The mobilising effect of political choice

Hobolt, Sara ORCID: 0000-0002-9742-9502 and Hoerner, Julian (2020) The mobilising effect of political choice. European Journal of Political Research, 59 (2). 229 - 247. ISSN 0304-4130

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Abstract

Political choice is central to citizens’ participation in elections. Nonetheless, little is known about the individual-level mechanisms that link political choice and turnout. It is argued in this article that turnout decisions are shaped not only by the differences between the parties (party polarisation), but also by the closeness of parties to citizens’ own ideological position (congruence), and that congruence matters more in polarised systems where more is at stake. Analysing cross-national survey data from 80 elections, it is found that both polarisation and congruence have a mobilising effect, but that polarisation moderates the effect of congruence on turnout. To further explore the causal effect of political choice, the arrival of a new radical right-wing party in Germany, the Alternative for Germany (AfD), is leveraged and the findings show that the presence of the AfD had a mobilising effect, especially for citizens with congruent views.

Item Type:	Article
Official URL:	https://ejpr.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/journal/14756...
Additional Information:	© 2019 The Authors
Divisions:	Government
Subjects:	J Political Science > JA Political science (General) J Political Science > JF Political institutions (General)
Date Deposited:	29 Apr 2019 11:24
Last Modified:	29 Nov 2024 00:42
URI:	http://eprints.lse.ac.uk/id/eprint/100529

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