Party leaders and voter responses to political terrorism

Abstract

In this article, we study the political implications of terrorism rooted in extremist political ideologies. Our data uniquely allow studying the potential role of party leader evaluations on political outcomes, including voter turnout and vote choice. To strengthen causal identification, we combine an event-study framework with the fact that Norwegians were affected personally to differing degrees by the 22 July 2011 terror attack because of variation in the victims' municipalities of residence. Our main findings suggest that extreme right-wing terrorism influences party vote intentions and evaluations of political leaders strongly in the short run, as well as party choice in actual elections in the longer run. We document shifts within Norway's left-right political blocs rather than shifts between those blocs frequently observed following religious/separatist violence.

Investigating the Effects of Right-Wing Terrorism on Government Satisfaction: A Time Course Analysis of the 2019 Christchurch Terror Attack

“…23 Following the attack, Prime Minister (and leader of the centre-left Labour party) Jacinda Ardern's swift response drew national and international praise. 24 On the one hand, 20 Benny Geys and Øystein Hernaes, "Party leaders and voter responses to political terrorism", Public Choice (2020) 21 Ibid. 22 Stephen Reicher, Alex Haslam, and Jay Van Bavel, "The road to Christchurch: A tale of two leaderships", New Zealand Journal of Psychology, 48, (2019): 13-15 23 Henry Cooke and Stacey Kirk, "New Zealand officially on high terror alert, in wake of Christchurch terror attacks", Stuff, March 15, 2019, New Zealand officially on high terror alert, in wake of Christchurch terror attacks (accessed November 15, 2020) 24 Ishaan Tharoor, "New Zealand shooting: The world is praising Jacinda Ardern's response to terrorist attack", Independent, March 20, 2019, https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/australasia/new-zealand-shootingjacinda-ardern-video-reaction-world-praise-a8832186.html (accessed November 15,2020) Ardern quickly displayed compassion to the Muslim community in New Zealand by wearing a headscarf when interacting with the community, and by her use of inclusive language (e.g., "they are us").…”

“…Because data for the NZAVS is collected on a rolling basis annually (i.e., a large number of responses collected from week-to-week), the study is uniquely positioned to track levels of satisfaction with the government and party support in the days and weeks prior to, and following, the Christchurch terror attack. Accordingly, we employ the same regression discontinuity analyses as Geys and Hernaes, 27 but on a day-to-day (rather than week-to-week) level, focusing on more general attitudes (satisfaction with the government and party support), and in relation to a terror event that targeted a religious minority group.…”

“…", Kyklos 64, (2011): 396-409; Henning Finseraas and Ola Listhaug, "It can happen here: the impact of the Mumbai terror attacks on public opinion in Western Europe", Public Choice 156, (2013): 213-228; Jakaonsson and Blom, "Terror Attacks in Norway"; Silva, "2015 Paris Terrorist Attacks" 17 Fineraas, Jakonsson, and Kotsadam, "Murder of Theo van Gogh"; Jakaonsson and Blom, "Terror Attacks in Norway" 18 Finseraas and Listhaug, "Mumbai terror attacks" following the attack. 20 Moreover, this occurred despite a gradual downward trend in the ruling party vote intentions in the weeks before the attack, although a sharp downward trend also occurred after the attacks. Labour vote intentions nevertheless remained elevated from their pre-attack levels 20 weeks following the attack.…”

“…3 (2007) 669-687 4 Laia Balcells and Gerard Torrats-Espinosa, "Using a natural experiment to estimate the electoral consequences of terrorist attacks", Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 115, no. 42 government. 7 Most studies show terrorism drives increased support for conservative parties and/or attitudes, as these are often seen as more 'hardline' on and competent in managing terror.…”

Do political protests mobilize voters? Evidence from the Black Lives Matter protests

“…We further contribute to the vast literature on how voters react to dramatic external events. For example, terrorism has been found to affect voting, even though the violence was committed by independent actors without the support of political parties (Geys & Hernæs, 2020 ; Montalvo, 2011 ). The lootings and riots that accompanied some of the BLM protests provided conservative commentators with a powerful narrative contending that under a Democratic government, lootings and riots would be the norm.…”