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Random Walk or Planned Excursion? Continuity and Change in the Left–Right Positions of Political Parties

Russell J. Dalton and Ian McAllisterView all authors and affiliations

Volume 48, Issue 6

https://doi.org/10.1177/0010414014558257

Abstract
Appendices
References
Biographies

Abstract

Implicit in theories of democratic elections is the idea of change—or at least the potential for change. Elections provide the opportunity for citizens to change their party preferences and thus alter the course of government. In addition, political parties can change their programmatic positions to attract new voters. Our research asks how much parties change their Left–Right positions between elections and what this tells us about parties’ strategic choices. We utilize data from the Comparative Study of Electoral Systems project and the Chapel Hill Expert Surveys. We demonstrate very high stability in parties’ Left–Right position over time. Furthermore, we find only modest evidence that parties change their Left–Right position in a conscious process of vote seeking.

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Appendices

Appendix Nations and Elections in the Database

Country	Pre-survey election₀	Election survey₁	Election survey₂	Election survey₃	Election survey₄
Australia*	1993	1996	1998	2001	2004
Canada	2006	2008	2011
Czech Republic*	1998	2002	2006	2010
Denmark	1994	1998	2001	2005	2007
Finland	1999	2003	2007	2011
France	1997	2002	2007	2012
Germany	1994	1998	2002	2005	2009
Hungary	1994	1998	2002
Iceland	1995	1999	2003	2007	2009
Ireland	1997	2002	2007	2011
Israel	1999	2003	2006
Japan	1993	1996	2000
Korea	1996	2000	2004	2008
Mexico	1997	2000	2003	2006	2009
Netherlands	1994	1998	2002	2006	2010
New Zealand	1993	1996	1999	2002	2008
Norway	1993	1997	2001	2005	2009
Poland	1993	1997	2001	2005	2007
Portugal	1999	2002	2005	2009
Romania*	2000	2004	2008	2009
Slovenia	1992	1996	2000	2004	2008
Spain	1993	1996	2000	2004	2008
Sweden	1994	1998	2002	2006
Switzerland	1995	1999	2003	2007
Taiwan	1998	2001	2004	2008
United Kingdom*	1992	1997	2001	2005	2010
United States	2000	2004	2008	2012

Nations with asterisk denote additions to CSES data from national election studies. CSES = Comparative Study of Electoral Systems.

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Biographies

Russell J. Dalton is professor of political science at University of California, Irvine, and was a founding director of the Centre for the Study of Democracy at UC Irvine. His research focuses on the role of citizens in the political process, and how democracies can better address public preferences and the democratic ideal. He has authored or edited more than 20 books and more than a 150 research articles.

Ian McAllister is distinguished professor of political science at Australian National University. His research covers comparative political behavior, postcommunist politics and Northern Ireland and Australian politics. He has been director of the Australian Election Study survey since 1987.

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