Candidates, Voting Choice, and Election Outcomes

2017 ◽  
pp. 14-51
Author(s):  
Walter J. Stone
Keyword(s):  
Voting Choice

scholarly journals The intergenerational foundations of class voting: social mobility and electoral choice in Western Europe

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Giuseppe Ciccolini ◽  
Juho Härkönen
Keyword(s):  
Social Mobility ◽  
Western Europe ◽  
Empirical Studies ◽  
European Social Survey ◽  
Political Behaviour ◽  
Individual Level ◽  
Specific Effects ◽  
Electoral Choice ◽  
Class Voting ◽  
Voting Choice

Scholarly explanations of the survival of left parties and the upsurge in mainstream politics discontent often refer to voters' intergenerational mobility resulting from the post-industrial transition. As the occupational structure evolves, voters across generations are exposed to heterogenous life chances, and the social elevator progressively alters class voting patterns. Yet empirical evidence for the electoral implications of social ascent and decline as well as their reasons is mixed at best – likely because most empirical studies seek for homogenous average mobility effects. To address this limitation, we analyse the diverse consequences of mobility across social groups in a quasi-descriptive fashion by applying a cutting-edge ANOVA-based OLS model. Contrarily to prior studies, this approach allows us to identify class-specific mobility effects on voting (ceteris paribus), consistently with theory. Our analyses draw on individual-level detailed information on both intergenerational social mobility and political behaviour from the European Social Survey (rounds 1-9) across 19 Western European countries. Although scholarly accounts on the consequences of social mobility averagely find little to no support in our analyses, we do observe some significant and substantial class-specific effects of both social ascent and descent on voting choice.

Left-Right Orientations and Voting Behavior

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Willy Jou ◽  
Russell J. Dalton
Keyword(s):  
Political Parties ◽  
Voting Behavior ◽  
Policy Preferences ◽  
Short Term ◽  
Conservative Policy ◽  
Common Framework ◽  
Societal Influences ◽  
Voting Choice

One of the ways that citizens and elites orient themselves to politics is in reference to a Left-Right vocabulary. Left and Right, respectively, refer to a specific set of progressive and conservative policy preferences and political goals. Thus, Left-Right becomes a framework for positioning oneself, political figures, and political parties into a common framework. Most citizens identify themselves in Left-Right terms and their distribution of these orientations vary across nations. These orientations arise both from long-term societal influences and from the short-term issues of the day. Most people also place political parties in Left-Right terms. This leads citizens to use Left-Right comparisons as an important factor in their voting choice, although this impact varies considerably across nations. Most parties attract voters that broadly share their Left-Right orientations.

The Economicization of the Cross-Strait Relationship: The Impact of the Cross-Strait Economic Relationship on the 2012 Presidential Election in Taiwan

2016 ◽  
Vol 52 (02) ◽  
pp. 1650006
Author(s):  
MEI-CHUAN WEI ◽  
YAO-NAN HUNG ◽  
CHEN-YUAN TUNG
Keyword(s):  
Presidential Election ◽  
Presidential Elections ◽  
Important Research ◽  
Election Result ◽  
Economic Statecraft ◽  
Important Research Topic ◽  
Economic Relationship ◽  
The Cross ◽  
Voting Choice ◽  
The Impact

In comparing Taiwan’s presidential elections in 2012 and 2016, looking into the influence of the cross-Strait relationship is an important research topic. Analyses of the 2012 presidential election focusing on the cross-Strait relationship therefore serve as a useful reference for such a comparison. All comments on and analyses of the outcome of Taiwan’s 2012 presidential election point to the impact of the cross-Strait economic relationship. By drawing on economic statecraft theories, this paper explores the issue through analyzing post-election survey data. Our study shows that the concern with the impact of the negative development of the cross-Strait economic relationship on Taiwan’s economy had Ma Ying-jeou lost the election significantly influenced the decisions of those voters who were dissatisfied with President Ma’s performance during his first term and yet still voted for him in the election mainly because of Ma’s position on the cross-Strait relationship. They accounted for 5.75% of the total number of voters. Given that the winning margin in the 2012 presidential election was 5.97%, the decision made by the aforementioned voters could have changed the election result. It also shows that 73.7% of the cross-Strait relationship voters were cross-Strait economic voters. Our findings demonstrate that, although the cross-Strait relationship per se may not be the most crucial factor that determines the voting choice of the Taiwan people, it however proves the influence of the cross-Strait economic relationship over the election, hence the economicization of the cross-Strait relationship. By economicization, it is meant that the cross-Strait economic relationship appears to be a dominant issue in the cross-Strait relationship.

EAST TIMOR'S FOUNDING ELECTIONS AND EMERGING PARTY SYSTEM

Asian Survey ◽  
2003 ◽  
Vol 43 (5) ◽  
pp. 745-757 ◽  
Author(s):  
Dwight Y. King
Keyword(s):  
Party System ◽  
Formal Education ◽  
Strategic Voting ◽  
District Level ◽  
Mountain Region ◽  
Western Region ◽  
Opposition Party ◽  
Constituent Assembly ◽  
Head Of State ◽  
Voting Choice

Abstract East Timor's statehood was launched with two U.N.-supervised elections, one in August 2001 to elect the Constituent Assembly (which became the parliament) and the second in April 2002 to elect the head of state. Analysis of district-level returns from the Assembly election reveals two types of strategic voting, three lines of political cleavage in the electorate, and two legacies of Indonesian rule. This article analyzes East Timor's first two elections, with particular focus on the bases of voting choice and on the nascent party system. There are three main findings: (1) a higher level of political savvy among the citizenry than expected, given their poverty and lack of formal education; (2) three political cleavages, one generational and two regional-one that divides the eastern from the western region and one that distinguishes the central mountain region from the rest of the country; and (3) areas that under Indonesian rule had voted heavily for the ““opposition”” party have now switched to FRETILIN, the new predominant party.

Partisan Orientations over the Long Haul: Results from the Three-Wave Political Socialization Panel Study

1984 ◽  
Vol 78 (4) ◽  
pp. 1000-1018 ◽  
Author(s):  
M. Kent Jennings ◽  
Gregory B. Markus
Keyword(s):  
Voting Behavior ◽  
Panel Study ◽  
Individual Level ◽  
Consistent Reinforcement ◽  
Generational Effects ◽  
School Senior ◽  
The Stability ◽  
The Individual ◽  
Voting Choice ◽  
The Relationship

The present study examines the dynamics of partisanship and voting behavior by utilizing national survey panel data gathered in 1965, 1973, and 1982 from two strategically situated generations—members of the high school senior class of 1965 and their parents. At the aggregate level, generational effects appeared in the persistently weaker partisan attachments of the younger generation. At the individual level, strong effects based on experience and habituation appeared in the remarkable gains occurring in the stability of partisan and other orientations among the young as they aged from their mid-20s to their mid-30s. Dynamic modeling of the relationship between partisanship and voting choice demonstrated that the younger voters had stabilized at an overall weaker level of partisanship, leading to more volatile voting behavior which, in turn, failed to provide the consistent reinforcement needed to intensify preexisting partisan leanings.

Voter Rationality and Party Competition: A Comment on Laver's Suggested Approach

1978 ◽  
Vol 8 (4) ◽  
pp. 511-511 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ian Budge
Keyword(s):  
Rational Choice ◽  
Rational Choice Theory ◽  
Choice Theory ◽  
Party Identification ◽  
Rapid Change ◽  
Party Competition ◽  
New Parties ◽  
Suggested Approach ◽  
Definition Of ◽  
Voting Choice

Laver is undoubtedly right in suggesting (a) that ideas of rationality are more of a hindrance than a help in explaining electors' behaviour, but (b) that a rational-choice theory of party competition can still be superimposed on an a-rational explanation of voting choice. Since he develops this position through a critique of Robertson's ‘wide’ definition of voter rationality, it is only fair to point out that Robertson's ascription of modified office-seeking to politicians forms the best developed rational – choice theory of party competition. The hypothesis that politicians seek votes by widening their issue-appeals when they think the election is competitive, but stress partisan appeals otherwise, has been validated for British and United States' elections from 1920 to 1974 – a more general and more rigorous check than has been applied to any competing hypothesis. Moreover it has already been incorporated with an a-rational account of voting behaviour in the form Laver advocates. The key elements of this synthesis are:(1) The location of electors and parties in a party-defined space, i.e. a space where individuals and groups are located in terms of their closeness to the election alternatives (party choices and non-voting). This is analogous to, but quite definitely not, the space produced by party identification, to which there are too many measurement objections.(2) The division of influences upon voting into predispositions (loyalties, social group traditions, etc.) and cues (current issues, candidates, etc.). Predispositions are associated with electoral stability, i.e. limited and slow movement in the party-defined space. Cues have the potential to produce rapid change and widespread movement of electors, often associated with the appearance of new parties.(3) Modified office-seeking by politicians. In elections which they expect to be competitive there is thus a premium on the introduction of new cues, while in other elections old partisan appeals will be made to existing predispositions.

Social Structure and Voting Choice

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Oddbjørn Knutsen
Keyword(s):  
Middle Class ◽  
New Left ◽  
Social Cleavages ◽  
Public And Private ◽  
New Middle Class ◽  
Geographical Regions ◽  
Linguistic Groups ◽  
Service Environments ◽  
Voting Choice ◽  
The Impact

The linkage between voters and political parties is to some degree based on stable social cleavages. Such cleavages express important and lasting societal divisions, allow parties and voters to establish long-term ties, and provide incumbents with clear representative and policy-making tasks against which they can be evaluated. Most research on cleavages has been based on the classic cleavages that were outlined in the Lipset-Rokkan model for social cleavages in industrial societies. These are: (1) the center–periphery cleavage, which is anchored in geographical regions and related to different ethnic and linguistic groups as well as religious minorities; (2) the religious conflict between the Church and the State, which pitted the secular state against the historical privileges of the churches; this cleavage has more recently polarized the religious section against the secular section of the population; (3) the class conflict in the labor market, which involved owners and employers versus tenants, laborers, and workers; and (4) the conflict in the commodity market between buyers and sellers of agricultural products, or more generally, between the urban and the rural population. Other social cleavages, such as gender, educational differences, and new divisions within the large new middle class, have been focused upon during the last decades. The new divisions within the new middle class are “horizontal” conflicts and can be conceptualized as a basic conflict between public and private employees, and as an alternative way of conceptualization, between those who work within technical, organizational, or interpersonal service environments. Some of the cleavages have declined in importance over time, while others have increased. Some cleavages have changed character such as the class cleavage where part of the new middle class has voted for the New Left and part of the working class has voted for the New Right in the last decades. Changes in the impact and character of different cleavages have resulted in strategic reconsideration of important policies and changing location of the parties in the political space.

A Vote of Competence: How a Similar Upbringing to Political Candidates Influences Voting Choice

2020 ◽  
Vol 39 (4) ◽  
pp. 396-411 ◽  
Author(s):  
Matthew D. Meng ◽  
Alexander Davidson
Keyword(s):  
Perceived Competence ◽  
Political Marketing ◽  
Political Leaders ◽  
Political Candidates ◽  
Political Skills ◽  
Self Perceptions ◽  
Marketing Tactic ◽  
Common Strategy ◽  
Voting Choice ◽  
Positive Effect

A common strategy employed by political leaders to win elections is to establish similarity with their constituents. This article extends previous research on this approach in several ways. First, the authors test and confirm the commonly used, but underresearched, political marketing tactic of highlighting similarity with constituents through upbringing characteristics. Second, given the debate about why the similarity-voting effect occurs, the authors aimed to establish causality of the effect. They found that perceived competence and liking both mediate this relationship in the context of similar upbringing. Finally, the positive effect of similar upbringing only holds for those with average and above-average self-perceptions of political skills, meaning that this approach would not be effective for some inexpert voting populations. By understanding the mechanism behind the similarity-voting effect in the context of similar upbringing, in addition to its important caveat, political marketers can approach campaigns in a more informed manner.

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