scholarly journals Estimating party positions on immigration: Assessing the reliability and validity of different methods

2017 ◽  
Vol 25 (3) ◽  
pp. 303-314 ◽  
Author(s):  
Didier Ruedin ◽  
Laura Morales
Keyword(s):  
Political Parties ◽  
The Netherlands ◽  
Reliability And Validity ◽  
Systematic Assessment ◽  
Policy Domain ◽  
Party Manifestos ◽  
The United Kingdom ◽  
Party Positions ◽  
Automated Coding ◽  
Expert Surveys

We provide a systematic assessment of various methods to position political parties on immigration, a policy domain that does not necessarily overlap with left–right and is characterized by varying salience and issue complexity. Manual and automated coding methods drawing on 283 party manifestos are compared – manual sentence-by-sentence coding using a conventional codebook, manual coding using checklists, automated coding using Wordscores, Wordfish and keywords. We also use expert surveys and the Comparative Manifesto Project (CMP), covering the main parties in Austria, Belgium, France, Ireland, the Netherlands, Spain, Switzerland and the United Kingdom, between 1993 and 2013. We find high levels of consistency between expert positioning, manual sentence-by-sentence coding and manual checklist coding and poor or inconsistent results with the CMP, Wordscores, Wordfish and the dictionary approach. An often-neglected method – manual coding using checklists – offers resource efficiency with no loss in validity or reliability.

scholarly journals A Matter of Supply and Demand: The Electoral Performance of Populist Parties in Three European Countries

2013 ◽  
Vol 48 (2) ◽  
pp. 175-199 ◽  
Author(s):  
Stijn van Kessel
Keyword(s):  
United Kingdom ◽  
Political Parties ◽  
The Netherlands ◽  
Comparative Studies ◽  
Crucial Role ◽  
Supply And Demand ◽  
European Countries ◽  
Electoral Success ◽  
The United Kingdom ◽  
Electoral Performance

This article assesses the electoral performance of populist parties in three European countries: the Netherlands, Poland and the United Kingdom. In explaining the electoral performance of the populist parties in the three countries, the article considers the agency of political parties in particular. More specifically, it examines the responsiveness of established parties and the credibility of the populist parties. Whereas the agency of populist parties, or other radical outsiders, has often been overlooked in previous comparative studies, this article argues that the credibility of the populist parties themselves plays a crucial role in understanding their electoral success and failure.

scholarly journals From convergence to congruence: European integration and citizen–elite congruence

2021 ◽  
pp. 146511652110249
Author(s):  
Daniel Devine ◽  
Raimondas Ibenskas
Keyword(s):  
Political Parties ◽  
European Integration ◽  
Party System ◽  
Political Representation ◽  
Party Systems ◽  
The European Union ◽  
State Party ◽  
The Public ◽  
Party Positions ◽  
Expert Surveys

Recent research argues that European integration has led to an ideological convergence of member state party systems, which is purported to have significant consequences for democratic representation. We argue that convergence of party positions is less problematic if congruence between governed and governing is maintained. We therefore turn to test whether integration has had an effect on congruence between the public and their governing elites. Using five measures of integration, two sources of public opinion data, and expert surveys on political parties, we find little evidence that integration into the European Union reduces congruence between the public and the national party system, government or legislature either ideologically or across five issue areas. These results should assuage concerns about integration’s effect on domestic political representation.

scholarly journals Parliamentary Questions

2019 ◽  
pp. 282-299 ◽  
Author(s):  
Enrico Borghetto ◽  
Laura Chaqués-Bonafont
Keyword(s):  
United Kingdom ◽  
Political Parties ◽  
The Netherlands ◽  
Agenda Setting ◽  
The United Kingdom ◽  
Issue Attention ◽  
Legislative Activity ◽  
Intense Debate

Do political parties increasingly engage in non-legislative parliamentary activities? To what extent is the range of issues addressed through parliamentary questioning becoming more diverse? Is overtime change in issue attention during question time incremental or rather stable and occasionally interspersed with radical changes? These questions have generated an intense debate in legislative and agenda-setting studies during the last decades. The goal of this chapter is to explore these trends by focusing on a specific type of non-legislative activity: oral questions to the cabinet in the plenary. The analysis relies on the data available in eight countries of the Comparative Agendas Project: Belgium, Denmark, France, Italy, the Netherlands, Portugal, Spain, and the United Kingdom.

From Text to Political Positions on Foreign Aid: Analysis of Aid Mentions in Party Manifestos from 1960 to 2015

2020 ◽  
Vol 64 (4) ◽  
pp. 980-990
Author(s):  
Simone Dietrich ◽  
Helen V Milner ◽  
Jonathan B Slapin
Keyword(s):  
Political Parties ◽  
Foreign Aid ◽  
Conventional Wisdom ◽  
Data Set ◽  
Party Manifestos ◽  
Party Positions ◽  
Election Manifestos ◽  
Positive Sentiment

Abstract Looking at texts of election manifestos, this paper examines systematic differences among political parties within and across countries in how they position themselves on foreign aid and in how these manifesto pledges translate into commitments to disburse aid. Conventional wisdom suggests that left-leaning parties may be more supportive of foreign aid than rightwing parties, but also that foreign aid may not be sufficiently electorally salient for parties to stake out positions in campaign materials, such as manifestos. We leverage a new data set that codes party positions on foreign aid in election manifestos for 13 donors from 1960 to 2015. We find that parties differ systematically in how they engage with foreign aid. Left-leaning governments are more likely to express positive sentiment vis-à-vis aid than right-leaning governments. We evaluate the effects of positions on aid outcomes and find that positive aid views expressed by the party in government translate into higher aid commitments, though only for left-leaning parties.

scholarly journals Party Positions from Wikipedia Classifications of Party Ideology

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michael Herrmann ◽  
Holger Döring
Keyword(s):  
Simple Model ◽  
Political Parties ◽  
High Stability ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Common Space ◽  
Party Positions ◽  
Measurement Strategy ◽  
Party Position ◽  
Party Ideology ◽  
Expert Surveys

We develop a new measure of party position based on a scaling of ideology tags supplied in infoboxes on political parties' Wikipedia pages. Assuming a simple model of tag assignment, we estimate the locations of parties and ideologies in a common space. We find that the recovered scale can be interpreted in familiar terms of 'left vs. right'. Estimated party positions correlate well with ratings of parties' positions from extant large-scale expert surveys, most strongly with ratings of general left-right ideology. Party position estimates also show high stability in a test-retest scenario. Our results demonstrate that a Wikipedia-based approach yields valid and reliable left-right scores comparable to scores obtained via conventional expert coding methods. It thus provides a measure with potentially unlimited party coverage. Our measurement strategy is also applicable beyond Wikipedia.

Dilemmas of Inclusion

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Rafaela M. Dancygier
Keyword(s):  
Political Parties ◽  
Domestic Politics ◽  
Electoral Politics ◽  
Party Systems ◽  
Political Incorporation ◽  
Party Positions ◽  
Trade Offs ◽  
And Gender ◽  
Muslim Communities ◽  
Equality And Diversity

As Europe's Muslim communities continue to grow, so does their impact on electoral politics and the potential for inclusion dilemmas. In vote-rich enclaves, Muslim views on religion, tradition, and gender roles can deviate sharply from those of the majority electorate, generating severe trade-offs for parties seeking to broaden their coalitions. This book explains when and why European political parties include Muslim candidates and voters, revealing that the ways in which parties recruit this new electorate can have lasting consequences. The book sheds new light on when minority recruitment will match up with existing party positions and uphold electoral alignments and when it will undermine party brands and shake up party systems. It demonstrates that when parties are seduced by the quick delivery of ethno-religious bloc votes, they undercut their ideological coherence, fail to establish programmatic linkages with Muslim voters, and miss their opportunity to build cross-ethnic, class-based coalitions. The book highlights how the politics of minority inclusion can become a testing ground for parties, showing just how far their commitments to equality and diversity will take them when push comes to electoral shove. Providing a unified theoretical framework for understanding the causes and consequences of minority political incorporation, and especially as these pertain to European Muslim populations, the book advances our knowledge about how ethnic and religious diversity reshapes domestic politics in today's democracies.

Public Opinion, Party Politics, and the Welfare State

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Johannes Lindvall ◽  
David Rueda
Keyword(s):  
Public Opinion ◽  
Welfare State ◽  
Party System ◽  
Median Voter ◽  
Party Politics ◽  
The United Kingdom ◽  
Party Positions ◽  
Long Run ◽  
The 1960S ◽  
The Welfare State

This chapter examines the long-run relationship between public opinion, party politics, and the welfare state. It argues that when large parties receive a clear signal concerning the median voter’s position on the welfare state, vote-seeking motivations dominate and the large parties in the party system converge on the position of the median voter. When the position of the median voter is more difficult to discern, however, policy-seeking motivations dominate, and party positions diverge. This argument implies that the effects of government partisanship on welfare state policy are more ambiguous than generally understood. The countries covered in the chapter are Denmark, France, Germany, Norway and the United Kingdom (going back to the 1960s). The number of observations is (necessarily) limited, but the diverse cases illustrate a common electoral dynamic centered around the position of the median voter.

scholarly journals Strategies for the assessment of competences during rheumatology training across Europe: results of a qualitative study

RMD Open ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 6 (2) ◽  
pp. e001183 ◽  
Author(s):  
Aurélie Najm ◽  
Alessia Alunno ◽  
Francisca Sivera ◽  
Sofia Ramiro ◽  
Catherine Haines
Keyword(s):  
The Netherlands ◽  
Current Practice ◽  
Online Discussion ◽  
Qualitative Approach ◽  
Formative Feedback ◽  
Competence Assessment ◽  
The United Kingdom ◽  
Online Focus Groups ◽  
Assessment Systems ◽  
Insight Into

ObjectivesTo gain insight into current methods and practices for the assessment of competences during rheumatology training, and to explore the underlying priorities and rationales for competence assessment.MethodsWe used a qualitative approach through online focus groups (FGs) of rheumatology trainers and trainees, separately. The study included five countries—Denmark, the Netherlands, Slovenia, Spain and the United Kingdom. A summary of current practices of assessment of competences was developed, modified and validated by the FGs based on an independent response to a questionnaire. A prioritising method (9 Diamond technique) was then used to identify and justify key assessment priorities.ResultsOverall, 26 participants (12 trainers, 14 trainees) participated in nine online FGs (2 per country, Slovenia 1 joint), totalling 12 hours of online discussion. Strong nationally (the Netherlands, UK) or institutionally (Spain, Slovenia, Denmark) standardised approaches were described. Most groups identified providing frequent formative feedback to trainees for developmental purposes as the highest priority. Most discussions identified a need for improvement, particularly in developing streamlined approaches to portfolios that remain close to clinical practice, protecting time for quality observation and feedback, and adopting systematic approaches to incorporating teamwork and professionalism into assessment systems.ConclusionThis paper presents a clearer picture of the current practice on the assessment of competences in rheumatology in five European countries and the underlying rationale of trainers’ and trainees’ priorities. This work will inform EULAR Points-to-Consider for the assessment of competences in rheumatology training across Europe.

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