2022
DOI: 10.1177/00104140221089652
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Varieties of Ambiguity: How do Voters Evaluate Ambiguous Policy Statements?

Abstract: Scholars voice increasing interest in strategic ambiguity—a strategy whereby parties intentionally conceal their positions on divisive issues. Scholars contend that strategic ambiguity can help European parties broaden their electoral appeals. Although they identify several tactics and styles of position-blurring, the observational literature has yet failed to capture different variants of ambiguous rhetoric, let alone evaluate their effect on the vote. In this article, I rely on cross-country survey experimen… Show more

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Cited by 10 publications
(4 citation statements)
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“…Second, work that investigates the distinct consequences of the various dimensions of ambiguity is an obvious area where more research is needed. Nasr's (2022) work has taken important steps to improve our understanding, comparing how inconsistency and vagueness have distinct effects on voter preferences. Yet, as he points out, we need to study whether various manifestations of ambiguity work similarly across different issues.…”
Section: Discussionmentioning
confidence: 99%
“…Second, work that investigates the distinct consequences of the various dimensions of ambiguity is an obvious area where more research is needed. Nasr's (2022) work has taken important steps to improve our understanding, comparing how inconsistency and vagueness have distinct effects on voter preferences. Yet, as he points out, we need to study whether various manifestations of ambiguity work similarly across different issues.…”
Section: Discussionmentioning
confidence: 99%
“…Frequent U-turns, on the other hand, may confuse the public because it complicates reconciling parties' current promises with their previous ideological positions. In addition, radical changes can damage the party's public image by portraying it as overly opportunistic or incompetent (Andreottola, 2021;Nasr, 2022).…”
Section: Rewarding Versus Punishing Policy U-turnsmentioning
confidence: 99%
“…Previous research has extensively investigated the causes and motivations for repositioning (Abou-Chadi, 2016;Adams et al, 2006;Adams & Somer-Topcu, 2009;Budge, 1994;Janda et al, 1995;Schumacher et al, 2013), but -strikingly-the repercussions of such changes have received far less attention (Adams, 2012). Existing research overall suggests that voters dislike candidates and parties who change course (Doherty et al, 2016;Nasr, 2022;Robison, 2017;Tomz & Van Houweling, 2012). However, change might become necessary in some situations, for example in the event of a large-scale crisis that threatens the society at large or with the ar-rival of new policy-relevant information, expert advice, or scientific evidence.…”
Section: Introductionmentioning
confidence: 99%
“…(1) Being disunited in the sense of sending ambiguous, tailored, or even inconsistent messages can be electorally advantageous (e.g., Downs, 1957;Page, 1976;Tomz and Van Houweling, 2008;Rovny, 2012;Somer-Topcu, 2015;Lo et al, 2016;Bräuninger and Giger, 2018), particularly if parties are not too obvious in catering simultaneously to different audiences (Sjöblom, 1968: 86;cf. Snyder and Ting, 2002;Martin, 2019;Tromborg, 2021) or engaging in outright flip-flopping (Nasr, 2023;Nyhuis and Stoetzer, 2021). The phenomenon of party leaders deliberately staging or highlighting intra-party heterogeneity to simultaneously appeal to different electoral constituencies is known as the broad-appeal strategy (Somer-Topcu, 2015).…”
Section: What Is Intra-party Conflict?mentioning
confidence: 99%