Why are the affluent better represented around the world?

Scholars have discovered remarkable inequalities in who gets represented in electoral democracies. Around the world, the preferences of the rich tend to be better represented than those of the less well-off. In this paper, we use the most comprehensive comparative dataset of unequal representation available to answer why the poor are underrepresented. By leveraging variation over time and across countries, we study which factors explain why representation is more unequal in some places than in others. We compile a number of covariates examined in previous studies and use machine learning to describe which mechanisms best explain the data. Globally, we find that economic conditions and good governance are most important in determining the extent of unequal representation, and we find little support for hypotheses related to political institutions, interest groups or political behaviour, such as turnout. These results provide the first broadly comparative explanations for unequal representation.     

The effect of generation and age on turnout to the European Parliament – How turnout will continue to decline in the future

Electoral turnout has been declining at national elections in almost all Western democracies. European Parliament (EP) elections have followed the same trend. We utilize a previously suggested method for separating the effect of generation, age and period and show that a major part of the decline can be attributed to the difference in turnout between pre- and post-baby-boomer generations though there are substantial differences across countries. Age has a curvilinear effect on turnout even when generation is taken into account, but the age composition has remained relatively stable over time. We utilize the estimated coefficients to predict future changes in turnout as a result of the expected shifts in the generational and age compositions over the next 30 years. The results point to a continued decline in turnout to EP elections – especially between the years of 2020 and 2040.     

Electoral consequences of declining participation: A natural experiment in Austria

Participation rates have declined sharply across developed democracies. But the precise impact of this decline on party systems has proven difficult to study due to endogeneity concerns. This paper seeks to address this issue by leveraging a natural experiment in Austrian parliamentary elections. By examining instances in which compulsory voting was gradually repealed in a federal setting, I isolate the causal relationship between turnout decline and subsequent shifts in party vote share. The findings suggest that turnout decline is not associated with a significant redistribution of votes between parties. The clearest visible effect is a consolidation of the party system, with a mild shift in votes from minor to mainstream parties. Evaluating the findings, the paper argues that characteristics of proportional representation systems insulate parties against the consequences of declining electoral participation.     

Candidate-centred electoral systems and voter turnout

Abstract

This study evaluates contradictory theoretical predictions concerning the relationship between the candidate-centredness of electoral systems and voter turnout. Candidate-centredness has been proposed to both stimulate and depress turnout. Cross-sectional time-series data from 36 democracies between 1990 and 2014 are used to test the competing assumptions made about the impact of the personal vote on turnout. Three measures assessing the extent to which electoral systems create incentives to cultivate a personal vote are employed. The results show that turnout is the lowest in candidate-centred systems and the highest in party-centred systems with closed and ordered lists, while controlling for a host of contextual factors that have been linked to aggregate turnout. In addition, the finding that candidate-centredness is negatively related to turnout holds up even when taking into account district magnitude, electoral disproportionality and effective number of parties.     

Turnout in electoral democracies

Abstract. We examine turnout in 324 democratic national lower house elections held in 91 countries, between 1972 and 1995. We rely on Freedom House ratings of political rights to determine whether an election is democratic or not. We distinguish three blocs of factors that affect turnout: the socio–economic environment, institutions, and party systems. We show that turnout is influenced by a great number of factors and that the patterns that have been shown to prevail in studies dealing with more limited samples of countries generally hold when we look at a larger set of democracies. But we also show that the socioeconomic environment, which has been downplayed in previous studies, has a substantial impact on turnout.     

Ethnic diversity decreases turnout. Comparative evidence from over 650 elections around the world

Ethnic diversity has been shown to play a significant role in public goods provision, economic growth and government quality, to mention a few. However, we do not know which is the impact of ethnic diversity on turnout. In this article, we determine which dimensions of ethnic diversity affects turnout. To do so, we have gathered data from over 650 parliamentary elections in 102 democracies covering over a fifty-year period. Our models and seven complementary robustness checks show that elections in countries with more fractionalised, more polarised and more concentrated ethnic groups have a significantly and substantially lower turnout.     

Economic globalization and voter turnout in established democracies

This paper asks whether international economic integration negatively affects electoral turnout. The theoretical model builds on the premise that economic integration constrains the ability of national governments to shape outcomes. Citizens are conscious of such constraints and take them into account when considering the costs and benefits of casting a vote in national elections. The result is a lower inclination to vote under conditions of high economic integration. Consequently, aggregate turnout is lower the more internationally integrated a national economy is. Analysis of aggregate data for parliamentary elections in 23 OECD democracies over the period 1965–2006 robustly supports this hypothesis. The empirical estimates suggest economic globalization as a central cause of the general decline in turnout within established democracies.     

Disproportionality and voter turnout in new and old democracies

A long-standing puzzle in electoral research is why the disproportionality of electoral systems has a negative effect on voter participation in established democracies, but not in new democracies. We propose a learning theory of electoral system’s effects, and test it in a cross-national analysis and by using Spain as a case study. Electoral disproportionality is unrelated to voter participation in early elections after democratization, but the relationship is increasingly visible as democracies grow older. The case study uncovers two mechanisms: small parties optimize their mobilization strategy only after the first democratic elections, and the difference in the turnout rates of small party supporters and large party supporters grows over time. Time is needed before the consequences of electoral systems are fully revealed. Importantly, the findings suggest that studies carried out just after an electoral system is created or reformed may provide downward biased estimates of their long-term consequences.     

Something about young people or something about elections? Electoral participation of young people in Europe: Evidence from a multilevel analysis of the European Social Survey

Abstract.  Turnout at general elections across Europe is in decline as it is in other established democracies. A particular cause for concern is that young people are less likely to participate than older voters. Evidence presented in this article, based on national election results and the 2002–2003 European Social Survey, shows the overall turnout rate for 22 European countries in elections between 1999 and 2002 was 70 per cent compared to 51 per cent for electors aged less than 25. The authors examine national variations in turnout for young people across Europe, and use multilevel logistic regression models to understand these variations, and to test the extent to which they are attributable to the characteristics of young people and the electoral context in each country. Variations in turnout among young people are partially accounted for by the level of turnout of older voters in the country and partly by the characteristics of young voters, including the level of political interest and civic duty. The authors conclude that both individual-level and election-specific information are important in understanding the turnout of young electors.     

Turnout determinants in democracies and in non-democracies

Elections are celebrated in democracies as well as in non-democracies. Studies on the factors explaining turnout normally focus, however, only on democracies. Are turnout patterns different in non-democracies? If so, how different are those? In this paper I address this issue with a unique dataset covering 1251 elections −678 democratic (in 107 countries) and 250 nondemocratic elections (in 81 countries) for the lower house and 209 democratic (in 57 countries) and 114 nondemocratic (in 60 countries)- for the period 1961–2008. I find that the turnout determinants are contingent upon the regimes and that the most important differences lay in the institutional and in the political factors.     

Electoral turnout and income redistribution by the state: A cross-national analysis of the developed democracies

Abstract.  This article explores the sources of variation in state redistribution across 13 developed democracies over the period 1979–2000, drawing upon data from the International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance, the Luxembourg Income Study and the Comparative Study of Electoral Systems. The discussion begins with the median voter hypothesis, which predicts that the extent of state redistribution in a country will be positively related to the degree of pre-government inequality. In seeking to extend the median voter approach, the article takes into account two additional variables: the level of electoral turnout and the degree to which turnout is skewed by income. The analysis confirms that pre-government inequality is indeed positively related to state redistribution. However, the predictive power of the median voter approach is significantly improved when account is taken of the level of electoral turnout and the extent to which the turnout rate reflects an income skew – variables that are themselves related. The link between turnout and redistribution is especially strong for social transfers as opposed to taxes, and for the lower and middle, as opposed to the upper, part of the income spectrum.     

Declining voter turnout in Taiwan: A generational effect?

Taiwan's voter turnout has declined nearly fifteen percentage points since the early 2000s. All ages voted less in 2016 than before, but the drop was particularly severe among younger voters, who turned out at rates up to twenty percentage points lower than in 2004. Thus Taiwan resembles other mature democracies like the U.S., Canada, Sweden, and Finland, where declining turnout has been shown to afflict the young disproportionately. However, we argue that this youthful disaffection with voting is more difficult to interpret than usually believed, and that it may not represent an inherent attribute of younger cohorts.     

To have or not to have: Effects of economic inequality on turnout in European democracies

The effect of economic inequality on turnout has received considerable interest recently. Some studies suggest that inequality depresses turnout, others that the relationship is either the other way around or simply non-existent. Employing a large dataset with some 80,000 respondents from 30 European democracies, we show that great care is required when exploring inequality and turnout. On average, there is indeed a negative/positive effect of being below/above the median income in a country – but it is conditioned by inequality (measured as the Gini coefficient) and national wealth (measured as GDP per capita). Moreover, the two country-level factors interact in surprising ways. Based on our results we warn against claims of mono-causal relationships between the economic situation of voters and turnout.     

Differential Turnout Decline in Norway and Sweden: A Generation of Apathy or Alienation?

Voter turnout has been in a trend of gradual decline in most established democracies in recent decades and the reasons for this are by no means fully understood. While most studies agree that the trend is largely driven by younger generations voting less than older cohorts, the individual‐level mechanisms of their declining propensity to vote are still disputed. A major distinction in the literature on democratic developments is that between theories of political apathy and political alienation: whether citizens are less interested in politics or still interested but instead estranged from their political systems. An interesting test for these different explanations can be found in Scandinavia: While Norway and Sweden have intimate historical, political and cultural similarities, Norway has been experiencing gradual turnout decline, while there has been no clear overall trend in Sweden. This study uses a combined dataset of over 50.000 respondents from 31 national election studies in these two countries from 1956–2013 to test the relative roles of apathy, alienation and generational dynamics in explaining these different trends in turnout. The results indicate that apathy has been declining while alienation has been rising in both countries. However, in Norway, those who are more apathetic today are much less likely to vote than apathetic citizens were in the past. The youngest generations are also significantly more apathetic and less likely to vote in Norway than in Sweden. These dynamics appear to account for the larger trend of turnout decline in Norway.     

Policy responsiveness to all citizens or only to voters? A longitudinal analysis of policy responsiveness in OECD countries

A close connection between public opinion and policy is considered a vital element of democracy. In representative systems, elections are assumed to play a role in realising such congruence. If those who participate in elections are not representative of the public at large, it follows that the reliance on elections as a mechanism of representation entails a risk of unequal representation. In this paper, we evaluate whether voters are better represented by means of an analysis of policy responsiveness to voters and citizens in democracies worldwide. We construct a uniquely comprehensive dataset that includes measures of citizens’ and voters’ ideological (left–right) positions, and data on welfare spending in Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development countries since 1980. We find evidence of policy responsiveness to voters, but not to the public at large. Since additional tests suggest that the mechanism of electoral turnout does not cause this voter-policy responsiveness, we outline alternate mechanisms to test in future research.     

Economic Integration,Party Polarisation and Electoral Turnout

Recent research provides evidence that economic integration has a negative effect on electoral turnout. Taking up these recent findings, this article explores the causal chain in more detail. Specifically, it argues that one way by which economic integration affects the calculus of voting is through the positioning of political parties. The expectation is that the polarisation between parties on an economic left–right scale is lower the more integrated an economy is. Consequently, electoral turnout should be lower with less polarisation in the party system. The article employs aggregate-level data from legislative elections in 24 developed democracies. Using data from the Comparative Manifestos Project, evidence is found not only that economic integration has a negative effect on party polarisation as measured on an economic left–right dimension, but also that this in turn exerts a negative effect on electoral turnout.     

Differential Responsiveness in Europe: The Effects of Preference Difference and Electoral Participation

As a core principle of contemporary democracy, political representation has been the subject of numerous studies. In particular, responsiveness has been thoroughly examined and research suggests that policies tend to reflect citizens’ preferences. However, it has also been argued that, in some instances, responsiveness systematically reflects the preferences of the rich better than those of the poor, hence violating a second democratic principle, that of political equality. While much research has focused on the United States, this study tests whether differential responsiveness also occurs in European democracies and enquires about the structural factors that may cause such inequality. The article examines to what extent the preference gap between the rich and the poor as well as the level of electoral participation can account for variation in differential responsiveness. To do this, a dataset including information on 25 European countries from 2002 to 2010 is constructed and analysed using time-series cross-sectional methods. The findings suggest that European democracies experience differential responsiveness and that the preference gap and level of turnout partly account for this.     

Valence politics and electoral choice in a new democracy: The case of Taiwan

After two peaceful alternations of political power in a single decade, Taiwan is a democratic success story, demonstrating levels of party competition, turnout rates and patterns of civic engagement similar to those in mature Western democracies. What factors drive electoral choice in Taiwan's new democracy? This paper addresses this question by testing rival models of voting behavior using the Taiwan Elections and Democratization Study (TEDS) 2008 presidential election survey data and the 2010 mayoral election survey data. Analyses show that, similar to their counterparts in mature democracies, Taiwanese voters place more emphasis on the performance of political parties and their leaders in delivering policies designed to address valence issues concerning broadly shared policy goals than on position issues or more general ideological stances that divide the electorate. Findings demonstrating the strength of the valence politics model of electoral choice in Taiwan closely resemble the results of analyses of competing models of voting behavior in Western countries such as Great Britain and the United States.     

Modeling ideological polarization in democratic party systems

There are mounting claims that increasing ideological polarization is reshaping democratic party systems with important effects on the functioning of electoral politics, the correlates of voting choice, turnout, and even the representativeness of government. Yet, our knowledge of what causes party system polarization is still developing. The primary research goal is to systematically combine and test existing theories predicting levels of party system polarization across 21 established democracies. Polarization levels have generally risen since the mid-1990s. A pooled model finds that characteristics of the electoral system and the party system largely determine the continuity of party system polarization. Polarization levels also appear linked to short-term factors such as citizens’ declining confidence in the economy and increasing concerns about immigration. The conclusion discusses the implications for party systems and politics in affluent democracies.     

‘Voice and Equality’: Young People’s Politics in the European Union

Academics and policy-makers have highlighted the increasing disconnection between citizens and electoral politics in Europe. Declining citizen involvement in traditional forms of politics has manifested itself in lower voter turnout and a dramatic shrinkage in the membership of political parties. Citizens have turned to alternative forms of civic and political engagement. These trends are most marked amongst young people. Whilst a number of studies have examined the nature of political participation in Europe, and the participation of young people in individual countries or specific political activities (such as voting), hardly any research has looked at patterns of engagement ‘within’ a generation of young people across different democracies. This article examines the political participation of young Europeans in national democracies in 15 European Union member states. Previous studies have shown that citizens are increasingly moving away from electoral forms of participation towards alternative forms of engagement that are (for the population as a whole) much less socially equal. Using data from the European Social Survey, this article finds that the social inequalities of participation are (with the major exception of voting) much less profound for young people. This latter finding has important implications for public efforts to promote greater youth participation in democracy.