Electoral Choice, Ideological Conflict, and Political Participation

Abstract

Generations of democratic theorists argue that democratic systems should present citizens with clear and distinct electoral choices. Responsible party theorists further argued that political participation increases with greater ideological conflict between competing electoral options. Empirical evidence on this question, however, remains deeply ambiguous. This article introduces new joint estimates of citizen preferences and the campaign platforms chosen by pairs of candidates in U.S. House and Senate races. The results show that increasing levels of ideological conflict reduce voter turnout, and are robust across a wide range of empirical specifications. Furthermore, the findings provide no support for existing accounts that emphasize how ideology or partisanship explains the relationship between ideological conflict and turnout. Instead, I find that increasing levels of candidate divergence reduce turnout primarily among citizens with lower levels of political sophistication. These findings provide the strongest evidence to date for how mass political behavior is conditioned by electoral choice.

How Ideology Fuels Affective Polarization

“…Our argument builds upon recent work by Abramowitz and Webster (2015) and Iyengar et al (2012), who study increases in affective polarization towards elites and political parties over the last several decades. 4 Previous research finds that the nature of the choice between candidates affects a wide range of behaviors and attitudes, including turnout decisions (Brody and Page 1973;Plane and Gershtenson 2004;Rogowski 2014), vote choice (Rogowski forthcoming;Vegetti 2014), and opinion formation (Druckman et al 2013;Garner and Palmer 2011;Thornton 2012). We expect that these dynamics similarly characterize the ways citizens evaluate political officials.…”

Anti‐elite parties and political inequality: How challenges to the political mainstream reduce income gaps in internal efficacy

“…Concretely, we would expect that anti-elite parties: (1) make decisions (as well as expressing opinions) easier because they radically simplify political questions; (2) emphasise stark differences between parties and thereby illustrate the relevance of party choice; (3) translate diffuse frustrations about the political system into concrete arguments and demands and thereby restore a sense of political agency; (4) stimulate emotions of anger and indignation which typically have a mobilising effect; and (5) dramatise politics with their confrontational style, which could make it more exciting and entertaining for relatively disinterested citizens. Although they usually do not differentiate by income, many studies suggest that polarisation makes it is easier for citizens to connect their preferences to parties (Dalton 2010;Jansen et al 2013;Lachat 2008;Lupu 2015) and to participate in politics (Dalton 2008;Moral 2017;Steiner & Martin 2012;Wilford 2017; for a critical view, see Rogowski 2014). Although they usually do not differentiate by income, many studies suggest that polarisation makes it is easier for citizens to connect their preferences to parties (Dalton 2010;Jansen et al 2013;Lachat 2008;Lupu 2015) and to participate in politics (Dalton 2008;Moral 2017;Steiner & Martin 2012;Wilford 2017; for a critical view, see Rogowski 2014).…”

What Happens When Extremists Win Primaries?

“…It is possible that these races differ from other contested primaries. For example, greater ideological distance between the candidates may depress turnout in the primary (Rogowski 2014). However, these are still precisely the races we want to focus on to understand the differing consequences of choosing between a truly extreme candidate and a more moderate candidate.…”