Regional Hierarchies of Discontent: An Accessibility Approach

We argue that so-called geographies of discontent work within regional hierarchies in a spatial continuum, whereas the previous literature has mainly invoked dichotomous divides, such as core-periphery or the North-South. A place’s relation to surrounding communities and regions remains an understudied topic. We analyse the municipal distribution of electoral support for Sweden Democrats (Sverigedemokraterna, SD) in the 2014 and 2018 Swedish national general elections. We show that higher accessibility to other large municipalities within the same region, as well as being surrounded by relatively larger neighbouring regions, is associated with further support for SD. The within-region associations are only reliably identified among the urban group.