Intra-party heterogeneity and voter perceptions of party positions

Autor(en)

Michael Imre

Abstrakt

Do voters correctly perceive left-right positions of political parties? This question received considerable attention in the literature in the past decades. Previous research has shown that most voters have somewhat ‘correct’ perceptions of where parties are located on a left-right dimension, but that both individual and party level factors influence how much those perceptions deviate from the real positions. This paper adds to this literature, relaxing the unitary actor assumption and introducing heterogeneity to the analysis. Using data from elite surveys to measure intraparty preference heterogeneity on two dimensions, I demonstrate that voters' misperceptions of party positions strongly increase the more heterogeneous the positions of party elites are on the economic dimension, but not on the sociocultural dimension, and that the effect size depends on how salient this dimension is for the party. The findings have implications for future research on mass-elite linkages, representation, as well as voting behavior.

Organisation(en)

Institut für Staatswissenschaft

Journal

Electoral Studies

Band

83

Anzahl der Seiten

19

ISSN

0261-3794

DOI

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.electstud.2023.102623

Publikationsdatum

06-2023

Peer-reviewed

Ja

ÖFOS 2012

506014 Vergleichende Politikwissenschaft

Schlagwörter

ASJC Scopus Sachgebiete

Political Science and International Relations

Link zum Portal

https://ucrisportal.univie.ac.at/de/publications/39e8eca2-b614-409a-87d6-0f2000d51fca