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. There are a whole host of typologies in relation to issues, and we distinguish different types of issues such as position issues and issues that are more or less emotional. If we take into account Przeworski and Sprague's idea that there can be a mobilization of the electorate in a logic of endogenous preference and non-maximization of the utility of voters. The economic model makes predictions and tries to explain both the participation but also, and above all, the direction of the vote, which is the electoral choice. 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. However, this is empirically incorrect. "The answer is "yes", as postulated by spatial theories, or "no", as stated by Przeworski and Sprague, for example. This model shows that there is more than political identities, partisan identification and social inking. The law of curvilinear disparity takes up this distinction. At the aggregate level, the distribution of partisan identification in the electorate makes it possible to calculate the normal vote. Reinforcement over time since adult voters increasingly rely on this partisan identification to vote and to face the problems of information, namely partisan identification seen as a way of solving a problem that all voters have, which is how to form an idea and deal with the abundance and complexity of the information that comes to us from, for example, the media, political campaigns or others in relation to the political offer. What interests us is that the idea of issue voting is fundamental to spatial theories of voting. Suicide is a global public health problem. They are voters who make the effort to inform themselves, to look at the proposals of the different parties and try to evaluate the different political offers. It is a moment when social cleavages directly influence the vote in this approach and therefore the sociological model, perhaps, at that moment, better explains the vote. Voters assess the utility income of parties and candidates. 135150. This is called retrospective voting, which means that we are not looking at what the parties said in their platforms, but rather at what the parties did before. changes in voting behaviour from one election to the next. The theory of the economic model of the vote is also a model that allows predictions to be made about party behaviour. These theories are called spatial theories of the vote because they are projected. It is a third explanation given by Przeworski and Sprague in their theory of partisan competition, also known as the theory of mobilization of the electorate. Theoretically, it is possible to have as many dimensions as there are issues being discussed in an election campaign. The basic idea is somewhat the same, namely that it is a way that voters have at their disposal, a euristic and cognitive shortcut that voters have at their disposal to deal with the problem of complex information. But more generally, when there is a campaign, the issues are discussed. Pages pour les contributeurs dconnects en savoir plus. Three notions must be distinguished: a phase of political alignment (1), which is when there is a strengthening of partisan loyalties, i.e. On the other hand, preferences for candidates in power are best explained by the proximity model and the simple directional model. For many, voting is a civic duty. There is no real electoral choice in this type of explanation, but it is based on our insertion in a social context. 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. The choice of candidates is made both according to direction but also according to the intensity of positions on a given issue. What we are interested in is on the demand side, how can we explain voters' electoral choice. For the sociological model we have talked about the index of political predisposition with the variables of socioeconomic, religious and spatial status. 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. In this model, there is a region of acceptability of positional extremism which is a region outside of which the intensity of the positions or the direction shown by a party cannot go because if it goes beyond that region, the voter will no longer choose that party. It is possible to determine direction based on the "neutral point" which is the point in the middle, or it is also possible to determine direction from the "status quo". Positioning on a left-right scale is related to this type of theory. This theory presupposed that the voter recognizes his or her own interest, assesses alternative candidates, and on the basis of this assessment, will choose for the candidate or party that will be most favourably assessed in the sense of best serving his or her own political interests and interests. 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. This model of directional proximity with intensity illustrates what is called symbolic politics which is related to the problem of information. Basic Idea What you are vote choice ; Key foundational studies ; Lazarsfeld, Berelson, Gaudet (1944) The Peoples Choice Berelson, Lazarsfeld, McPhee (1954) Voting Numerous studies examine voting behavior based on the formal theoretical predictions of the spatial utility model. The theory of partisan competition was completely eliminated by the other types of explanations. 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. Prospective voting is the one that has been postulated by Downs and by all other researchers who work in proximity models but also in two-way models. Thus, they were well suited not only to develop and test theories of voting behavior, but also to provide an historical record of the considerations shaping the outcomes of specific national elections. Voters try to maximize the usefulness of the vote, that is, they try to vote for the party that makes them more satisfied. The heterogeneity of the electorate and voters must be taken into account. So all these elements help to explain the vote and must be taken into account in order to explain the vote. 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. Fiorina proposed an alternative way to explain why voters vote for one party rather than another, or a different answer to how the position of different candidate parties can be assessed. The reference work is The People's Choice published in 1948 by Lazarsfeld, Berelson and Gaudet. It is because we are rational, and if we are rational, rationality means maximizing our usefulness on the basis of the closeness we can have with a party. In the spatial theories of the vote, we see the strategic link between a party's supply and a demand from voters or electors. In other words, they propose something quite ecumenical that combines directional and proximity models. 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 psycho-sociological model can be seen in the light of an explanatory contribution to the idea that social inking is a determining factor in explaining the vote, or at least on a theoretical level. The idea is that it is in circles of interpersonal relations even if more modern theories of opinion leaders look at actors outside the personal circle. So, we are going to the extremes precisely because we are trying to mobilize an electorate. There are several responses to criticisms of the proximity model. %PDF-1.3 % How was that measured? party loyalties are freed from their social base and thus these party identifications are formed and crystallized. The ANNALS of the American Academy of Political and Social Science, 261(1), 194194. There is also the economic vote, which is the role of the economy. These authors have tried to say that the different explanatory theories of the vote can be more or less explanatory in the sense of having more or less importance of explanatory power depending on the phases in which one is in a process of alignment and misalignment. LAZARSFELD, PAUL F., BERNARD BERELSON, and HAZEL GAUDET. The basic assumption is that voters decide primarily on the basis of ideologies and not on the basis of specific positions on issues. This identification with a party is inherited from the family emphasizing the role of primary socialization, it is reinforced over time including a reinforcement that is given by the very fact of voting for that party. _____ were the first widespread barriers to the franchise to be eliminated. 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. First, they summarize the literature that has been interested in explaining why voters vary or differ in the stability or strength of their partisan identification. The concept of electoral choice does not belong to the sociological model but rather to rationalist theories. 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. There are also intermediate variables that relate to loyalties to a certain group or sense of belonging. It is a very detailed literature today. Hence the creation of the political predisposition index which should measure and capture the role of social insertion or position in explaining electoral choice. All parties that are in the same direction of the voter maximize the individual utility of that voter. In this model, importance is given to primary socialization. This electoral volatility, especially in a period of political misalignment, is becoming more and more important and is increasingly overshadowed by this type of explanation. These are possible answers more to justify and account for this anomaly. There was a whole series of critics who said that if it's something rational, there's a problem with the way democracy works. There is a particular requirement, which is that this way of explaining the voting behaviour of the electoral choice is very demanding in terms of the knowledge that voters may have about different positions, especially in a context where there are several parties and where the context of the political system and in particular the electoral system must be taken into account, because it may be easier for voters to know their positions when there are two parties, two candidates, than when there are, as in the Swiss context, many parties running. We need to find identification measures adapted to the European context, which the researchers have done. On the basis of this, we can know. The idea is to see what are all the factors that explain the electoral choice. This diagram shows the process of misalignment with changes in the generational structure and changes in the social structure that create political misalignment. Even more plausibly, election campaigns are built around several issues. 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. 1948, Berelson et . Ideology is to be understood as a way of simplifying our world in relation to the problem of information. 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. However, he conceives the origin and function of partisan identification in a different way from what we have seen before. The explanatory factors and aspects highlighted by these different models are always taken into account. Nevertheless, some of these spatial theories depart from this initial formulation. A first criticism that has been made is that the simple proximity model gives us a misrepresentation of the psychology of voting. The choice can be made according to different criteria, but they start from the assumption that there are these voters who arrive in an electoral process that refers to the idea of the hexogeneity of voters' preferences. This is more related to the retrospective vote. 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. If certain conditions are present, such as good democratic functioning within the party, activists will have the opportunity to exercise "voice" and influence positions. The personality model highlights the importance of childhood experiences for political behavior and belief in adulthood; the sociological model highlights the importance of primary and interest . This is especially important when applying this type of reasoning empirically. Professor Political Science Buena Vista University Two basic concerns: Turnout ("Who votes?") Key questions: What are the characteristics and attitudes of voters vs. nonvoters? Pp. Four questions around partisan identification. There is a small degree of complexity because one can distinguish between attitudes towards the candidate or the party, attitudes towards the policies implemented by the different parties and attitudes about the benefits that one's own group may receive from voting for one party rather than another. Lazarsfeld's book created this research paradigm. maximum proximity, as the party, his or her utility increases, and when the voter moves away from the party, his or her utility decreases. They are both proximity choices and directional choices with intensity, since there are voters who may choose intensity and others who may choose direction. Therefore, they cannot really situate where the different parties stand. "i.e., if it is proximity, it is 'yes', otherwise it is 'no' and therefore directional; 'are the preferences of the actors exogenous? The spatial theory of the vote postulates that the electoral choice is made in the maximization of individual utility. When you vote, you are taking your personal time and effort to advance the collective good, without any guarantee of personal rewardthe very heart of what it means to be altruistic. The role of the centrality of partisan identification has been criticized, especially today, because partisan identification plays a role that is still important but much less important than it used to be and may be much less important than some researchers within this paradigm have postulated. The degree of political sophistication, political knowledge, interest in politics varies from voter to voter. Hinich and Munger take up the Downs idea but turn it around a bit. 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. is premised on the assumption that elections connect the will of the people to the actions of government. They try to elaborate a bit and find out empirically how this happens. 65, no. as a party's position moves away from our political preferences. As far as the psycho-sociological model is concerned, it has the merit of challenging the classical theory of democracy which puts the role on the rational actor. There are also external factors that also need to be considered, such as the actions of the government, for example, voters are influenced by what the government has done. The psycho-sociological model also developed a measure called the partisan identification index, since this model wanted to be an empirical model with behaviourism and the idea of studying individual behaviours empirically with the development of national election studies and survey data to try to measure the partisan identification index. Prospective voting says that voters will listen to what candidates and parties have to say. 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 . There are different strategies that are put in place by voters in a conscious or unconscious way to reduce these information costs, which are all the costs associated with the fact that in order to be able to evaluate the utility income given by one party rather than another, one has to go and see, listen, hear and understand what these parties are saying. This refers to the Michigan model, the psycho-sociological model. startxref This ensures congruence and proximity between the party and the electorate. A unified theory of voting: directional and proximity spatial models. - What we're going to do in this video is start to think about voting behavior, and in particular, we're going to start classifying motivations for why someone votes for a particular candidate, and I'm going to introduce some terms that will impress your political science friends, but you'll see that they map two things that . We worked with a sample of 516 Argentinean adults, aged 18 to 75. 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