Towards a two-party system? The Swedish parliamentary election of September 2006

Aylott, Nicholas; Bolin, Niklas

doi:10.1080/01402380701276477

Cited by 64 publications

(22 citation statements)

References 3 publications

(1 reference statement)

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“…A more specific example is the Swedish Moderate Party. The party's disagreement scores were consistently low between 1982 and 2002 (e.g., 0.23, 0.21, and 0.21 for the 1994, 1998, and 2002 elections, respectively), but the disagreement score jumped from 0.21 to 0.3 in 2006 when the new leader Fredrick Reinfeldt decided to appeal to centrist voters with a U‐turn in the party's economic policy while keeping a right‐wing stance on the party's energy policy in favor of continued support for nuclear power (Aylott and Bolin )…”

Section: Empirical Analysismentioning

confidence: 99%

Everything to Everyone: The Electoral Consequences of the Broad‐Appeal Strategy in Europe

Somer‐Topcu

2014

American J Political Sci

173

146

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Parties often tailor their campaign message differently to different groups of voters with the goal of appealing to a broader electorate with diverse preferences and thereby winning their votes. I argue that the strategy helps a party win votes if it can convince diverse groups of voters that the party is ideologically closer to their preferred positions. Using election data from nine Western European democracies, I first show that parties gain votes when they appeal broadly. Analysis of individual-level survey data suggests that voters perceive broadly appealing parties as ideologically closer to their own positions, a finding that identifies a plausible mechanism behind the aggregate positive effect of this strategy on party election performance. These findings not only help explain the behavior of some European parties, but they may also offer a potential recipe for electoral success in multiparty democracies. P olitical pundits, commentators, and scholars alike expect clarity and consistency from political parties, especially in multiparty systems. While Downs (1957, 136) argues that parties in a two-party system should disguise their positions "in a fog of ambiguity" to increase the size of their constituency, he argues that parties in multiparty systems should distinguish themselves ideologically from each other and take clear and differentiated positions to win (126-27).Taking clear, consistent, and differentiated positions also has important implications for many normative conceptions of representation and is often thought to be critical for the effective functioning of a representative democracy (Berelson 1952;Dahlberg 2009). When parties do not clearly articulate their positions, or appear consistent and to the point, voters arguably have a much harder task when attempting to identify the party that would best represent their interests in office. The failure to take clear and consistent positions during campaigns Zeynep Somer-Topcu is Assistant Professor,

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Section: Empirical Analysismentioning

confidence: 99%

Everything to Everyone: The Electoral Consequences of the Broad‐Appeal Strategy in Europe

Somer‐Topcu

2014

American J Political Sci

173

146

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“…In contrast to previous elections, immigration and integration issues were not as prominent in the 2006 election. Although immigration, and especially integration, figured frequently in the public debate, these issues were somewhat overshadowed by the unexpected agreement between the centre-right alliance ('Alliance for Sweden') on a number of policies (growth, education, foreign policy, the welfare state, the labour market and justice) thus making them a serious competitor for being in government (Aylott and Bolin, 2007). Furthermore, the Conservatives had learned from the 1998 election and adjusted their rhetoric to once again frame integration in a general and ideology compatible language.…”

Section: The 1990s: Going Different Ways?mentioning

confidence: 99%

Going different ways? Right-wing parties and the immigrant issue in Denmark and Sweden

Green‐Pedersen¹,

Odmalm²

2008

Journal of European Public Policy

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This article analyses centre-right parties' attitudes and positions on immigration and integration in Denmark and Sweden. Despite being socioeconomically and culturally similar, there are also some significant political and structural differences which help to explain why immigration has played a much more prominent role in Danish politics compared to Swedish politics. The article argues that this can be explained with reference to, on the one hand, the stability of bloc party politics and, on the other, the extent to which centre-right parties have exploited 'the immigration issue' as a profiling tool. The findings suggest that even though Denmark has adopted a much tougher stance on immigration and integration compared to Sweden, the political climate in the latter has also undergone a number of changes in the past decade which has allowed for centre-right and radical right parties to use immigration to challenge the prevailing cross-party consensus on the issue by suggesting a more market oriented integration policy.

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“…The Swedish party system can be divided into two blocs: a centre‐left, ‘red‐green’ bloc, containing the Social Democrats, the Green Party and the Left Party; and a centre‐right, ‘bourgeois’ bloc, containing the Moderate Party, the Liberals, the Centre Party and the Christian Democrats (Aylott & Bolin ). Data for the ‘balance of power’ variable was originally collected by Wångmar () and Loxbo ().…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

Do Anti‐immigration Parties Matter? The Case of the Sweden Democrats and Local Refugee Policy

2014

Self Cite

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With the increased electoral success of anti‐immigration parties, questions regarding what impact the parties actually have naturally follow. Previous research has rarely explored this question. Furthermore, within this body of research, one is given different answers. While some argue that anti‐immigration parties have made an impact on public policy, others find no such evidence. This article shows that some of this inconsistency is a consequence of the methodological strategies that have been employed. Previous studies are either single case studies or comparisons of a small number of countries. Consequently, different parties in different institutional settings are compared, making it difficult to estimate the actual impact of the party of interest. In order to circumvent such methodological problems, this article explores the question of anti‐immigration party impact on a local level and asks if the Sweden Democrats (SD) have managed to influence decisions on refugee reception in Swedish municipalities. The analysis shows mixed results. First, while unable to find an independent effect of the size of the representation of the SD, it appears that the party's impact is conditioned by them holding the balance of power. Second, the SD's impact is not dependent upon whether there is right‐wing or left‐wing rule, although local migration policy is stricter when the main right‐wing party has strong support.

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Towards a two-party system? The Swedish parliamentary election of September 2006

Cited by 64 publications

References 3 publications

Everything to Everyone: The Electoral Consequences of the Broad‐Appeal Strategy in Europe

Everything to Everyone: The Electoral Consequences of the Broad‐Appeal Strategy in Europe

Going different ways? Right-wing parties and the immigrant issue in Denmark and Sweden

Do Anti‐immigration Parties Matter? The Case of the Sweden Democrats and Local Refugee Policy

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