Abstract
Research indicates that ideological congruence between citizens and political parties increases the likelihood of turning out to vote. But does this relationship also hold in times of economic crisis? In this study, I investigate whether economic conditions moderate the effect of voter–party representation on turnout. I argue that ideological congruence has significant effects on electoral participation during “normal” times, but these are even more relevant when citizens face economic hardship. Thus, in times of crisis, citizens are more likely to vote if they have a party that represents their position. I empirically test this argument by analyzing large-scale cross-national survey data from the Comparative Study of Electoral Systems (CSES). Findings bear important implications for the relationship between economic conditions and the functioning of modern democracies.
Highlights
One of the most intriguing questions in political science research is what makes citizens vote
There are two competing theoretical expectations: on the one hand, it can be expected that economic downturns make ideological congruence more prominent as a determinant of individual turnout but, on the other, it can be hypothesized that the relevance of congruence as a predictor of electoral participation decreases in case of economic turmoil
A graphical representation of these results provides a better understanding of the actual effect of the level of unemployment and congruence on electoral participation because the coefficients are significant but not of a large magnitude
Summary
One of the most intriguing questions in political science research is what makes citizens vote. Several scholars have dedicated their endeavors to study what drives citizens to participate in elections even when this action is very unlikely to be pivotal for the electoral results. While understanding what makes citizens more or less likely to vote has been widely studied by political scientists, it is still a controversial topic because experts do not agree on what factors drive turnout (Blais 2006; Smets and van Ham 2013; Cancela and Geys 2016; Frank and Martínezi Coma 2021). Scholars have offered different sets of explanations of what makes voters more likely to vote, but while some have just focused on the individual characteristics that make citizens more willing to vote (Smets and van Ham 2013), others have paid attention to the institutional settings in order to assess the differences in voter turnout (Frank and Martínezi Coma 2021). Most explanations of citizens’ turnout assume that individual characteristics
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