Democratic Performance of Parties and Legitimacy in Europe

This article analyses the development of legitimacy across 20 European democracies (1990–2010). The claim is that the democratic performance of parties affects levels of legitimacy. A conceptual and empirical discussion is presented to establish this relationship. Democratic performance is characterised by trusting parties to be responsive to the electorate and responsible in government. Legitimacy is defined as a composite measure representing satisfaction with parties, compliance with the rule of law as well as voter turnout and willingness to protest. The responsiveness of parties appears less representative on public concerns and governmental responsibility appears closer to party interests than to the general interest. Hence, a ‘democratic deficit’ seems to have emerged across Europe, manifested by more electoral volatility, new parties and alternation in government and lower survival rates of governments. This negatively affects trust in parties, parliament and government efficacy. Hence, party behaviour has not strongly contributed to political legitimacy since the 1990s.     

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.     

Negative voting and party polarization: A classic tragedy

Elections around the globe attest to the persistence of polarization in democratic politics. Popular support for antagonistic elite strategies defies standard predictions of ideological convergence. This paper develops a new solution to the theoretical puzzle: The centrifugal drive in representative democracy is a byproduct of voters’ disposition to evaluate policy platforms on the basis of issue positions that they dislike—to wit, negative voting. While reasonable individually, this behavior backfires collectively as elections dominated by negativity produce more polarized legislatures. Quite tragically, party polarization ultimately reflects an uncoordinated struggle of the electorate to avoid the worst rather than to pursue the best. Support for these claims comes from a theoretical model and a large comparative analysis of vote choice and party platforms. The evidence also favors the negativity model over earlier spatial models of elections. In light of negativity, normative concerns about polarization and democratic representation stand to be reconsidered.     

新型政党制度所蕴含的中国智慧

中国共产党领导的多党合作和政治协商制度是从中国土壤中生长出来的新型政党制度,充分汲取了中国传统民本智慧、和合智慧、包容智慧,展现出了无与伦比的内在优越性,实现了群众根本利益与群体特殊利益的有机统一、实现了政党关系的非对称性和谐、实现了通过政党协商进行科学民主决策、实现了集中力量办大事,从而克服了垄断型一党制和竞争型两党制、多党制的固有弊端。作为和谐型多党制的新型政党制度充分展现了中国智慧,为世界政党制度发展与进步提供了新方向和新选择。     

The partisan heuristic and the voters’ knowledge: The essential role of the information environment

The low-information rationality theory expects voters with low political knowledge to make more use of the partisan heuristic than those with high knowledge. However, empirical studies on decision making in direct democracy observe a positive correlation between political knowledge and the use of party cues. We resolve this tension between theory and empirical evidence by demonstrating that the relationship between political knowledge and the use of party cues is conditional on the information environment. We provide evidence for this hypothesis by exploiting a natural experiment in Switzerland and analyze a large variety of direct democratic votes. The results show that voters with lower levels of political knowledge tend to align less with their preferred party because they often have a wrong perception of their preferred party’s vote recommendation. However, if information on parties’ position is easily available, their vote choice is at least as much in line with their preferred party as among those with high knowledge. This suggests that in such an information environment voters with low political knowledge strongly rely on the partisan heuristic. Our research note supports the low-information rationality theory and this way contributes to the literature on the quality of political opinion formation and the political psychology of reasoning and decision making.     

It takes two: how Eurosceptic public opinion and party divisions influence party positions

Do parties respond to voters’ preferences on European integration in elections to the European Parliament (EP)? Following recent research that shows political party responsiveness to Eurosceptic attitudes during EP elections is conditioned by party characteristics, this article seeks to understand how party unity on European integration affects party responsiveness to Euroscepticism. It argues that when Eurosceptic attitudes among voters are high and the parties are divided in their position on European integration, parties will be more responsive to voters and take a more Eurosceptic position. To test the theoretical expectations, the study uses data from the Chapel Hill Expert Survey, the Euromanifestos Project, and European Election Study for 1989–2009 for over 120 parties across 20 European Union member states. The findings have important implications for understanding the nature of democratic representation in the European Union.     

The Non-Procedural Determinants of Responsiveness

This article starts from the remarks by Peter Mair on the growing gap between responsiveness and responsibility – or middle-run responsiveness – and the declining capacity of parties to bridge that gap. It focuses on the empirical analysis of the association between economic and substantive democratic dimensions and responsiveness, which are highly relevant to the way in which parties compete and govern within contemporary democracies. Following an introduction of the topic, the second section puts forward key concepts and hypotheses; the third presents the operationalisation of the variables and the applied method; the fourth and primary empirical section of the article analyses the non-procedural determinants of political and economic responsiveness, including freedom and equality as well as several key economic structural factors. The concluding remarks recapitulate the main empirical findings and submit a number of aspects that party leaders ought to take into account when addressing the thorny issue of responsiveness.     

Research Note: On the inverse relationship between votes and proximity for niche parties

Abstract.  Do niche parties occupying left-right policy positions that diverge sharply from the centre of the voter distribution gain more popular support than those moderately positioned along the left-right continuum? Cross-sectional analyses, based on observations from twelve Western European countries from 1984–1998, are presented that suggest the answer is 'yes'. By contrast, these analyses strongly suggest that for mainstream parties, policy radicalism depresses popular support. The implication of these findings is that for niche parties, it is the distinctiveness of their left-right positions that enhances their competitiveness in democratic elections. While this finding runs counter to the intuition of standard spatial theory, it is consistent with recent dynamic accounts of niche party responsiveness to shifts in public opinion and electoral support for niche parties. These findings have implications for party strategies, spatial theories and the understanding of political representation.     

Competition and interaction: Party ties to interest groups in a multidimensional policy space

Political parties and interest groups play a vital role in incorporating societal interests into democratic decision-making. Therefore, explaining the nature and variation in the relationship between them will advance our understanding of democratic governance. Existing research has primarily drawn attention to how exchange of resources shapes these relationships largely neglecting the role of contextual conditions. Our contribution is to examine whether parties’ structured interactions with different categories of interest groups vary systematically with the pattern of party competition at the level of policy dimensions. First, we argue that higher party fragmentation in a policy space makes organisational ties to interest groups more likely, due to fears of voter loss and splinter groups. Second, we expect higher polarisation between parties on a policy dimension to make ties to relevant groups less likely due to increased electoral costs. We find support for both expectations when analysing new data on 116 party units in 13 mature democracies along nine different policy dimensions. Our findings underline the value of considering the strategic context in which parties and interest groups interact to understand their relationship. The study sheds new light on parties and interest groups as intermediaries in democracy and contributes to a new research agenda connecting interest group research with studies of parties’ policy positions and responsiveness.     

Social Democracy or Social Liberalism? Ideological Sources of Liberal Democrat Policy

Liberal Democrat policy has been labelled as social democratic, yet the party has been reluctant to so describe itself. Taking Crosland's The Future of Socialism as a reference point, there appears to be much shared ground between social democracy and Liberal Democrat policy. Meanwhile, the party's tax policy adopted in 2006 takes the Croslandite approach of taxing wealth rather than income. Despite this, the article argues that the party is a social liberal rather than a social democratic one. These two political philosophies have so much in common that it is understandable that some commentators see the influence of social democracy where they might instead perceive social liberalism. Yet the two differ in their attitudes to the state. Both see a positive role for the state in furthering social goods. However, social liberalism shares classical liberal concerns about the dangers of an over-mighty state. This approach underpins Liberal Democrat policy.     

论“民主”反腐的机制与机率探析

推进党的反腐败工作和反腐倡廉建设,必须将民主理念和民主手段引入其中,将民主提升为惩防腐败的新治本之策,着力建立健全＂教育、制度、监督、民主＂并重的惩治预防腐败体系。这就必须切实关注＂民主＂惩治预防腐败的机制与＂民主＂惩治预防腐败的机率。     

Measurement and the dynamics of party identification

Recent work has questioned the conclusions of the revisionist model of party identification. One central issue concerns the measurement of party identification. According to the critics, the research showing that partisanship is responsive to other political evaluations is in error because of peculiarities of measurement. I test this assertion by considering the effects that changes in measurement have on estimates of the dynamics of party identification. The results strongly support the original revisionist conclusions. The findings of responsiveness of party identification to evaluations of party issue positions are quite robust in the face of alternative measures of party identification.     

The limits of decentralisation: Legislative careers and territorial representation in Spain

Scholars of decentralisation in comparative perspective have argued that these reforms should lead to a ‘territorialisation of politics’. For the party system and the legislature this means that subnational interests will increasingly influence rules and practices as well as positions on policy choice. This study tests this proposition in Spain, which has undergone extensive decentralisation during its democratic history (1977–present). By examining the career trajectories of deputies in the ruling lower house, the study finds little evidence that decentralisation expanded the influence of subnational representatives within the party system or the parliament of democratic Spain. This was true despite the growing cohort of deputies with subnational experience in the Congreso, the ability of subnational party offices to recruit and place candidates on electoral lists, and the increasing importance of regional issues in national elections.     

政党代表性危机与西方国家民粹主义的兴起

西方国家民粹主义的兴起,是代表性危机的结果。从政党政治的角度,主流政党疏离社会、融入国家,由代表组织转变为统治机构,导致政治回应性的弱化。主流政党代表功能的萎缩,促使社会成员转向民粹主义的替代模式。为了控制政策议程,民粹主义政党仍然需要遵循选举政治的逻辑。民粹主义固然挑战了主流的民主模式,但它同样可以在调整国家与社会关系的基础上重构政党体制,扩展政治代表的渠道。只有客观地分析国家、社会与政党在代表性建构中的互动机制,才能准确地认识民粹主义的社会基础及其发展趋势。     

Responsive to whom? A comparison of the Mitterrand and Hollande presidencies

This article investigates the responsiveness of the Parti socialiste towards specific social groups under the Hollande and Mitterrand presidencies. It thereby contributes to the discussion on the changing representativeness of social democratic parties in Western Europe. The study is based on a content analysis of the governments’ justifications for the annual budget. With this innovative approach it is possible to assess whether the responsiveness of a party persists at the governmental level. Through an inductive coding procedure, three categories of responsive justifications are discerned: inequality reduction, needs of specific social groups and general functioning of society. In line with its title, the article mainly focuses on the second category, identifying a shift from responsiveness to the low-income classes towards responsiveness to the middle classes. Furthermore, a corresponding transformation of the Parti socialiste is observed, from advocating expansive policies in the early 1980s to justifying restrictive policies today.     

“He’s not my prime minister!”: negative party identification and satisfaction with democracy

ABSTRACT

Across Europe and the United States, negative party identification – an abiding aversion to a particular opposing political party is on the rise. At the same time, satisfaction with democracy is down worldwide. In this article, we explore the potential connection between these two phenomena. We develop a theory that posits a relationship between negative party identification and satisfaction with democracy where institutional structures and outcomes can mitigate the deleterious effects of negative party identification. We test our theory by drawing on data from 25 parliamentary and semi-presidential countries in the third wave of the Comparative Study of Electoral Systems (CSES) from 2006–2011 to assess the cross-national effect of negative party identification on levels of satisfaction with the democratic process in one’s own country. We find that satisfaction with democracy declines among voters in multiparty systems when an “out-group” party holds the prime ministership. At the same time, larger vote margins and the nature of the governing coalition can mitigate the effects of negative party identification. Our findings have important implications for how institutions can reduce the potential effect of negative party identification on satisfaction with democracy.     

Who “Wins”? Determining the Party of the Prime Minister

The prime ministership is the preeminent political post in parliamentary democracies. Yet few studies examine PM party choice, perhaps under the assumption that the choice is a simple function of party size. In this article, we argue that key strategic actors and the context in which government negotiations take place can play a critical role in PM party choice. We test our hypotheses using a mixed logit with random coefficients on an original data set comprising PM selection opportunities in 28 European countries. Our methodological approach allows us to incorporate qualitative concerns about heterogeneity and causal complexity into our analysis. Contrary to conventional wisdom, we find that the largest party is often disadvantaged when it comes to PM party choice, that some presidents play an influential role in choosing the PM, and that the value of being the incumbent depends on one’s performance in office and how the previous government ended.     

Social democratic parties and EC integration

Abstract. This paper presents evidence of initial steps taken since 1989 towards the enhancement of social democratic transnational party co-operation, manifesting itself on both a programmatic and an organizational level. To explain this development, a thesis based on the neo-functionalist logic of political spillover together with a theory of party change is presented. An emerging European-level presence is explained by increased EC policymaking since the adoption of the Single European Act, interacting with the internal preconditions for organizational innovation present in many social democratic parties. Evidence of such trends is then submitted, focusing on the French Socialist, German Social-Democratic and British Labour Parties; the European Parliament Socialist Group; and the Socialist transnational party federation.     

试论江泽民坚持和健全党内民主集中制思想

从党的十三届四中全会到十六大期间,江泽民从马克思主义政党党内民主集中制理论的基本要求出发,总结历史经验,在民主集中制建设的重要意义、内涵完善、增强党内团结、发展党内民主、规范议事决策机制等方面提出了一系列新论断、新见解,进一步丰富和完善了这一理论。