Why do citizens in democracies fail to punish political candidates who openly violate democratic standards at the ballot box? The bulk of existing research assumes that a common understanding of democracy underpins citizens’ evaluations of different candidates, resulting in a trade-off between undemocratic practices and partisan or economic considerations. We shed doubt on this assumption by showing that divergent understandings of democracy coexist among citizens and affect vote choice. We leverage a novel approach to estimate individual-level citizen commitment to democracy by means of a candidate choice conjoint experiment in Poland, a country experiencing democratic backsliding in a context of deep polarization. We find support for our claim that respondents with less clear-cut liberal democratic attitudes not only tolerate democratic violations more readily, but do so irrespective of a given candidate’s partisan affiliation. Thus, we contend that a lack of attitudinal consolidation around liberal democratic norms explains continued voter support for authoritarian-leaning leaders.
Many authoritarian political regimes hold multiparty elections in which the opposition often stands a chance to defeat the incumbent. How do ordinary citizens perceive the integrity of elections in such systems? We argue that government supporters follow the incumbent's narrative in considering elections fair and legitimate. In contrast, opposition supporters regard elections in such systems as biased and not meaningful. We provide evidence from cross-country public opinion data and the unexpected 2018 Turkish snap election announcement to examine long- and short-term patterns of perceived electoral integrity. We find that the partisan gap in perceived electoral integrity is more substantial under electoral authoritarianism than under democratic rule. In the short term, electoral events can boost incumbent supporters' confidence in the quality of elections. Our study yields implications for the dynamics between elites and citizens in authoritarian regimes in which elections remain the primary source of legitimacy.
Adequately financed branches contribute to the integration of regional interests into statewide parties. Yet, we have limited knowledge about the determinants of branches' varying income levels in federal contexts. To address this shortage, this article elucidates why branches receive donations from citizens and businesses to different degrees. I hypothesise that party competition at the state level, the difference in regional economic performance and parties' historical legacies can account for the level of branches' donation revenue. Analysing German statewide party branches' income from 2009 to 2017, this study finds support for the facilitating impact of state and federal electoral contests on donation levels. Regional economic disparities, by contrast, only marginally affect donation revenues. At the same time, parties' path-dependent developments help explain asymmetries in average revenue levels between western and eastern branches. The study's findings suggest that intense regional party competition contributes to branches' financial independence within the statewide party organisation.
The elections in three East German Länder in 2019 did not only result in significant changes in the proportional vote share but also in severe shifts in constituency results between directly elected deputies . Against this backdrop this article analyses the election results in Brandenburg, Saxony, and Thuringia since 1990 . It shows that most of the constituencies have become contested . Hence, concepts dealing with “safe” constituencies for one party can, particularly in an increasingly fragmented party system, no longer explain election outcomes . Instead, the relevance of candidates for their respective electoral performances is taken into account . Overall, our results clearly suggest an incumbency factor .
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