Electoral Spillovers in an Intertwined World: Brexit Effects on the 2016 Spanish Vote

Abstract

The Brexit vote took place three days before the June 26, 2016, Spain's parliamentary elections, in which anti-systemic parties performed worse compared to the previous elections (December 2015) despite the optimistic predictions of the pre-election polls. We split the Spanish votes in local ones (casted after Brexit) and postal ones (casted before Brexit) and -by employing a differences-in-differences model a la Montalvo (2011)-we provide causal evidence suggesting that the electoral performance of the anti-systemic parties deteriorated due to the uncertainty/fear caused to the Spanish electorate by the Brexit vote.

When the US far-right sneezes, the European far-right catches a cold. Quasi-experimental of electoral contagion from Spain

“…First, we provide empirical support to the growing body of empirical work that demonstrates the substantive causal impact salient political events of individual electoral preferences and attitudes. Not only do we find that salient events matter but, in line with the work of Giani and Meón (2019), Delis et al (2020) and Turnbull-Dugarte ( 2021), we also demonstrate that cross-national spillover effects can causally influence electoral preferences and public opinion. Second, we add to the literature (Rydgren, 2005;Van Hauwaert, 2019) that address the transnational nature of far-right parties.…”

“…Importantly, the effect of political and societal shocks also have an impact beyond the confines of the state boundaries. Delis et al (2020), for example, relying on a quasiexperimental research design, demonstrate that the unexpected outcome of the UK's Brexit referendum, which triggered the process of the UK's exit from the European Union (EU), had a significant impact on electoral choices in Spain. Comparing those who cast their ballots before the Brexit result was announced to those who cast their ballots immediately afterwards, the authors argue that the signals of political and economic instability brought about by the Brexit results -as illustrated by the volatility in the international stock market -led a substantive fall in support for anti-system parties.…”

“…Given studies evince the role of cross-national spillover effects on preferences and attitudes (Giani & Meón, 2019;Minkus et al, 2019;Turnbull-Dugarte, 2021), as well as electoral behaviour (Delis et al, 2020), we seek to assess the impact of Donald Trump's electoral defeat in a cross-national setting.…”

Is the grass greener on the other side? Benchmarking Covid-19 vaccine procurement against the British experience

“…First, studies on Brexit evaluations within Britain were published (for instance Grynberg et al, 2020;Hobolt et al, 2021;Vasilopoulou and Talving, 2019). Second, case studies on voting preferences in other EU states have been released (for instance Delis et al, 2020). Third, there has been research examining public preferences for the actual line in Brexit negotiations and post-withdrawal relations with the UK (Jurado et al, 2021;Walter, 2020).…”

“…EU 'Benchmark theory' (de Vries, 2018) states that citizens base their assessment of the EU on whether their country would fare comparatively better or worse outside the Union. Nowadays one can best draw a picture of such an alternative state of affairs of being outside the EU by looking at a recently departed EU member state: the UK.…”