Dandoy R., « Party Manifesto Strategies in Simultaneous Elections » (ST 6)

Régis Dandoy, (Facultad Latinoamericana de Ciencias Sociales, Ecuador)

Recent comparative and empirical analyses criticized the second-order election model and highlighted some of its shortcomings and weaknesses. In addition, its poor applicability in the Belgian case (mainly concerning national and regional elections) has been demonstrated. One of these reasons is the fact that elections from different policy levels are often organised simultaneously. In recent history (1994-2014), the electoral calendar in Belgium displayed different combinations of simultaneous elections at three different levels, gathering regional, national and/or European elections. Yet, few alternatives to the second-order election model based on the demand-side explanations (i.e. the observation of aggregated voting patterns) have been suggested. This paper analyses relationships between elections across levels of government from the supply-side, i.e. from the party perspective, and focuses on the characteristics of the manifestos drafted by those parties. Manifestos released at the occasion of simultaneous elections reveal different strategies : different documents for each policy level, joint manifesto with separate sections, integrated and coherent manifesto, etc. Based on the empirical analysis of all party manifestos drafted for the regional, national and European elections in Belgium (1994-2004), this paper observes a set of indicators that allow understanding party strategies and identifying the first-orderness of manifestos in the case of simultaneous elections.

Section thématique 6 : Le vote différentié multi-niveau
Session unique, vendredi 11 avril 2014, 13h30-16h00