0000001124 00000 n They may rely less on their partisan loyalties, so their vote may be explained less by their social base and more by their choice among an offer that is the economic model. In the spatial theories of the vote, we see the strategic link between a party's supply and a demand from voters or electors. The idea is to see what are all the factors that explain the electoral choice. There may be one that is at the centre, but there are also others that are discussed. On the other hand, the intensity directional model better explains the electoral choices of candidates who are not currently in power. Misalignment creates greater electoral volatility that creates a change in the party system that can have a feedback on the process of alignment, misalignment or realignment. $2.75. It is an answer that remains faithful to the postulates of Downs' theory and the proximity model. In this theory, we vote for specific issues that may be more or less concrete, more or less general, and which form the basis for explaining electoral behaviour. offers a behavior analysis of voting behavior. Radical approach regards class-based (structural) model as outdated and insufficient to explain . 0000011193 00000 n 1.2 Psychology and behavior 9 1.3 Voting behavior and action 13 1.4 Strategies of explanation 14 1.5 Research questions and outline 16 2 The empirical analysis of voting action 19 2.1 Introduction 21 2.2 The Wrzburg school 21 2.3 Lazarsfeld and the empirical analysis of action 23 2.4 The Columbia approach to voting action 26 Maximizing utility is done in proximity to certain issues. Some have criticized this model saying that it puts forward the one-dimensional image of the human being and politics, that is, that it is purely rational, hypercognitive in a way without taking into account sociological but also psychological elements. The economic model has put the rational and free citizen back at the centre of attention and reflection, whereas if we push the sociological model a bit to the extreme, it puts in second place this freedom and this free will that voters can make since the psycho-sociological model tells us that voting is determined by social position, it is not really an electoral choice that we make in the end but it is simply the result of our social insertion or our attachment to a party. Ideology is a means of predicting and inferring political positions during an election campaign. The basic idea is the representation of a point that is an ideal point for each voter in a hypothetical space. Moreover, retrospective voting can also be seen as a shortcut. The theories that are supposed to explain the electoral choice also explain at the same time the electoral participation in particular with the sociological model. Political parties can make choices that are not choices to maximize the electorate, unlike spatial theories, where parties seek to maximize their short-term electoral support in an election. Voting requires voters to know the candidates' positions on issues, but when there are several candidates or several parties, it is not very easy for some voters in particular. From the perspective of the issue vote, there are four main ways to explain how and why voters are going to vote a certain way and why parties are going to position themselves. The theoretical account of voting behavior drew heavily upon the metaphor of a 'funnel of causality'. The ideological space can be defined as a left-right ideological space but can also be defined more precisely in relation to certain issues. There are other models that try to relate the multiplicity of issues to an underlying ideological space, i.e., instead of looking at specific issues, everything is brought back to a left-right dimension as a shortcut, for example, and there are other theories that consider the degree of ambiguity and clarity of the candidates' positions. 0000002253 00000 n This is more related to the retrospective vote. These studies model individual utility from the election of a preferred party or candidate as decreasing as the alternative deviates from one's ideal point, but differ as to whether this loss should be modeled linearly or quadratically. The fit of a measurement model that differentiates between the various degrees of suicidal severity was verified. those who inquire: they are willing to pay these costs. On the other hand, in rationalist approaches, shortcuts are cognitive shortcuts. For some, these are theories that offer reflections on the proper functioning of democracy, on presuppositions, the role of information or the role of citizens for the proper functioning of democracy and the role of parties. IVERSEN, T. (1994). Merrill and Grofman have proposed unified models that want to get out of this hyper-simplification with respect to spatial theories where one either makes a choice of possibilities or a choice of direction but evacuates any other element such as partisan identification, socialization, social inclusion, economic conditions as well as the role of opinion leaders as seen in the funnel model of Michigan theory. On the other hand, to explain the electoral choice, we must take into account factors that are very far from the vote theoretically, but we must also take into account the fact that there are factors that are no longer close to the electoral choice during a vote or an election. carried out by scholars at Columbia. These authors find with panel data that among their confirmed hypotheses that extroverted people tend to have a strong and stable partisan identification. Ecological regression represents one extreme: the presumption that voting behavior changes systematically across groups but only changes randomly, if at all, within groups. 43 0 obj <> endobj The theory of the economic model of the vote is also a model that allows predictions to be made about party behaviour. Finally, in a phase of misalignment, this would be the economic model, since there is a loss of these partisan loyalties, so these voters become more and more reactive to political events and therefore may be more rational in their decision-making process. Some parties have short-term strategies for maximizing voting and others have long-term strategies for social mobilization. Others have criticized this analogy between the economic market and the political market as being a bit simplistic, saying that, basically, the consequences of buying a consumer product have a certain number of consequences, but they are much more limited compared to what buying a vote can have in terms of choosing a party. Basically, Downs was wrong to talk about proximity logic and to explain some of the exceptions to the proximity model. Then they evaluate their own position in relation to the issues and they do the same operation positioning themselves on this left-right axis. This approach would be elitist, this assumption that voters have the ability to know what is going on which is the idea of information and this ability that voters have to look at that information and process it. What is interesting is that they try to relate this to personality traits such as being open, conscientious, extroverted, pleasant and neurotic. If we do not accept the idea that actors will vote according to their assessment of certain issues, to be more precise, according to their assessment of the position that the various parties have on certain issues, if we do not understand that, we cannot understand the spatial theories of voting either. On the other hand, the political preferences are exogenous to the political process which is the fact that when the voter goes to vote which is the moment when he or she starts to think about this election, he or she already arrives with certain fixed or prefixed political preferences. 135150. Three notions must be distinguished: a phase of political alignment (1), which is when there is a strengthening of partisan loyalties, i.e. The second question is according to which criteria to determine the individual utility of voters. Print. According to Fiorina, retrospective voting is that citizens' preferences depend not only on how close they are to the political position of a party or candidate, but also on their retrospective assessment of the performance of the ruling party or candidate. The limitations are the explanation of partisan identification, which is that the model has been criticized because it explains or does not explain too much about where partisan identification comes from except to say that it is the result of primary socialization. A distinction is made between the sociological model of voting from the Columbia School, which refers to the university where this model was developed. However, this is empirically incorrect. By Phone: (386) 758-1026 ext. There has also been the criticism of abstention as the result of rational calculation. The influence of friends refers to opinion leaders and circles of friends. In Personality traits and party identification over time published in 2014 by Bakker, Hopmann and Persson, the authors attempt to explain partisan identification. The anomaly is that there is a majority of the electorate around the centre, but there are parties at the extremes that can even capture a large part of the preferences of the electorate. A set of theories has given some answers. What voters perceive are directional signals, that is, voters perceive that some parties are going in one direction and other parties are going in another direction on certain issues. If we take into account Przeworski and Sprague's idea that preferences are exogenous and not endogenous, it is possible to create a typology as Iversen did. Today, this may be less true, but until a certain point, there were relatively few empirical analyses based on the economic model of the vote. [15] Then we'll look at the space theories of the vote. 0000010337 00000 n What determines direction? This refers to the Michigan model, the psycho-sociological model. The extent to which the usefulness of voters' choices varies from candidate to candidate, but also from voter to voter. McClung Lee, A. Candidate choices are made towards parties or candidates who are going in the same direction as the voter, this being understood as the voters' political preferences on a given issue. A first criticism that has been made is that the simple proximity model gives us a misrepresentation of the psychology of voting. It is multidimensional also in the bipartisan context of the United States because there are cleavages that cut across parties. On the other hand, the focus is on the political goals of the voters, whereas the psychological model puts a little more emphasis on the social use of the vote. Nowadays, the internet is the most used communication environment, and therefore it becomes very important to try to determine the behavior of users regarding internet use. Voters who vote against the party with which they identify keep their partisan identification. One must take into account the heterogeneity of the electorate and how different voters may have different motivations for choosing which party or candidate to vote for. 43 17 It is by this configuration that May tries to explain this anomaly which is due to the fact that there is a group of voters who become activists within the party and who succeed in shifting the party's positioning towards the extremes. This ensures congruence and proximity between the party and the electorate. In other words, there is the idea of utility maximization which is a key concept in rational choice theory, so the voter wants to maximize his utility and his utility is calculated according to the ratio between the cost and the benefit that can be obtained from the action, in this case going to vote (1) and going to vote for that party rather than this one (2). Personality traits and party identification over time. We must also take into account other socializing agents that can socialize us and make us develop a form of partisan identification. It rejects the notion that voting behavior is largely determined by class affiliation or class socialization. . From the point of view of parties and candidates, the economic model and in particular the model that was proposed by Downs in 1957 and which predicts a convergence of a party position towards the centre. New York: Columbia University Press, 1948. A lawmaker's (stochastic) voting behavior is characterized by the relationship between her position in this space and the bill's position [1 . Voters vote for the candidate or party closest to their own position which is the proximity model. Directional model with intensity: Rabinowitz, Four possible answers to the question of how voters decide to vote, Unified Voting Model: Merrill and Grofman, Responses to criticisms of the proximity model, Partisan Competition Theory: Przeworski and Sprague, Relationship between voting explanatory models and realignment cycle. How does partisan identification develop? The initial formation of this model was very deterministic in wanting to focus on the role of social inclusion while neglecting other aspects, even though today there is increasingly a kind of ecumenical attempt to have an explanation that takes into account different aspects. That discounting depends on where the policy is right now in relation to what the party is promising, and that is the directional element. There are three actors at play in this theory: there are voters, candidates, and an intermediate group represented by activists who are in fact voters who become activists going to exercise "voice". The aspect is based on the idea that there is an information problem that represents a difficulty and costs that voters must pay to gather information and to become informed about an election. the maximum utility is reached at the line level. The concept and measurement of partisan identification as conceived by these researchers as applying to the bipartite system and therefore needs to be adapted to fit the multiparty and European system. In the psychological approach, the information problem is circumvented by the idea of the development of partisan identification, which is an emotional shortcut that voters operate. Voters calculate the cost of voting. Since the economic crisis, there has been an increasing focus on the economic crisis and economic conditions and how that can explain electoral volatility and electoral change. Most voters have a sense of allegiance to a party that is inherited through the family. Many researchers have criticised the Downs proximity model in particular. [8][9], The second very important model is the psycho-sociological model, also known as the partisan identification model or Michigan School model, developed by Campbell, Converse, Miller and Stokes in Campbell, Converse, Miller and Stokes, among others in The American Voter published in 1960. We must also, and above all, look at the links between types of factors. . We talk about the electoral market in the media or the electoral supply. Political scientists have defined several models of voter behavior in an attempt to explain the different motivations of voters: Rational choice theory describes someone voting in their best interest, supporting the candidate whose platform will give them the most favorable outcomes. The ANNALS of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, 261(1), 194194. Other researchers have tried to propose combined models that combine different explanations. For example, there is Lazarsfeld's theory with the idea that opinion leaders can be seen as people to whom we attribute a strong trust and maybe even an esteem in relation to the political judgment they may have and therefore, by discussing with these people, it is possible to form an electoral choice and therefore there is no need to go and pay these costs of gathering information. A third possible answer is that they will vote for the candidate whose political ideas are closest to their own. Fiorina proposed the question of how to evaluate the position of different parties and candidates: how can voters know what the position of different parties is during an election campaign? Four questions can be asked in relation to this measure: For the first question, there are several studies on the fact that partisan identification is multi-dimensional and not just one-dimensional. Here we see the key factors, namely electoral choice and, at the centre, the identification variable for a party, which depends on two types of factors, namely primary socialization and group membership. So there is an overestimation in this model with respect to capacity. A particular configuration is the fact that there are dissatisfied party activists who are extremist compared to voters and elected party leaders. Spatial theories of voting are nothing other than what we have seen so far with regard to the economic model of voting. The initial formulation of the model is based on the Downs theory in An Economic Theory of Democracy publi en 1957. Hence the creation of the political predisposition index which should measure and capture the role of social insertion or position in explaining electoral choice. The idea of prospective voting is very demanding. The Logics of Electoral Politics. social determinism Often, in the literature, the sociological and psycho-sociological model fall into the same category, with a kind of binary distinction between the theories that emphasize social, belonging and identification on the one hand, and then the rationalist and economic theories of the vote, which are the economic theories of the vote that focus instead on the role of political issues, choices and cost-benefit calculations. Some have another way of talking about convergences and showing how the theories explaining the vote can be reconciled with the process of political misalignment. Inking and the role of socialization cause individuals to form a certain partisan identification that produces certain types of political attitudes. Positioning on a left-right scale is related to this type of theory. In Person: 971 W Duval St. Ste. the further a party moves in the same direction as the voter, the more likely it is to be chosen by that voter. The idea of the directional model, and this applies to both the simple directional model and the intensity directional model, is that voters basically cannot clearly perceive the different positions of political parties or candidates on a specific issue. According to Merril and Grofman, one cannot determine whether one pure model is superior to another because there are methodological and data limitations. Four questions around partisan identification. According to Fiorina, identification with a party is not necessarily the result of a long phase of socialization, but it is also the result of evaluations of a certain party, it is the fact of voting for that party that makes it possible to develop a partisan identification. Has the partisan identification weakened? Iversena proposed a way of classifying the different explanatory theories of voting that allow to add a very important element that has been neglected until now. In their view, ideology is a means of predicting political positions on a significant number of issues and also a basis for credible and consistent engagement by the party or candidate that follows it. Therefore, they cannot really situate where the different parties stand. Several studies have shown that the very fact of voting for a party contributes to the development of a certain identification for that party. startxref The degree of political sophistication, political knowledge, interest in politics varies from voter to voter. This study presents an automated and accurate . There have been attempts to address this anomaly. (1949). The book's focus was sociological, mainly considering socio-demographic predictors, interpersonal influence, cross-pressures, and the effects of social groups, as well as analyzing voter activation, reinforcement, and conversion across the election year. In the study of electoral behaviour, there is a simple distinction between what is called prospective voting and retrospective voting. The utility function of this model is modified compared to the simple model, i.e. Merrill, Samuel, and Bernard Grofman. On the other hand, women tend to have less stable partisan identification, they change more often too. One possible strategy to reduce costs is to base oneself on ideology. Political conditions as well as the influence of the media play an important role, all the more so nowadays as more and more political campaigns and the role of the media overlap. He wanted to see the role of the media in particular and also the role of opinion leaders and therefore, the influences that certain people can have in the electoral choice. The distance must be assessed on the basis of what the current policy is. According to them, it is necessary to combine different types of explanations and in particular, in the electoral choice, the components related to proximity, leadership, and also the rather "intensity" leadership, all of which play a significant role in the positioning of candidates and parties. There is the idea of the interaction between a political demand and a political offer proposed by the different candidates during an election or a vote. LAZARSFELD, PAUL F., BERNARD BERELSON, and HAZEL GAUDET. The role of the media and campaigns simplifies information by summarizing it. The Neighborhood Model. We leave behind the idea of spatial theories that preferences are exogenous, that they are pre-existing and almost fixed. More specifically, the costs that the voter has to take into account according to the different parties and candidates must be evaluated, which is the partisan differential, i.e. Distance must be taken into account and the idea of mobilizing the electorate must be taken into account. One of the answers within spatial theories is based on this criticism that voters are not these cognitively strong beings as the original Downs theory presupposes. There are several responses to criticisms of the proximity model. This model has given rise to the spatial theories of voting which are the dominant theories. This is the basic motivation for the development of these directional models. For the sociological model we have talked about the index of political predisposition with the variables of socioeconomic, religious and spatial status. One of the merits, which can be found in Lazarsfeld's book entitled The People's Choice published in 1944 is that this model marks a turning point in the study of political behaviour. The psycho-sociological model initiated the national election studies and created a research paradigm that remains one of the two dominant research paradigms today and ultimately contributed to the creation of electoral psychology. The Columbia County Supervisor of Elections strives to provide reasonable accomodations to help people with disabilities have an equal opportunity to participate on our website. So, voters evaluate the positions of the parties and from these positions, this party is a left-wing party and this party is a right-wing party. We can talk about two major theories or two major models or even three models. This is the idea that gave rise to the development of directional models, which is that, according to Downs and those who have followed him, because there is transparency of information, voters can very well see what the political platforms of the parties or candidates are. There has been the whole emergence of the rational actor, which is the vote in relation to issues, which is not something that comes simply from our affective identification with a party, but there is a whole reflection that the voter makes in terms of cost-benefit calculations. The psycho-sociological model has its roots in Campell's work entitled The American Voter publi en 1960. By Web: Vote-By-Mail Web Request. The cause-and-effect relationship is reversed, according to some who argue that this is a problem at the empirical level when we want to study the effect of partisan identification on electoral choice because there is a problem of endogeneity; we no longer know what explains what. Numbers abound, since we have seen that, in the end, both models systematically have a significant effect. models of voting behavior -the columbia school (1940s) -the Michigan school (1950s) the columbia school -1940s -social determinism -voter brand loyalty (party id) -selective perception/projection -minimal campaign effect -cross-pressures -high interest+low partisanship are rare minimal campaign effect . If voters, who prefer more extreme options, no longer find these options within the party they voted for, then they will look elsewhere and vote for another party. The 'funnel of causality' provided a convenient framework within which to pursue both a comprehensive program of electoral accounting and a more selective strategy of explanation. Voters have knowledge of the ideological positions of parties or candidates on one or more ideological dimensions and they use this knowledge to assess the political positions of these parties or candidates on specific issues. 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