Multidimensional Incongruence and Vote Switching in Europe

Summary, in English

Does ideological incongruence hurt parties in elections? Research on the representational relationship between parties and voters suggests that ideological congruence can boost a party’s electoral prospects. However, while the mechanism is at the individual-level, most of the literature focuses on the party-level. In this article, we develop a set of hypotheses based on a multi-issue conception of party-voter congruence at the individual-level, and examine the electoral consequences of these varying congruence levels in the 2014 European Parliament elections. Consistent with our expectations, comparative analysis finds that ideological and issue-specific incongruence is a significant factor in voting behavior in the European Parliament elections. Although the substantive effects of incongruence are understandably small compared to partisanship, government, or EU performance evaluations, party-voter disagreement consistently matters, and voters’ issue salience is an important moderator of the impact of incongruence on vote choice.

• Författare: Ryan Bakker; Seth Jolly; Jonathan Polk
• Publiceringsår: 2018
• Språk: Engelska
• Sidor: 267-296
• Publikation/Tidskrift/Serie: Public Choice
• Volym: 176
• Issue: 1-2
• Fulltext: - 663 kB; Download statistics
• Länkar: http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s11127-018-0555-z
• Dokumenttyp: Artikel i tidskrift
• Förlag: Springer
• Ämne: Political Science
• Nyckelord: Parties; Elections; Incongruence; European Union
• Status: Published
• ISBN/ISSN/Övrigt: ISSN: 0048-5829