It All Happens at Once: Understanding Electoral Behaviour in Second-Order Elections

Alberto Sanz,Eftichia Teperoglou,Daniela Braun,Hermann Schmitt

doi:10.17645/pag.v8i1.2513

Abstract

The second-order election (SOE) model as originally formulated by Reif and Schmitt (1980) suggests that, relative to the preceding first-order election result, turnout is lower in SOEs, government and big parties lose, and small and ideologically extreme parties win. These regularities are not static but dynamic and related to the first-order electoral cycle. These predictions of the SOE model have often been tested using aggregate data. The fact that they are based on individual-level hypotheses has received less attention. The main aim of this article is to restate the micro-level hypotheses for the SOE model and run a rigorous test for the 2004 and 2014 European elections. Using data from the European Election Studies voter surveys, our analysis reveals signs of sincere, but also strategic abstentions in European Parliament elections. Both strategic and sincere motivations are also leading to SOE defection. It all happens at once.

Highlights

We provide a micro-model of inter-election voting patterns and study the most relevant of them— abstaining and defecting in second-order election (SOE)—at the occasion of the 2004 and 2014 European Parliament (EP) elections
Less attention has been given to the micro-foundations of the SOE model, that is, the hypotheses about the motivations and intentions of individual voters that drive their behaviour in a SOE—relative to what they have done in the preceding first-order elections (FOEs)
We summarise the hypotheses underlying the SOE model and subject them to a rigorous empirical examination using the data from the EES 2004 and 2014 post-electoral voter surveys

Summary

Introduction

Standing on the shoulder of giants, the second-order election (SOE) model was proposed by Reif and Schmitt (1980) in an effort to understand voter motivations and electoral outcomes in the first direct election of the European Parliament (EP) in 1979. Reif and Schmitt (1980) identified this supranational election as another case of a ‘low stimulus election.’ The roots of this stream of research go back to the US electoral context and here in particular to efforts to explain the typical losses of the Politics and Governance, 2020, Volume 8, Issue 1, Pages 6–18 presidential party in midterm elections (Campbell, 1966; Campbell, Converse, Miller, & Stokes, 1960). Among them are midterm elections in Latin America (see among others, Erikson & Filippov, 2001; Remmer & Gélineau, 2003; Thorlakson, 2015) and all sorts of subnational elections—such as state elections in Germany (Dinkel, 1977, 1978) or provincial elections in Canada (Erikson & Filippov, 2001) In their effort to understand EP election outcomes and their difference to national first-order elections (FOEs) and over time, Reif and Schmitt (1980, 9–15) propose altogether six dimensions of variability. Most important here is that (6) government parties’ losses are greater the closer a SOE is located around the midterm of the first-order electoral cycle (Reif, 1984, 1997; Reif & Schmitt, 1980; but see Stimson, 1976)

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Conclusion