While officials involved in graft, bribery, extortion, nepotism, or patronage typically like keeping their deeds private, the fact that corruption can have serious effects in democracies is no secret. Numerous scholars have brought to light the impact of corruption on a range of economic and political outcomes. One outcome that has received less attention, however, is voter turnout. Do high levels of corruption push electorates to avoid the polls or to turn out in larger numbers? Though of great consequence to the corruption and voter-turnout literature, few scholars in either area have tackled this question and none has done so in a broad sample of democracies. This article engages in this endeavor through an analysis of the broadest possible sample of democratic states. Through instrumental variable regression we find that as corruption increases the percentage of voters who go to the polls decreases.

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alone, more than 130 articles were published in peerreviewed journals using turnout at the national, regional or local level as the dependent variable. This meta-analysis tries to synthesize the results of these studies. I find there is a strong consensus in the literature that turnout is higher under compulsory voting, if the election is important, and if it is held in a small country. I also find that the influence of most other predictor variables, including the type of electoral system, the number of parties, development, income inequalities and electoral closeness is inconclusive at best. These results hint at the fact that the determinants of turnout might be more complex than the current theory suggests and is rather more context dependent.

A whole array of studies has shown that the physical appearance of candidates running for elective office matters. However, it is unclear whether attractiveness or perceived competence is the source of such electoral advantage. In addition, the gender of candidates might interact with perceptions of physical appearance. With the help of Canadian student coders and through the use of a web-based survey, we measure the threefold link between physical attractiveness, perceived competence, and gender for all races in the 2008 U.S. House of Representatives elections. We find that both the attractiveness and perceived competence of candidates matter for candidates' electoral successes; the former having an important effect in intra-gender races and the latter in inter-gender races.

More information at: http://www.s3ri.soton.ac.uk/qmss Funded places for junior researchers in Europe to participate in three workshop/seminars on:. analysis of longitudinal data. analysis of cross-national cross-sectional data. measurement, data collection and data quality providing high-level training and interaction with senior researchers on latest developments in quantitative methods.

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Although many studies address the representation of women in parliament, few explore gender representation in Africa. Prior research on women's representation conducted in various areas of the world has emphasized the type of electoral system, quotas and the economic affluence of a country, as well as the state's political culture. In this evaluation these commonly used indicators are complemented by two factors that are not that frequently employed -a country's degree of democracy and its level of corruption. Besides quota provisions and the electoral system type of a country, both of these additional variables affect women's representation. Higher containment of corruption fosters higher percentages of women in parliament. In contrast, democratic states have fewer female members in parliament than non-democratic states.

In this article, we summarize the individual demand-level factors explaining the radical right-wing vote in European countries. To do so, we first review 46 quantitative peer-reviewed articles featuring the individual vote choice in favour of a radical right-wing party as the dependent variable. To identify relevant articles, we use Kai Arzheimer’s bibliography on the radical right and employ the following inclusion criterion: the articles must be written in English, they must use the individual vote for a radical right-wing party as the dependent variable, they must use a quantitative methodology and they must include some type of regression analysis. Using this strategy, we conduct a meta-analysis of 329 relevant models and find that over 20 individual variables are tested. Because many variables such as attitudes towards immigration, employment, age, education and gender only show moderate success rates in attempting to explain an individual’s propensity to vote for the radical right, we complement the review of quantitative studies with an analysis of 14 qualitative publications. The review of these qualitative works shows that the processes through which somebody becomes a voter, supporter or activist of the radical right are often more complex than the commonly used surveys can portray them. Frequently, feelings of relative economic deprivation and dissatisfaction with the political regime trigger an awakening that makes individuals seek engagement. However, the processes behind this awakening are complex and can only be partially captured by quantitative studies.