Cycles and chaos in political party voting—a research note

Abstract

Several studies have shown cycles in the vote for political parties in American presidential elections, raising the question of whether cycles are unique to two‐party systems. This study extends the investigation of cycles to parliamentary elections in several countries that have multiple political parties: Japan, Germany, Norway, and Canada. Phase‐space analysis, a graphical method, is used to show that these countries have a variety of cyclic voting patterns in the distribution of votes among their political parties. Voting cycles may be associated with significant changes in the political party system and with stability of the government. Voting in presidential elections in Alabama is shown to have some characteristics of chaotic change, which is an extreme form of cyclic behavior. The possibility of chaos in voting behavior raises important research issues.