When parties move to the middle: the role of uncertainty
Political parties face a crucial trade-off between electoral and partisan goals: should they put electoral goals first, pursuing the policies they think will win them the most votes in the next election, or should they put partisan goals first, pursuing the policies their members, activists, and mos...
| Main Authors: | , , |
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| Format: | Journal article |
| Language: | English |
| Published: |
Cambridge University Press
2023
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| _version_ | 1797111282410717184 |
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| author | Lindvall, J Rueda, D Zhai, H |
| author_facet | Lindvall, J Rueda, D Zhai, H |
| author_sort | Lindvall, J |
| collection | OXFORD |
| description | Political parties face a crucial trade-off between electoral and partisan goals: should they put electoral goals first, pursuing the policies they think will win them the most votes in the next election, or should they put partisan goals first, pursuing the policies their members, activists, and most loyal voters prefer? In this paper we argue that main political parties make different choices depending on the information environment they are in. They have strong incentives to follow the median voter when the median voter's position is well known, but when there is more uncertainty they have strong incentives to adopt policies they prefer for partisan reasons, since uncertainty makes party leaders more willing to bet that the party's preferred policies are also vote winners. We develop an empirical analysis of how the main parties on the left and the right in twenty democracies have changed their platforms from election to election since the 1960s. |
| first_indexed | 2024-03-07T08:06:34Z |
| format | Journal article |
| id | oxford-uuid:6d3e1158-8367-467e-957e-c69a18173a25 |
| institution | University of Oxford |
| language | English |
| last_indexed | 2024-03-07T08:06:34Z |
| publishDate | 2023 |
| publisher | Cambridge University Press |
| record_format | dspace |
| spelling | oxford-uuid:6d3e1158-8367-467e-957e-c69a18173a252023-11-02T18:11:39ZWhen parties move to the middle: the role of uncertaintyJournal articlehttp://purl.org/coar/resource_type/c_dcae04bcuuid:6d3e1158-8367-467e-957e-c69a18173a25EnglishSymplectic ElementsCambridge University Press2023Lindvall, JRueda, DZhai, HPolitical parties face a crucial trade-off between electoral and partisan goals: should they put electoral goals first, pursuing the policies they think will win them the most votes in the next election, or should they put partisan goals first, pursuing the policies their members, activists, and most loyal voters prefer? In this paper we argue that main political parties make different choices depending on the information environment they are in. They have strong incentives to follow the median voter when the median voter's position is well known, but when there is more uncertainty they have strong incentives to adopt policies they prefer for partisan reasons, since uncertainty makes party leaders more willing to bet that the party's preferred policies are also vote winners. We develop an empirical analysis of how the main parties on the left and the right in twenty democracies have changed their platforms from election to election since the 1960s. |
| spellingShingle | Lindvall, J Rueda, D Zhai, H When parties move to the middle: the role of uncertainty |
| title | When parties move to the middle: the role of uncertainty |
| title_full | When parties move to the middle: the role of uncertainty |
| title_fullStr | When parties move to the middle: the role of uncertainty |
| title_full_unstemmed | When parties move to the middle: the role of uncertainty |
| title_short | When parties move to the middle: the role of uncertainty |
| title_sort | when parties move to the middle the role of uncertainty |
| work_keys_str_mv | AT lindvallj whenpartiesmovetothemiddletheroleofuncertainty AT ruedad whenpartiesmovetothemiddletheroleofuncertainty AT zhaih whenpartiesmovetothemiddletheroleofuncertainty |