Economic performance and presidential trait evaluations: A longitudinal analysis

Presidential traits (i.e. morality, intelligence, leadership) have generally been assumed to be idiosyncratic personal characteristics of the individual and are treated as exogenous from other political and economic factors. Prior literature has shown that presidential characteristics and economic performance are important elements of vote choice and approval. Using ANES data from 1984 to 2008, we demonstrate an important link between these factors, showing that objective and subjective indicators of economic performance are significant predictors of trait evaluations. Specifically, evaluations of the incumbent president at election time are directly related to changes in economic performance earlier in the year. The effects of economic performance are not isolated to retrospective policy evaluations, but also influence the overall evaluation of the president as a person.     

The paradox of politics and policy in redistributing income

With political ideology with respect to the income distribution measured by proxy as the fraction of conservative coalition victories, it is found that over the period 1961–1984 the degree of conservative coalition strength is positively associated with changes in inequality, holding the effects of unemployment and inflation constant.A natural question is why don't the low income types vote in candidates who will consistently redistribute income in their favor? The result of such a political process would be a downward trend in income inequality. In point of fact, there is no evidence whatsoever of any trend in income equality over the period. The answer to both questions may be that Tullock (1983, 1986) is on to something. If the middle class voters transfer gains back and forth, the poor can't gain and they don't, then the distribution should be stable and is.     

Analyzing partisanship in Central Mexico: A geographical approach

The article explores the relevance of socioeconomic variables on partisanship in Central Mexico for the 2006 presidential election. We perform an exploratory canonical correlation analysis, a predictive binomial logit analysis and a further confirmatory set of OLS regression analyses. The analyses are based on a data set that uses electoral results as well as census information, constructed as 1.6 km (one mile) radii GIS neighborhoods, which allow for the integration of electoral and census geographies. The results suggest that income and education do not always influence party preferences in the same direction. In particular in the case of the vote for the left leaning party, these two variables have contradicting effects.     

Beyond personal vote incentives: Dividing the vote in preferential electoral systems

Comparative studies of preferential electoral systems have paid much attention to the incentives for personalized instead of party-centered campaigns, but they have largely ignored how some of these systems allow “allocation errors” and so create incentives for parties to “manage” the vote and intraparty campaigns. We discuss how the single non-transferable vote (SNTV) and single transferable vote (STV) systems create these incentives, and we illustrate the degree to which they affect actual electoral results across seven preferential electoral systems. The analysis reveals statistically significant differences in the vote inequality among incumbent cohorts (members of the same party and district), indicating the strong influence of vote division incentives over candidate-centered electoral environments. The results also have important implications for comparative research on legislative turnover and the incumbency advantage.     

Short-term factors versus long-term values: Explaining the 2009 election results

This paper examines the way three types of factors influence eastern and western German voters in order to assess the similarities and differences in electoral behavior across the former East-West divide. First, to what extend does the performance of parties and the regime influence party support in the East and the West? Second, how do candidate perceptions affect party support? Third, to what degree do ideological values influence vote choice? The results suggest that even 20 years after unification, voters in the East and the West still follow a partially different logic. While candidate evaluations broadly influence party support similarly, negative performance assessments lead west German voters to support the opposition, whereas eastern Germans tend to either “exit” the electoral arena or support the Linke party. Moreover, ideological values have no affect on party choice in the West, whereas they strongly influence the choice of Die Linke in the East. Theoretically, the results reflect the different East-West experiences, illustrating that voters in newer democracies may base their party choice on a different rationale than voters in more mature democracies.     

Revitalizing the United States‐Japanese alliance

Abstract

While the notion that subjective economic perceptions as well as objective economic conditions affect electoral outcomes has long been explored in advanced democracies and new democracies, evidence of the link between the economy and elections has been rarely found in East Asian countries. As economic issues have become salient since the 1997 financial crisis, political leaders’ capacity to manage the economy has become one of the most important criteria in electoral choice in East Asia. This paper examines how economic issues influenced the results of the 2007 presidential election in South Korea. By making use of the 2007 Presidential Election Panel Study, this study examines the continuity of and changes in the Korean voters’ electoral behavior. This study describes the political situation in the post-1997 financial crisis period under two liberal governments in Korea and introduces the processes and characteristics of electoral campaigns in the 2007 presidential election. This paper then explores the link between the economy and vote choice, focusing on whether economic issues were salient among the electorate, whether retrospective or prospective economic voting was prevalent among Koreans, and how the voters supported Lee Myung Bak across age groups, regions, and parties in the 2007 presidential election.     

Running for office again: evidence from Portuguese municipal elections

Using a data set that covers all Portuguese mainland municipalities for the period 1979–2005, this study performs an empirical analysis of the economic determinants of mayors’ decisions to run for another term in office. The literature on the subject is mainly centered on the United States and, as far as we know, there are no papers addressing the economic factors influencing those choices. Probit panel estimations show that local economic conditions matter more than the national or regional economic environment. The results also confirm that political variables are important and that they influence the likelihood of seeking reelection in much the same way as they affect vote and popularity functions.     

Priming Gender: Campaigning on Women's Issues in U.S. Senate Elections

The gender gap has been an important feature of American elections since 1980. Yet, most explanations for the effects of gender on voting behavior focus on differences between men and women without taking account of how campaign strategies may serve to highlight or mask these differences. I examine how Senate candidates act strategically in deciding whether and how to target women voters. I find that candidates make these decisions based largely on two factors: (1) the importance of these issues to the state's voters and (2) whether gender gaps had been decisive in previous statewide contests. Analysis of exit-poll data indicates that when campaigns focused more on women's issues, women became more likely to vote Democratic while the vote choices of men were unaffected. Thus, campaign strategies do appear to influence the importance of gender differences in voting behavior.     

The integration hypothesis: How the European Union shapes economic voting

Whereas economic perceptions influence the national vote in Western European countries, globalization, or international openness, conditions the influence of economic perceptions on that national vote. But how do attitudes toward the EU itself influence the economic vote? After establishing the presence of a national economic vote in Southern Europe (Spain, Italy, Greece and Portugal) we test the hypothesis that heightened perception of European Union economic responsibility reduces the magnitude of the national economic vote coefficient. These tests are carried out on current (2009) survey data, via logistic regression analysis of fully specified voting behavior models, estimated country-by-country and in a data pool. Clearly, the national economic vote diminishes, to the extent the EU is held responsible for the economy.     

If people vote because they like to, then why do so many of them lie?

Of those eligible, about 40% do not vote in presidential elections. When asked, about a quarter of those nonvoters will lie to the survey takers and claim that they did. Increases in education are associated with higher voting rates and lower rates of lying overall, but with increased rates of lying conditional on not voting. This paper proposes a model of voter turnout in which people who claim to vote get praise from other citizens. Those who lie must bear the cost of lying. The model has a stable equilibrium with positive rates of voting, honest non-voting, and lying. Reasonable parameter changes produce changes in these proportions in the same direction as the changes actually observed across education levels. I argue that a model where people vote because they want to be known as voters provides a better explanation for observed voting behavior than does a model where people vote because they want to vote.     

The national front in France and the construction of political legitimacy

The National Front in France has experienced a meteoric increase in support since 1981, attacting about ten per cent of the vote in elections at every level. The principal issues on which the party has won support ‐ immigration and security ‐ have become key domestic issues. This article analyses the rise of the party and the inability of the established parties of the right to maintain the confidence of their supporters. It also examines a process of construction of legitimacy in which political elites of right and left participated. Finally, an evaluation is made of the National Front's ability to maintain and expand its electoral strength.     

Social Capital and Political Trust in Finland: An Individual-level Assessment

Political trust has in previous studies mainly been associated, either positively or negatively with a set of political variables, such as subjective knowledge of and interest in political issues, political efficacy, national pride, post-materialist values and corruption permissiveness. More recently, it has been debated whether or not indicators of social capital also have an impact on political trust. It has been argued that social capital helps to sustain civic virtues and that lack of it will create democratic problems like political dissatisfaction and declining political participation. While trends in social capital seem stable and high at the aggregate level in Finland, the level of political trust has varied to a much larger degree. In this article, indicators of social capital, political variables and social background variables are set against the Finns' trust in politicians and the parliament as well as their satisfaction with democracy. The analysis shows that social capital, as defined by a set of variables comprised of interpersonal trust and voluntary organisational activism, does not, en bloc, prove to be a powerful predictor of political trust. However, when the social capital items are examined as single factors, interpersonal trust seems to have strong impact on all levels of political trust, while the influence of voluntary organisational activity is less evident.     

Economic voting in Sweden 1985–2010

Despite the fact that Sweden has the world’s second longest time-series of national election Studies, the standard model of micro-level economic voting has only been occasionally applied in Sweden. This study presents a long-term perspective on economic voting in Sweden and analyzes to what extent economic perceptions influence governmental support in general elections in Sweden at the eight latest parliamentary elections, 1985--2010. To this end, this article makes use of the rolling two-wave panels of the Swedish national election studies and estimates the probability of voting for the government depending on economic perceptions, previous vote, ideology and a set of SES controls. The results show that Swedish voting behaviour is no exception to that of most western democracies; subjective economic evaluations of the Swedish economy systematically influence government support. If voters feel the economy is improving they are more likely to vote for the incumbent government than when they feel the economy is getting worse.     

Explaining the Breakdown of the Religion–Vote Relationship in The Netherlands, 1971–2006

This article examines the extent to which changes in the effect of religion on voting in The Netherlands since the 1970s can be explained by ‘bottom-up’ and ‘top-down’ approaches. The first includes religious integration and education. The latter category encompasses the restructuring of the party system and changes in party positions. Hypotheses are tested employing logistic and conditional logistic regression analyses of the Dutch Parliamentary Election Studies (1971–2006) supplemented by data from the Comparative Manifesto Project. Weakening religious integration largely explains the decline of political boundaries between non-religious voters and Catholics and Calvinists. In line with earlier research, the article finds that the creation of a single Christian Democratic Party (CDA) has reduced the religion–vote relationship. However, this merger effect largely disappears after taking into account party positions. Moreover, party positions influence the religion–vote association: the effect of religion on voting increases as religious parties emphasise traditional moral issues in their manifestos.     

Volatile voters,short-term choices? An analysis of the vote choice determinants of stable and volatile voters in Great Britain†

The increase of electoral volatility in established democracies is typically interpreted as proof that short-term factors are increasingly important determinants of vote choice. The empirical evidence to support this assertion, however, is relatively weak. This paper addresses this question by investigating the impact of both long- and short-term determinants on the vote choices of stable and volatile voters in Britain. Analysis of three British election panels (1992–1997, 1997–2001 and 2005–2010) indicates that short-term factors – especially economic issues – do have more weight in determining the vote choices of volatile voters compared with stable voters. However, the results also reveal that the growth in instability of voting behaviour is driven mainly by the weakening impact of long-term factors and not by increasing importance of short-term determinants of the vote choice. Short-term predictors are becoming more important, therefore, but this gain in strength is in relative rather than absolute terms.     

Critical Election in the Wake of an Economic and Political Crisis: Realignment of Icelandic Party Voters?

A critical election is generally defined as one in which the decisive results of voting reveal a sharp alternation of pre‐existing cleavage(s) and voting patterns, and the dealignment or realignment made between parties is lasting. A critical election can be caused by various factors and in this article the authors analyse whether the global credit crunch in 2008 set things in motion in Iceland, resulting in the 2009 election as a critical election. In that election, the electoral relevance of voters’ psychological attachment to parties and of ideological distances to them weakened, whereas party competence perceptions increased in importance for vote choices. Attachment to parties and ideological distances are factors that are generally stable and change slowly over time, while party competence is influenced by which issues are of importance at the time of the election. This indicates that, in 2009, a restructuring of the determinants of the vote occurred; a pattern of changes that is typical for a critical election. Evidence is found that the importance of party sympathy increases again in the 2013 election, indicating a realignment, rather than a dealignment, occurring in the wake of the 2009 election.     

The effect of electoral rules on voting behavior: the electoral college and shift voting

The Electoral College has a measurable effect on the propensity of the rational voter to vote for the candidate he most prefers. The ‘slippage’ between the individual's articulated preference ordering and his actual vote is analyzed (using 1968 data) with respect to the strategic position of the voter in his state. The direction of the findings support the theoretically-derived propositions. Nevertheless, the low overall incidence of shifts and the reluctance of voters to shift from nationally-viable candidates demonstrates the overwhelming influence of the national electoral environment.     

Rejecting representation? Party systems and popular support for referendums in Europe

Under what conditions do citizens favor deciding political issues by popular vote? Models of support for popular vote processes usually consider the influence of individual attitudes such as political trust and interest in politics. But much less is known about the effect of institutional variables on support for popular vote processes. This article builds on research showing that disaffection with elected officials shapes support for referendums by considering the influence of the party system. First, an analysis of multilevel data from twenty-four European democracies indicates that individuals are more supportive of referendums in countries with fewer effective political parties. Second, a mediation analysis provides evidence that the number of parties influences referendum support through individual-level political trust and external efficacy. Where there are fewer viable parties, feelings that elected officials are unresponsive tend to increase popular support for referendums. These findings suggest a trade-off between available representation by political parties and support for direct influence over public policy.     

Survey research and racially charged elections: The case of David Duke in Louisiana

Accuracy in measuring vote intention has become a particular problem in elections involving candidates who take conservative positions on racial issues and who emphasize these issues in their campaigns. Consistent understatement of support for such candidates in preelection polls would seem to indicate a reluctance on the part of some survey respondents to honestly express their vote intention, perhaps due to the fear that their intended action might be interpreted as an expression of racism. This research, which utilizes surveys conducted during the 1991 Louisiana governor's election in which David Duke was prominently featured, attempts to develop more accurate alternative measures of support for racially conservative candidates. The findings indicate that more accurate and valid vote intention measures can be constructed through the use of candidate image variables. The findings also call into question the practice of attempting to develop more accurate measures of vote intention through simple reallocation of undecided voters based solely on race.     

Turning your back on the EU. The role of Eurosceptic parties in the 2014 European Parliament elections

This paper analyses how disaffection with the EU influenced individuals' likelihood of turning out to vote and of casting a vote for a Eurosceptic party in the 2014 EP elections, and how these relationships were moderated by the Eurosceptic partisan supply of each country. We argue that the degree to which political parties oppose European integration, as well as the ideological leaning of Eurosceptic parties, should influence both the likelihood of disaffected citizens turning out to vote, and their likelihood of voting for a Eurosceptic party. Our empirical findings show that, in the presence of a party that is strongly opposed to European integration, disaffected citizens are more likely to turn out to vote and to vote for a Eurosceptic party provided that this party also shares their ideological leaning in the left-right dimension. These results indicate that Eurosceptic parties are important actors for the politicization of the European integration conflict and for the Europeanization of EP elections, but, at the same time, they suggest that opposition to European integration is subordinate to the traditional left-right conflict.