Turnout and the Vote for Left-of-Centre Parties: A Cross-National Analysis

1995 ◽  
Vol 25 (1) ◽  
pp. 137-143 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alexander Pacek ◽  
Benjamin Radcliff
Keyword(s):  
Political Parties ◽  
Conventional Wisdom ◽  
National Elections ◽  
Folk Wisdom ◽  
Industrial Democracies ◽  
National Analysis ◽  
Cross National

Political folk wisdom has long suggested that the electoral fortunes of left-of-centre political parties are affected by the rate of turnout. As is so often the case, the conventional wisdom has yet to be subjected to wide empirical scrutiny. In this Note, we attempt such an examination in the context of national elections in industrial democracies.

scholarly journals When Does Income Inequality Cause Polarization?

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-18
Author(s):  
Jacob R. Gunderson
Keyword(s):  
Income Inequality ◽  
Political Parties ◽  
Positive Relationship ◽  
Conventional Wisdom ◽  
National Elections ◽  
Economic Issues ◽  
Party Positions ◽  
Economic Elites ◽  
The Right ◽  
Issue Content

Scholars have long been concerned with the implications of income inequality for democracy. Conventional wisdom suggests that high income inequality is associated with political parties taking polarized positions as the left advocates for increased redistribution while the right aims to entrench the position of economic elites. This article argues that the connection between party positions and income inequality depends on how party bases are sorted by income and the issue content of national elections. It uses data from European national elections from 1996 to 2016 to show that income inequality has a positive relationship with party polarization on economic issues when partisans are sorted with respect to income and when economic issues are relatively salient in elections. When these factors are weak, however, the author finds no relationship between income inequality and polarization.

scholarly journals How Stable Is Political Parties’ Issue Ownership? A Cross-Time, Cross-National Analysis

2016 ◽  
Vol 65 (2) ◽  
pp. 475-492 ◽  
Author(s):  
Henrik Bech Seeberg
Keyword(s):  
Political Parties ◽  
Empirical Work ◽  
Issue Ownership ◽  
Short Term ◽  
Know How ◽  
Comprehensive Data ◽  
National Analysis ◽  
Over Time ◽  
Cross National

Research on issue ownership is accelerating and so is its use in studies of voting and party behaviour. Yet we do not know how stable issue ownership is. Does it describe a solid, persistent association between a party and an issue in the eyes of the electorate, or does it describe a more fluid and fragile issue reputation of a party among the electorate? Theoretical and empirical work suggests both stability and variability in issue ownership. To get closer to an answer, this article presents and analyses unprecedented comprehensive data on issue ownership. The analysis identifies stability rather than change in issue ownership over time and similarity more than difference across countries, and therefore suggests that issue ownership is a general and long-term rather than a local and short-term phenomenon. The implications for how voters perceive parties are important.

Gendered political resources

2016 ◽  
Vol 24 (5) ◽  
pp. 536-548 ◽  
Author(s):  
Tània Verge ◽  
Sílvia Claveria
Keyword(s):  
Political Parties ◽  
Sociodemographic Factors ◽  
Power Dynamics ◽  
Party Government ◽  
Country Level ◽  
Political Resources ◽  
Industrial Democracies ◽  
Political Resource ◽  
Gender Power ◽  
National Analysis

Party office is a crucial political resource for those seeking a political career. It provides advantageous access to the distribution of the patronage parties are entitled to in party government democracies. This article aims at measuring this comparative advantage while simultaneously investigating whether it benefits women and men equally in political recruitment processes. We concentrate on viable candidacy for parliamentary office, ministerial appointments, as well as post-ministerial offices in public and semi-public life that are also in the hands of political parties to distribute. Our cross-national analysis of advanced industrial democracies shows that men are much more likely than women to benefit from holding party office in their ascendant political careers, even when controlling for other political resources, sociodemographic factors and country-level variables. This suggests that party office is a gendered political resource and that gender power dynamics are deeply entrenched in political parties.

The Political Bases of Citizen Contacting: A Cross-National Analysis

1985 ◽  
Vol 79 (1) ◽  
pp. 117-131 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alan S. Zuckerman ◽  
Darrell M. West
Keyword(s):  
Political Parties ◽  
Political Participation ◽  
Economic Resources ◽  
The Political ◽  
Election Campaigns ◽  
Government Officials ◽  
Data Set ◽  
Political Ties ◽  
National Analysis ◽  
Cross National

This article examines a mode of political participation that frequently has been overlooked—individual efforts to obtain assistance from government officials. Using the seven-nation data set of Verba, Nie, and Kim, we develop and empirically evaluate alternatiave models of citizen contacting. Our first model draws on variations in the distribution of social and economic resources to explain the likelihood of contacting. The second focuses on differences in political ties to locate those most likely to contact government officials. We find greater support for the political ties model. Persons active in political parties and election campaigns are the most likely to engage in citizen contacting. Without political ties, few poor or uneducated persons would ask officials for assistance. We conclude by noting the more general theoretical and normative implications of our study.

Forging the Franchise

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Dawn Langan Teele
Keyword(s):  
Political Parties ◽  
Strategic Alliances ◽  
National Level ◽  
Conventional Wisdom ◽  
Competitive Environments ◽  
Political Preferences ◽  
Massive Change ◽  
Political Emancipation ◽  
Women’S Preferences ◽  
Do So

In the 1880s, women were barred from voting in all national-level elections, but by 1920 they were going to the polls in nearly thirty countries. What caused this massive change? Contrary to conventional wisdom, it was not because of progressive ideas about women or suffragists' pluck. In most countries, elected politicians fiercely resisted enfranchising women, preferring to extend such rights only when it seemed electorally prudent and necessary to do so. This book demonstrates that the formation of a broad movement across social divides, and strategic alliances with political parties in competitive electoral conditions, provided the leverage that ultimately transformed women into voters. As the book shows, in competitive environments, politicians had incentives to seek out new sources of electoral influence. A broad-based suffrage movement could reinforce those incentives by providing information about women's preferences, and an infrastructure with which to mobilize future female voters. At the same time that politicians wanted to enfranchise women who were likely to support their party, suffragists also wanted to enfranchise women whose political preferences were similar to theirs. In contexts where political rifts were too deep, suffragists who were in favor of the vote in principle mobilized against their own political emancipation. Exploring tensions between elected leaders and suffragists and the uncertainty surrounding women as an electoral group, the book sheds new light on the strategic reasons behind women's enfranchisement.

Cross-National Analysis of Islamic Fundamentalism

2016 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mansoor Moaddel ◽  
Kristine J. Ajrouch
Keyword(s):  
Islamic Fundamentalism ◽  
National Analysis ◽  
Cross National
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