| 1. |
- Bendz, Anna, 1967, et al.
(författare)
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The welfare reality check: how policy-specific information influences public responsiveness
- 2022
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Ingår i: Journal of Elections, Public Opinion and Parties. - : Informa UK Limited. - 1745-7289 .- 1745-7297. ; 32:3, s. 615-634
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- © 2020 The Author(s). Published by Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group. Democratic responsiveness implies that politicians are expected to be responsive to public demands and needs but also that the public is expected to respond to actual policies and reforms by adjusting their demands. What is often over-looked is that policy-specific knowledge is imperative for public policy responsiveness to send correct signals. By using survey experiments, we tested the effects of policy-specific information on policy preferences for privatization of welfare services in Sweden. In line with the thermostatic model, we expected information on the increase of privatization to show negative correlations with demand for more privatization. The experiments showed that policy preferences changed in most policy areas when policy-specific facts were provided. The negative effects of information about privatization were most pronounced among centre-left respondents, increasing the left-right polarization. The results suggest that policy-specific knowledge can serve as a useful mechanism in order to meet the identified theoretical need to strengthen the causal relationship in theories of public responsiveness. The study adds important knowledge to how we understand public responsiveness, and highlight the need of “reality checks” when analysing policy demands.
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| 2. |
- Bhatti, Yosef, et al.
(författare)
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Can you deliver a baby and vote? The effect of the first stages of parenthood on voter turnout
- 2019
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Ingår i: Journal of Elections, Public Opinion and Parties. - : Informa UK Limited. - 1745-7289 .- 1745-7297. ; 29:1, s. 61-81
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Becoming a parent is a profound change in one’s life that likely has consequences for political mobilization. This paper focuses on the earliest stages of parenthood, which have rarely been theorized nor empirically investigated. Close to childbirth, there may be substantial demobilizing effects due to hospital stays, immediate childcare responsibilities, parenting distress and the physical burden of pregnancy and childbirth. It is unclear how sizeable these effects are on political demobilization as well as the extent to which they are long-lasting. Based on two individual-level register datasets from Denmark and Finland, we compare the voter turnout among parents in local elections across different dates of childbirth. We find a robust negative short-term effect. We also find that the recovery periods after childbirth are differentiated by gender, illustrating a somewhat stronger demobilizing effect of early stages of motherhood compared to the early stages of fatherhood. There are also some indications that recovery periods after childbirth are slower for women with higher socioeconomic backgrounds. Our study shows that childbearing and childbirth have strong demobilizing, although mostly temporary, implications for electoral participation, even in these strong welfare states.
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| 3. |
- Bäck, Hanna, et al.
(författare)
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Legalize Cannabis? : Effects of party cues on attitudes to a controversial policy proposal
- 2022
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Ingår i: Journal of Elections, Public Opinion, and Parties. - : Taylor & Francis. - 1745-7289 .- 1745-7297. ; 32:2, s. 489-500
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- This article focuses on how party identity can shape policy support or opposition to the controversial issue of legalizing cannabis in Sweden, which is strongly opposed by the public. In a survey experiment (N = 3612), we manipulated if a message that supported or opposed a policy proposal to legalize cannabis was presented by a representative of the own party or an outgroup party. Results showed increased opposition to the proposal when the ingroup party opposed the policy and when the outgroup party endorsed the policy. When the ingroup party endorsed the policy and when the outgroup party opposed the policy, attitudes to the policy were not influenced. We argue that prior attitudes moderate how ingroup- and outgroup party messages are processed and that voters do not blindly follow the party line. Only when the own party presents a position that coincides with the individual’s prior position, are attitudes strengthened and voters follow the party line. Attitudes are also strengthened as a way to increase distance to a disliked outgroup party. When the party cue contradicts prior beliefs (ingroup-endorse; outgroup-oppose), the information is ignored, which allows individuals to retain their view of the party, be it positive or negative.
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| 4. |
- Dahlberg, Stefan, 1975, et al.
(författare)
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Does Corruption Suppress Voter Turnout?
- 2016
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Ingår i: Journal of Elections, Public Opinion, and Parties. - : Informa UK Limited. - 1745-7289 .- 1745-7297. ; 26:4, s. 489-510
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- This paper investigates to what extent voters’ perceptions of political corruption affect turnout. In previous research, two opposing views are put forward with regards to the relationship between corruption and turnout. On the one hand, corruption increases turnout because voters either are bought off to participate or because they are mobilized on clean government issues. On the other hand, corruption decreases turnout because presence of corruption corrodes the political system which leads to general cynicism, distrust and voter apathy. In this paper, we contribute to the existing research by adopting a multilevel approach to the relationship between corruption and turnout. We test the hypothesis that voters’ perceptions of corruption dampens turnout but that the effect is conditional upon the corruption context. We test our hypothesis by combining individual-level data and country-level data from 26 countries from the Comparative Study of Electoral Systems and country-level data from the Quality of Government Data Set. The findings show that perceiving corruption negatively affects turnout, but only in countries with low to medium levels of system corruption.
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| 5. |
- Dawson, Stephen
(författare)
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Electoral fraud and the paradox of political competition
- 2022
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Ingår i: Journal of Elections Public Opinion and Parties. - : Informa UK Limited. - 1745-7289 .- 1745-7297. ; 32:4, s. 793-812
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Why are some elections more fraudulent than others? While much work has been devoted to understanding the structural conditions under which election quality can suffer, little is currently understood about election-specific dynamics that shape the conduct of polling day. This study assesses the impact of a more proximate determinant of election day fraud: the anticipated closeness of the race. In doing so, the paper sheds light on a potential paradox of political competition; highly competitive elections are seen as a healthy sign of democratic functioning, yet they may also lead to a reduction in the integrity of the process. Using novel pre-election polling data for 109 presidential elections around the world between 1996 and 2016, results suggest that ex ante closeness incites electoral fraud. In democratic contexts, closer elections - and elections in which the incumbent's prospects are ambiguous - are associated with greater levels of ballot box manipulation as attempts are made to get over the finish line. This is the case largely irrespective of whether the incumbent is marginally ahead or behind in the race, suggesting that it is the mere uncertainty of the election result that can encourage election day fraud.
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| 6. |
- Dulani, B., et al.
(författare)
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Elections in the time of covid-19: the triple crises around Malawi’s 2020 presidential elections
- 2021
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Ingår i: Journal of Elections, Public Opinion and Parties. - : Informa UK Limited. - 1745-7289 .- 1745-7297. ; 31:S1, s. 56-68
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- In June 2020, in the midst of the Covid-19 pandemic, Malawians went to the polls and voted to replace the incumbent government. Much like other natural disasters, the Covid-19 pandemic and accompanying economic and political shocks had the potential to shake voters’ confidence in the government, reduce turnout, and/or reduce support for the incumbent if voters associated them with the ills of the pandemic. In this paper, we examine the extent to which the Coronavirus pandemic influenced Malawi’s 2020 elections. We consider how fear of infection and economic distress affected citizens’ trust and confidence in President Mutharika’s government, their willingness to turn out to vote, and their choices at the polls using data collected pre- and post-Covid. We find that fears about the virus and its economic impact did influence trust and confidence in the government to handle Covid but had little to no effect on either abstention or vote choice. © 2021 The Author(s). Published by Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group.
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| 7. |
- Erlingsson, Gissur, et al.
(författare)
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Close actions speak louder than distant words? The effect of local parties on voter turnout in Swedish local elections 1994-2018
- 2024
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Ingår i: Journal of Elections, Public Opinion, and Parties. - : ROUTLEDGE JOURNALS, TAYLOR & FRANCIS LTD. - 1745-7289 .- 1745-7297.
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Does the presence of local political parties increase turnout in municipal elections? A handful of previous studies have found that local parties indeed have this effect. Against that backdrop, we examine the impact of the rapid growth in the number of local parties on voter turnout in Swedish local elections. We test the so-called "best of both worlds" hypothesis, which predicts that the presence of local parties - alongside lists of local branches of national party organizations - increases choice for the voters, and thereby increases voter turnout. Our empirical tests employ data from seven Swedish local elections between 1994 and 2018. Ultimately, and contrary to findings from other settings, our results suggest that the presence of local parties does not contribute to higher voter turnout in Sweden. We maintain that this most likely is due to Sweden being a tough test for this hypothesis since Sweden has some unique institutional characteristics, such as concurrent elections and high baseline turnout in local elections.
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| 8. |
- Farjam, Mike, et al.
(författare)
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Social conformity or attitude persistence? : The bandwagon effect and the spiral of silence in a polarized context
- 2024
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Ingår i: Journal of Elections, Public Opinion and Parties. - : Informa UK Limited. - 1745-7297 .- 1745-7289. ; , s. 1-21
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- This study examines whether and to what extent the bandwagon effect and the spiral of silence impact opinion formation in a polarized context, where individuals tend to be persistent in their policy attitudes. Focusing on contentious policy issues at the heart of the culture war in American politics, our aim is to study the relative importance of attitude persistence and social conformity in the opinion-formation process, and how these responses depend on individuals’ ideological commitments. We conducted an experimental study of US citizens, where participants donated money to organizations advocating opposed positions on seven of the most contentious issues in American politics. Utilizing the presentation of opinion polls as a treatment, the findings are threefold. First, we show that polls cause ideologically moderate people to abandon the minority and conform to the majority opinion regardless of the issue at stake. By contrast, we show that attitude persistence prevails among ideologically extreme people. Second, we demonstrate that seeing polls generally demobilizes people with minority views. Third, we find that opinion-conversion and demobilization jointly undermine minority opinions, while only a small minority of extremists repels both mechanisms. These findings have important implications for research on opinion formation in today's polarized political landscape.
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| 9. |
- Fredén, Annika
(författare)
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Threshold Insurance Voting in PR Systems : A study of voters' strategic behavior in the 2010 Swedish General Election.
- 2014
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Ingår i: Journal of Elections, Public Opinion, and Parties. - Abingdon, Storbritannien : Routledge. - 1745-7289 .- 1745-7297. ; 24:4, s. 473-492
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- This study investigates strategic voting for small parties in proportional representationsystems, in previous work sometimes referred to as threshold insurance voting (Cox,1997). Starting from theories of rational voting (Downs, 1957), three conditions for threshold insurance voting are developed: the voter considers potential government outcomes, votes fora party at risk of falling below an electoral threshold, and votes for another party than his orher most preferred one. The conditions are tested on the case of the 2010 Swedish general election. Using extensive data material and a conditional logit model of vote choice, the resultsshow that in this election voters cast strategic votes for at least one of the small parties, the Christian Democrats which was included in the incumbent government coalition.
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| 10. |
- Geers, Sabine, et al.
(författare)
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Patterns of Intra-Election Volatility: The Impact of Political Knowledge
- 2019
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Ingår i: Journal of Elections, Public Opinion, and Parties. - : Informa UK Limited. - 1745-7289 .- 1745-7297. ; 29:3, s. 361-380
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- One key trend changing political environments across advanced industrial democracies is increasing electoral volatility. Despite extensive research, at the individual level we still know relatively little about the mechanisms behind electoral volatility during election campaigns, including the impact of political knowledge. Against this background and based on a four-wave panel study in the context of the 2014 Swedish national election, the purpose of this paper is to investigate (a) patterns of intra-election volatility and the impact of (b) political knowledge on patterns of electoral volatility. Distinguishing between party alienation, crystallization, wavering, reinforcement, and conversion, among other things, findings show some effects from political knowledge on patterns of electoral volatility but only for acquired political knowledge.
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