Oscillations in Perceptual Accuracy: How well do people perceive parties’ ideological positions? (at Political Behavior)
(with Oguzhan Alkan, Ruth Dassonneville and Zeynep Somer-Topcu)
While citizens are sufficiently informed about parties’ ideological stances during elections, we know little about how the perceptual accuracy of party positions evolves beyond the election campaign period. We argue that, during election campaigns, when political information is more readily available, citizens perceive party positions more accurately, but this perceptual accuracy decreases outside of election time. Leveraging the as-if random variation in interview timing in the Comparative Study of Electoral Systems dataset across 21 established democracies and the panel data structure of the British Election Study Internet Panel, we show that perceptual accuracy declines post-election and increases during the pre-electoral campaign period. Additional analyses suggest that these fluctuations in accuracy are primarily due to individuals becoming less informed rather than updating their perceptions in response to new information. These findings have important implications for democratic representation.
Do voters and non-voters differ in their policy preferences? (at European Journal of Political Research)
The declining voter turnout across democracies has raised concerns regarding its implications for democratic representation. Yet, the extent to which low turnout may undermine representation in Europe remains unclear. Do the policy preferences of voters and non-voters differ? This research addresses that question by providing the first large-scale, cross-national examination of policy preference differences between voters and non-voters in European democracies. Using data from the 2014 and 2019 waves of the European Election Study, covering 29 European democracies, I analyse differences across the left-right spectrum, economic attitudes (ie redistribution, regulation, spending), social attitudes (ie immigration, same-sex marriage, environment, and civil liberties), and views on European integration. The results reveal some disparities between voters and non-voters, but these are generally sporadic, even within individual countries, suggesting that such disparities are not the norm. Still, when differences do arise, they are not trivial. The analysis of how the electorate’s preferences would change under a hypothetical full turnout scenario suggests that these disparities can introduce meaningful biases. Using data from the British Election Study Internet Panel, I further distinguish between regular voters, peripheral voters, and perpetual non-voters and find notable heterogeneity in their policy preferences. These findings show that when turnout is low, the electorate’s overall stance reflects that of regular voters, but higher turnout mitigates this bias. Overall, the results suggest that while voters and non-voters in Europe typically hold similar policy views, occasional disparities can introduce representation bias in policy preferences, with implications for democratic representation and party strategies.
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How do masses react to party polarization? Limited effect of party polarization on mass polarization (at European Journal of Political Research)
Elite ideological polarization is rising in Western democracies. Is this elite ideological polarization associated with mass ideological polarization? I argue that when a party adopts a more extreme position, the masses polarize via two mechanisms. In-partisans should follow the party and adopt a more extreme ideological stance while out-partisans should backlash and move in the opposite direction. To test these expectations, I exploit a real-world sudden party polarization when the Labour Party of the United Kingdom suddenly shifted to the left under new leadership. Using British Election Study Internet Panel data, I find limited evidence that elite polarization leads to mass polarization. Overall, neither in-partisans followed the party, nor out-partisans backlashed to it. Only ideologically out-of-touch in-partisans adjusted their ideological stance to match their party, indicating the effectiveness of partisan cues, nonetheless. These findings provide insight into how the masses react to increasing party polarization, alleviating pundits’ concerns that the masses are blind followers and bound to polarize if political parties polarize.
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Do sexual minorities participate more in politics? (at Research & Politics)
(with Jean-François Daoust, Ruth Dassonneville and Mélyann Guévremont)
Individuals who participate more in politics tend to be better represented politically. As a result, it is important to examine which groups are more and which groups are less likely to participate. In this paper, we study the institutional and non-institutional political participation of an important group that has only received scant attention in the literature: sexual minorities. To do so, we leverage recent datasets and conduct the first comprehensive study on the relationship between sexual orientation and non-electoral political participation in Canada. Consistent with our theoretical expectations, the analyses reveal that sexual minorities (n = 2061) participate to a greater extent in politics compared to heterosexuals (n = 23,652), even after controlling for numerous socioeconomic factors. We also find that the sexuality gap is similar across gender identities. We conclude by discussing the implications of our findings for the comparative literature on sexuality and politics.
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Electoral Participation Among Canadian Sexual Minorities (Research report for Elections Canada)
(with Jean-François Daoust and Ruth Dassonneville)
This report analyzes the role of sexual identity on electoral participation in Canada. To do so, it uses data from the 44th federal election that were derived from the Canadian Election Study along with data from provincial elections in Quebec (2021), Ontario (2021), Nova Scotia (2021), Newfoundland and Labrador (2021), Saskatchewan (2020), and New Brunswick (2020). Sexual minorities were found to be more likely to self-report their participation in elections compared to heterosexuals. This is in line with theories suggesting that sexual minorities are more mobilized and politically engaged. However, there are differences in the relationship between one’s sexual orientation and electoral participation across sexual minority groups. Specifically, electors identifying as bisexual demonstrated no significant difference in their voting likelihood compared to their heterosexual counterparts (87.6% and 85%, respectively). Conversely, those identifying as gay/lesbian and queer/questioning/another identification were associated with a higher chance of voting compared to heterosexual electors, with voting chances reaching 90% and 93%, respectively. The observed pattern of increased voting likelihood among sexual minorities seems to depend on the jurisdiction at play: it holds true for federal elections but not for provincial ones. Finally, this research uncovered findings suggesting that the increased electoral participation of sexual minorities is likely driven by men who identify as gay or bisexual. However, notably, in C-DEM’s data, 86.5% of men report to have voted while only 80.4% of women report to have done so; thus, this biased gender gap in self-reported voter turnout may exaggerate the finding. Further research can help determine whether men are truly the ones driving the observed mobilization effect.
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Party System Polarization and Electoral Behavior (at Oxford Research Encyclopedias, Politics)
(with Ruth Dassonneville)
When deciding whether to turn out to vote and what party to support, citizens are constrained by the available options within their party system. A rich literature shows that characteristics of this choice set, which capture how “meaningful” the choice is, have pervasive effects on electoral behavior and public opinion. Party system polarization in particular, which captures how ideologically dispersed the parties are, has received much attention in earlier work. More ideologically polarized party systems are associated with higher turnout rates, while both proximity voting and mechanisms of accountability appear strengthened when parties are more ideologically distinct. However, party system polarization also strengthens party attachments and entails a risk of fostering mass polarization.
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Does party ambivalence decrease voter turnout? A global Analysis (at Party Politics)
Does party ambivalence, that is, simultaneously evaluating positively more than one political party, decrease turnout? The extant literature on this question is limited to the American case, and findings are rather mixed. Using the data from the Comparative Study of Electoral Systems project, this paper provides a first large-scale comparative analysis of the ambivalence-turnout nexus in 46 countries. Based on two different ambivalence measures, I show that party ambivalence is more prevalent in multiparty systems and that a substantial portion of citizens are ambivalent. Moreover, ambivalence, on average, reduces turnout by at least 4.5 percentage points across countries. Importantly, however, this is not the case for every country. Whether ambivalence decreases voter turnout is conditioned by macro-level factors. More specifically, ambivalence tends to dampen turnout in (1) polarized contexts, (2) parliamentary systems, (3) voluntary voting countries, and (4) less fragmented systems.
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Polarized partisanship in Turkey, over-stability and partisan bias in Turkey (at Turkish Studies)
A vast literature demonstrates that partisanship has a stabilizing impact on politics, as it limits electoral volatility. Recent studies have also shown that polarization increases partisanship, thus contributing to electoral stability. Focusing on Turkey, an unconsolidated and highly polarized democracy, this study investigates the role of partisanship in a comparative context by means of data from the Comparative Study of Electoral Systems project. I find that Turkey (among more than 40 countries) is a very high-partisanship country, where partisanship greatly shapes the evaluations of short-term determinants of vote and the vote itself. This research also shows that partisanship in Turkey is associated with very low electoral volatility and defection rates. Moreover, the degree of identification also plays a significant role in its impact on volatility and defection. These findings from the Turkish case offer insights and stimulate a new normative debate on the role of partisanship in unconsolidated democracies.
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How do Turks abroad vote? (at Turkish Studies)
(with Semra Sevi, Can Serif Mekik and André Blais)
Voting rights are an essential feature of democratic citizenship. Turkey enfranchised its expatriate citizens in 1995, but they were first granted the right to vote from overseas in the 2014 presidential election. We examine turnout and vote choice among expatriates in Turkish elections from 2014 to 2018. We find that turnout among expatriates is low and that they tend to vote in the same direction as domestic voters. Furthermore, the Justice and Development Party (AKP) and the People’s Democratic Party (HDP) tend to do better among expatriates compared to their domestic counterparts. Our analyses also suggest that expatriate voting is linked to the strength of voters’ ties to their country of origin. Moreover, expatriate vote choice appears to vary with geographic and political variables associated with the host countries.