence. There is as well a diversity of situations in terms of trends in both party representation and left-right ideological congruence. Finally, the chapter reports evidence, both across and within countries, of both bottom-up and top-down representation, which underscores the relevance of both types of representation for the functioning of democracy. Keywords: Substantive representation; left-right ideological congruence; Great Recession; crisis and post-crisis; southern Europe

The Portuguese part of the analysis of this paper would have not been possible without the support of FCT Project, 2016-2019, PTDC/IVC-CPO/3098/2014. Freire would like to thank Viriato Queiroga & Augusta Correia for the help in data analysis and editing.

Keywords: Substantive representation,left-right ideological congruence,Great Recession,crisis and post-crisis,southern Europe