Candidate-centred electoral systems and voter turnout
This study evaluates contradictory theoretical predictions concerning the relationship between the candidate-centredness of electoral systems and voter turnout. Candidate-centredness has been proposed to both stimulate and depress turnout. Cross-sectional time-series data from 36 democracies between...
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Published in | West European politics Vol. 40; no. 3; pp. 516 - 533 |
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Main Author | |
Format | Journal Article |
Language | English |
Published |
London
Routledge
04.05.2017
Taylor & Francis Ltd |
Subjects | |
Online Access | Get full text |
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Summary: | This study evaluates contradictory theoretical predictions concerning the relationship between the candidate-centredness of electoral systems and voter turnout. Candidate-centredness has been proposed to both stimulate and depress turnout. Cross-sectional time-series data from 36 democracies between 1990 and 2014 are used to test the competing assumptions made about the impact of the personal vote on turnout. Three measures assessing the extent to which electoral systems create incentives to cultivate a personal vote are employed. The results show that turnout is the lowest in candidate-centred systems and the highest in party-centred systems with closed and ordered lists, while controlling for a host of contextual factors that have been linked to aggregate turnout. In addition, the finding that candidate-centredness is negatively related to turnout holds up even when taking into account district magnitude, electoral disproportionality and effective number of parties. |
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Bibliography: | ObjectType-Article-1 SourceType-Scholarly Journals-1 ObjectType-Feature-2 content type line 23 |
ISSN: | 0140-2382 1743-9655 |
DOI: | 10.1080/01402382.2016.1271599 |