Protest Voting and Abstention Under Plurality Rule Elections

Abstract

Voting decisions are influenced by electoral systems, particularly when voters are dissatisfied. Plurality rule electoral systems tend to restrict the number of effective parties. As a consequence, people may often vote for a party not because of its attraction but because of a lack of a genuinely preferred alternative - to wit, protest voting. Similarly people will often confront specific choices between abstaining and an unsatisfactory vote in plurality-rule electoral systems. The purpose of this article is to explore the logic of protest voting and abstaining by employing a public choice approach. Adapting Hirshman's approach for voting behaviour, this article focuses on the variable `quality' provided by political parties, i.e. the quality-satisficing approach. This approach allows us to frame a comprehensive explanation of the choices between protest voting and abstention, which in existing often seem discrete or unrelated.