Election Timing and Party System Fragmentation: A Constituency Level Analysis of the 1967-2012 French Legislative Elections

2012 ◽  
Author(s):  
Bernard Dolez ◽  
Annie Laurent
Keyword(s):  
Party System ◽  
Legislative Elections ◽  
Election Timing ◽  
Level Analysis

scholarly journals The impact of using proportional representation system on the fragmentation of the party system in Algeria. Applied to the elections of the National People’s Assembly (1997–2017)

2021 ◽  
Vol ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print) ◽  
Author(s):  
Ali Mahmoud Mahgoub
Keyword(s):  
Political System ◽  
Party System ◽  
Electoral System ◽  
Proportional Representation ◽  
Effective Number ◽  
Legislative Elections ◽  
Representation System ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Number Of Parties ◽  
The Impact

Purpose The purpose of this study is to examine the impact of using proportional representation system on the fragmentation of the party system in the Algerian political system within the period from 1997 to 2017, in which Algeria has experienced five legislative elections regularly every five years by testing a hypothesis about adopting the proportional representation system on the basis of the closed list during the foregoing legislative elections has obviously influenced the exacerbation of the Algerian party system’s fragmentation, compared to other factors. Design/methodology/approach The essence of the theoretical framework of this study is to address the effect of the electoral system as an independent variable on the party system as a dependent variable. The starting point for that framework is to reassess the “Duverger’s law,” which appeared since the early 1950s and has influenced the foregoing relationship, and then to review the literature on a new phase that tried to provide a more accurate mechanism for determining the number of parties and their relative weight, whether in terms of electoral votes or parliamentary seats. This means that researchers began to use a measure called the effective number of parties (ENP) for Laakso and Taagepera since 1979. The study elaborates the general concepts of the electoral system and the party system. It used Laakso, Taagepera index of the “ENP” to measure the phenomenon of fragmentation party during the five legislative elections from 1997 to 2017 in Algeria. Findings The results of the study reveal that the proportional representation electoral system – beside other factors – had clear impacts on the fragmentation of the Algerian party system by all standards, whether on the level of the apparent rise in the number of the parties represented in the Algerian parliament from 10 parties in 1997 election to 36 parties in 2017 election or according to the index of Laakso and Taagepera (ENP). The average number of effective number of electoral parties in the five elections was around 7.66, and the average number of effective number of parliamentary parties in the five elections was around 4.39, which puts Algeria in an advanced degree of the fragmentation of the party system. Originality/value This study about the phenomenon of the fragmentation of the party system, which is one of the new subjects in the field of comparative politics – globally and in the Arab world. Hence, the value of this study aims to shed light on this mysterious area of science, the fragmentation of the party system in the Algerian political system during the period from 1997 to 2017.

scholarly journals Forecasting Dutch elections: An initial model from the March 2017 legislative contests

2017 ◽  
Vol 4 (3) ◽  
pp. 205316801772002 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ruth Dassonneville ◽  
Michael S. Lewis-Beck ◽  
Philippe Mongrain
Keyword(s):  
Political Economy ◽  
Party System ◽  
Routine Activity ◽  
Forecasting Model ◽  
Prediction Markets ◽  
Initial Model ◽  
Legislative Elections ◽  
Election Forecasting ◽  
Accurate Forecast ◽  
Western Democracies

Serious election forecasting has become a routine activity in most Western democracies, with various methodologies employed, for example, polls, models, prediction markets, and citizen forecasting. In the Netherlands, however, election forecasting has limited itself to the use of polls, mainly because other approaches are viewed as too complicated, given the great fragmentation of the Dutch party system. Here we challenge this view, offering the first structural forecasting model of legislative elections there. We find that a straightforward Political Economy equation managed an accurate forecast of the 2017 contest, clearly besting the efforts of the pollsters.

scholarly journals Away Inside: Emigrants and Transnationalism Through the Eyes of Political Parties

2011 ◽  
pp. 61-82
Author(s):  
Manuel Abrantes ◽  
Joana Azevedo ◽  
Ana Maria Belchior ◽  
Marco Lisi
Keyword(s):  
Political Parties ◽  
Party System ◽  
Future Research ◽  
Legislative Elections ◽  
Public Officials ◽  
Institutional Conditions ◽  
Empirical Inquiry ◽  
External Voting ◽  
Transnational Citizenship ◽  
The Subject

This article examines how political parties in Portugal organize concerning emigrants and the subject of migration outflow, uncovering the issues and strategies that they favour. The 2009 Portuguese legislative elections offer a privileged site for empirical inquiry. Not only are emigrants able to elect members of the national parliament  through particular voting districts, but also a complete period of electoral campaigning under standard institutional conditions (rather than early elections) could thus be followed in real-time by the research team. Analysis draws chiefly on electoral manifestos, campaign activities, and first-hand interviews with members of the parliament and public officials. A close tie between the capacity of parties to organize abroad and the salience of issues related to the emigrant population in party programs is exposed. It is argued that the ambigous position of external voting between the strengthening of national(istic) bonds and transnational citizenship is disputed within the party system, since attitudes towards each of these perspectives vary across parties. Parties must therefore be understood as key players in the ongoing redefinition of the political agency of migrants, bearing a significant impact on their participation and representation. Last, implications for future research are addressed.

scholarly journals Las elecciones uruguayas de 2014: Tabaré y el Frente Amplio otra vez

2016 ◽  
Vol 15 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Asbel Bohigues
Keyword(s):  
Party System ◽  
Key Factors ◽  
Legislative Elections ◽  
National Elections ◽  
System Evolution ◽  
Popular Support ◽  
The Third ◽  
Socioeconomic Context ◽  
Territorial Division ◽  
Sobre Todo

En octubre de 2014 se celebraron las elecciones nacionales en Uruguay, resultando vencedor el expresidente Tabaré Vázquez y revalidándose la mayoría parlamentaria del Frente Amplio. Los resultados electorales fueron similares a los de 2009, confirmando el apoyo popular del Frente Amplio, en la presidencia desde 2005. En este trabajo se analizan los resultados en las elecciones legislativas y presidenciales de Uruguay en 2014, situándolos en la evolución del sistema de partidos uruguayo de las últimas décadas, a la vez que se atiende a la distribución territorial del voto, y el contexto político y socioeconómico previo a las elecciones. Igualmente se apunta a las principales claves para entender la tercera victoria consecutiva del Frente así como las implicaciones de dichos resultados a futuro tanto para el presidente Tabaré Vázquez como para el partido. Estas elecciones confirman el predominio del Frente Amplio en Uruguay, frente a los dos partidos tradicionales históricos, el Nacional y el Colorado, que llevan ya más de 10 años en la oposición, así como la división territorial del país: el interior apoya sobre todo a los partidos tradicionales, de centro-derecha, y la zona urbana, especialmente Montevideo, a la izquierda. In October 2014 the national elections in Uruguay took place, the expresident Tabaré Vázquez won and the Broad Front got again the parliamentary majority. The electoral results were quite similar to 2009, confirming the Broad Front’s popular support, with the presidency since 2005. This paper aims to analyse the results in both presidential and legislative elections in Uruguay in 2014, contextualizing them in the Uruguayan party system evolution in recent decades, also focusing on the territorial distribution of the vote, and the prior political and socioeconomic context to the elections. Likewise, the main key factors to explain the third consecutive victory of the Front are highlighted, as well as what these results involve for the future, both for president Tabaré Vázquez and for the party. This election confirms the predominance of the Broad Front in Uruguay, in opposition to the two historical traditional parties, National and Coloured, which have been in the opposition for more than 10 years, as well as the territorial division of the country: inland supports center-right traditional parties, and the urban zone, Montevideo specially, the left.

Personal vote, spatial registration rules, and party system nationalization in Latin America

2017 ◽  
Vol 39 (2) ◽  
pp. 192-208 ◽  
Author(s):  
Yen-Pin Su
Keyword(s):  
Latin American ◽  
Party System ◽  
Legal Status ◽  
Electoral Systems ◽  
Interactive Effect ◽  
Electoral System ◽  
Legislative Elections ◽  
Spatial Registration ◽  
Party Registration ◽  
The Impact

While many studies of party system nationalization examine the effects of various institutional factors, few take into account the impact of party formation cost. This paper aims to fill the empirical gap by focusing on the interactive effect of electoral systems and party registration rules. I argue that the effect of electoral systems on party system nationalization is conditional on spatial registration rules, a requirement that requires a party to collect signatures or organize local branches in a specified geographical manner to maintain the party’s legal status. Based on data for 97 legislative elections in 18 Latin American countries from 1978 to 2011, the empirical analysis demonstrates that a country with an electoral system that encourages a personal vote tends to have a much lower level of party system nationalization when that country does not have spatial registration requirements. The result is robust across different model specifications and estimation techniques.

scholarly journals The Role of International Factors in Electoral Volatility in Latin America: An Examination of Structural Adjustment

SAGE Open ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 11 (2) ◽  
pp. 215824402110178
Author(s):  
Michelle Kuenzi ◽  
Hafthor Erlingsson ◽  
John P. Tuman
Keyword(s):  
Latin America ◽  
Latin American ◽  
Structural Adjustment ◽  
Party System ◽  
Economic Voting ◽  
Original Data ◽  
Legislative Elections ◽  
Data Set ◽  
Electoral Volatility

Does structural adjustment increase party system instability in Latin America? We employ the Latin American Presidential and Legislative Elections (LAPALE) database ( http://www.lapaledata.com ) and our own original data set for structural adjustment to assess the effects of structural adjustment and other economic, social, and political variables on legislative volatility in 18 Latin American countries during the period of 1982 to 2016. The results of our study indicate that structural adjustment results in higher levels of within-system electoral volatility and support a broad version of economic voting theory. Extra-system electoral volatility is driven primarily by institutional and demographic factors. Our findings also highlight the importance of disaggregating electoral volatility as within-system volatility and extra-system volatility appear to be largely driven by different factors, or in different ways by the same factors.

scholarly journals Concurrent elections lead to coattails and electoral spill-overs: Quasi-experimental evidence from German municipalities

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lukas Rudolph ◽  
Arndt Leininger
Keyword(s):  
Experimental Evidence ◽  
Party System ◽  
Electoral System ◽  
Executive Leadership ◽  
The Other ◽  
Theoretical Argument ◽  
Legislative Elections ◽  
Unique Case ◽  
Quasi Experimental ◽  
Concurrent Elections

Concurrency of elections is a widely used tool to increase turnout. However, this turnout increase is likely not outcome-neutral if some voters attribute more importance to one of the elections compared to the other. We theorize coattail effects and electoral system effects that should occur in this setting. Drawing on a unique case of quasi-random variation in the timing of local executive and legislative elections in Germany, we show that concurrent elections lead to an increase in turnout. Thereby, in line with our theoretical argument, concurrency of local executive elections increases council votes for the incumbent mayor's party and for centrist parties more generally. Additionally, concurrent elections consolidate party system and political power through more single-party majorities in councils, less fragmentation and greater alignment of executive leadership and legislative majority. Our theoretical argument and empirical results thus serve to explain divergent findings in the literature on turnout effects.

scholarly journals Was 2016 a Realigning Election in Taiwan?

Asian Survey ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 60 (6) ◽  
pp. 1006-1028
Author(s):  
Cal Clark ◽  
Alexander C. Tan ◽  
Karl Ho
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Social Movements ◽  
Party System ◽  
The United States ◽  
Democratic Progressive Party ◽  
Fundamental Change ◽  
Legislative Elections ◽  
Long Time ◽  
Progressive Party

The January 2016 presidential and legislative elections in Taiwan produced a dramatic and unprecedented victory for the Democratic Progressive Party over its long-time rival, the Kuomintang. The party had never had a parliamentary majority before 2016. The elections indicated the potential for fundamental change in Taiwan’s party system. This is what political scientists call a critical realigning election. The problem with identifying these elections, such as the 1896 and 1932 ones in the United States, is that we can only be sure of such an interpretation after a significant amount of time has passed. Still, some of the changes in Taiwan are fundamental enough to make such an evaluation worthwhile. We summarize realigning elections; discuss the factors that may lead to a change in the partisan balance; and describe the growing role of protest parties and social movements in Taiwan politics.

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