Measuring Centre–Periphery Preferences: The Regional Manifestos Project

Abstract

We propose a methodology for measuring political parties' centre–periphery preferences and positions. The proposal is based on an extension of the Manifesto Project's methodology that allows us to analyse manifestos in multi-level settings (i.e. manifestos written for sub- and supra-state electoral arenas). This adaptation requires extending the Manifesto classification scheme to include territorial preferences together with policy preferences specific to each electoral level. It has two major objectives: on the one hand, it allows us to apply content analysis to manifestos written for all possible electoral levels; on the other, it measures parties' centre–periphery preferences beyond the widely used and uninformative categories of ‘centralization/decentralization’ and ‘nationalism’. We have applied our methodology to Spanish state-level and regional-level manifestos between 2009 and 2012 with encouraging results

Parties’ electoral strategies in a two-dimensional political space

“…The RMP categories of the territorial and the economic dimensions Territorial dimension (based on Alonso et al, 2013) Economic dimension (based on Laver and Budge, 1992) General statements in favour of decentralization at the regional level on the strategic behaviour of political parties in decentralized states and the quality of political representation at the regional level. She has published in journals such as Regional and Federal Studies, Comparative European Politics and South European Society and Politics.…”

Ethnic and Regionalist Parties in Western Europe: A Party Family?

“…I also note that a number of datasets focusing mainly on ethnic and/or regionalist actors have been developed in recent years. Of these datasets, the Regional Manifestos Project by Alonso et al (2013) and the expert survey by Szöcsik and Zuber (2015) are probably the most promising. The main limitation of the Regional Manifestos Project is that it covers only British and Spanish parties.…”

El elector federalista catalán como solución (parcial) al reto independentista

“…Así, las percepciones instrumentales actuarían como un atajo informativo (heurístico) que se vería influenciado por el contexto que les rodea. Si atendemos al marco teórico del cleavage centro-periferia y a su dimensión institucional en España, los partidos políticos nacionalistas tendrían la capacidad de crear temas que orientan las opiniones de los ciudadanos en el territorio subnacional (Alonso et. al, 2013;Barrio y Rodríguez-Teruel, 2016).…”