Youngkin's Virginia victory will be hard to replicate

Significance There has been speculation that Youngkin, who generated support from both from former President Donald Trump's camp and moderate Republicans as well as some swing voters last year, may represent the future of the Republican party. However, not all aspects of his campaign are replicable elsewhere. Impacts Of the 36 states holding elections for governor this year, 20 are held by Republicans. Trump will remain central to the Republican party despite a background role in Virginia. Among Democrats, similar speculation about the creation of a new electoral template surrounds Eric Adams, New York’s new mayor.

Jam-Barrel Politics

This paper studies the executive-legislative exchange of centrally-allocated benefits (jam) for legislative support in Colombia using data from road building projects, legislative roll-call votes, and a leaked database which uncovered the assignment of road contracts to individual legislators. We draw hypotheses from a model in which an executive spreads jam to sway legislators. We document that assigned projects had excess costs, legislators targeted were more likely to be swing voters in congress, and legislators increased their support for the executive after their contracts were signed. The results are driven by legislators representing remote regions and constituencies with weaker political institutions.

The Unstable Voting Behaviour: Tracing of the Voting Behaviour in Indonesia Post-Reformasi Era

Article aimed to analyses about construction of voting behavior in Indonesia election implementation. It urge and significant to elaborate and scrutinize political preferential which became base foundation to elect and submit their vote. There are two prominent factor can be main tools to covering voting behavior trend In Indonesia. Firstly, figures presumably primary sources to mention constructing public voting behavior. In Indonesia post authoritarian era, democracy has been suspended due to emergence of strong figure. This become ironic in implementation of democracy when hijacked oligarchic power that still persist and insist their resources in recent era. Secondly, analyzing of voting behavior in Indonesia has been swiftly in every election. It’s important to note that main character of voting behavior is swing voters dominated by young residents. Therefore, voting behavior trend fluctuated depending on issue and media news, become main consideration public to elect and submit their vote. In addition to both factor, emergence of political broker in recent election has indicated urgent needs to bridging voter and candidate in order to more engage. Those three factor will be primary focus to be elaborated in this paper, how recent trend in voting behavior in Indonesia and its impact to election event.AbstrakArtikel ini bertujuan untuk menganalisis konstruksi perilaku memilih dalam pemilu Indonesia. Isu ini menjadi penting dan siginifikan dalam melihat pola preferensi memilih ketika akan mencontreng kertas suara. Temuan dalam riset ini memuat dua faktor penting yang menjadi basis politik perilaku memilih Indonesia. Pertama, kekuatan personal seorang elite agaknya menjadi faktor penting dalam membaca perilaku memilih tersebut. Hal ini dikarenakan kondisi demokrasi Indonesia yang masih terbajak oleh kekuatan oligarki yang masih cukup kuat. Kedua, masih adanya masa pemilih mengambang, utamanya kalangan muda dan terdidik. Hal tersebut dikarenakan perilaku politik mereka masih dipengaruhi adanya isu dan kepentingan. Di luar dari kedua faktor tersebut, munculnya broker politik dan uang politik menjadi faktor yang tidak bisa terelakan dalam konstruksi perilaku memilih di Indonesia paskareformasi.

Effect of Undecided and Swing Voters on The Dynamics Voters Model in Presidential Elections

In this paper, we construct the NUS1S2A voters model of two political fanaticism figures which involves undecided and swing voters. We determine the equilibrium points and the threshold parameter of the voters model. We also perform a sensitivity analysis for the threshold number to determine the importance of model parameters. The results of the sensitivity analysis show that the rate of transfer from neutral voters to undecided and swing voters is not the most negative sensitive parameter of the model, even though an increase in its parameter will cause a decrease in voter interest in voting in the presidential elections.

Centrist swing voters to decide German election

Headline GERMANY: Centrist swing voters to decide election

Marching to the Ballot Box: Sex and Voting in the 2020 Election Cycle

With the 2020 election marking the 100th anniversary of the ratification of the 19th Amendment, our attention has been keenly focused on women voters. Media coverage of women voters portrayed them as swing voters and focused on a small subgroup of women (white, married, mothers). I argue that women’s and men’s voting behavior in 2020 was highly similar to past elections and does not support the claims that women or a subgroup of women are swing voters. I illustrate the diversity of women’s voting behavior through analyzing the intersection of gender with race, ethnicity, education, marital status, and parental status. Even though women were not swing voters, women still play an important role in electoral politics, representing the majority of members in both the Democratic and Republican Parties and holding stronger attachments to these parties than men.

Incomplete Political Contracts with Secret Ballots: Reciprocity as a Force to Enforce Sustainable Clientelistic Relationships

Clientelism is frequently observed in our societies. Various mechanisms that help sustain incomplete political contracts (e.g., monitoring and punishment) have been studied in the literature to date. However, do such contracts emerge in elections with secret ballots when the interactions are one-shot? How does repetition affect the evolution of incomplete political contracts? Using an incentivized experiment, this article finds that even during one-shot interactions where monitoring is not possible, candidates form incomplete contracts through vote buying and promise-making. The candidates’ clientelistic behaviors are heterogeneous: some target swing voters, whereas others offer the most to loyal voters, or even opposition voters. These tactics distort voting behaviors as well as election outcomes. Repeated interactions significantly magnify candidates’ offers and deepen clientelistic relationships. These results underscore the possibility that clientelism evolves due to people’s strategic behaviors and interdependent preferences, without relying on alternative mechanisms (JEL C92, D72).

Bases Loaded

Over the past few decades, a fundamental shift in political campaign strategy has been afoot in U.S. elections: Political campaigns have been gradually shifting their attention away from swing voters toward their respective, partisan bases. Independents and weak partisans have been targeted with less frequency, and the emphasis in contemporary elections has been on strong partisans. This book documents this shift—away from persuasion toward base mobilization—in the context of U.S. presidential elections and explains that this phenomenon is likely linked to several developments, including advances in campaign technology and voter-targeting capabilities as well as insights from behavioral social science focusing on voter mobilization. The analyses show the 2000 presidential election represents a watershed cycle that punctuated this shift. The book also explores the implications of the shift toward base mobilization and links these developments to growing turnout rates for strong partisans and attenuating participation among independents or swing voters over time. The book concludes these patterns have contributed to heightened partisan polarization in the United States.