Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-jkksz Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-22T17:56:36.590Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Revamping the menu – or just offering what’s in stock? Candidate list volatility in open-list PR systems. Evidence from Finland

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  12 July 2021

Vesa Koskimaa Open the ORCID record for Vesa Koskimaa [Opens in a new window] ,
Mikko Mattila Open the ORCID record for Mikko Mattila [Opens in a new window] ,
Achillefs Papageorgiou Open the ORCID record for Achillefs Papageorgiou [Opens in a new window]  and
Åsa von Schoultz
Vesa Koskimaa*
Affiliation:
Faculty of Management and Business, Tampere, Finland
Mikko Mattila
Affiliation:
Faculty of Social Sciences, University of Helsinki, Helsinki, Finland
Achillefs Papageorgiou
Affiliation:
Faculty of Social Sciences, University of Helsinki, Helsinki, Finland
Åsa von Schoultz
Affiliation:
Faculty of Social Sciences, University of Helsinki, Helsinki, Finland
*
*E-mail: [email protected]
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Why do parties change candidate lists between elections? Although candidate list volatility is an important indicator of the responsiveness of electoral representation, it has received little attention in research. We offer a critical case study of party list volatility in Finland, using a candidate-centred open-list proportional (PR) electoral system with ideal conditions for ‘ultra-strategic’ party behaviour. Our explorative two-stage research design begins with party elite interviews, to extract factors that can affect list volatility, which in the following step are tested in a regression analysis of 564 party lists in parliamentary elections 1983–2019. Our results show that list formation is a complex phenomenon, where demand and supply factors interact in a contingent fashion. Following trends of voter dealignment, personalization and ‘electoral-professionalization’ of parties, volatility has increased over time. Electoral defeats and declining party membership increase volatility, but a member-driven mass-party heritage that limits party elites’ strategic capacity has a stabilizing effect.

Keywords

party organizationcandidate selectionpartisan dealignmentparty change
Type
Research Article
Information
European Political Science Review , Volume 13 , Issue 4 , November 2021 , pp. 449 - 466
Copyright
© The Author(s), 2021. Published by Cambridge University Press on behalf of European Consortium for Political Research

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Arter, D. (2013), ‘The ‘Hows’, not the ‘Whys’ or the ‘Wherefores’: the role of intra-party competition in the 2011 breakthrough of the True Finns’, Scandinavian Political Studies 36(2): 99–120.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Arter, D. (2014), ‘Clowns, ‘Alluring Ducks’ and ‘Miss Finland 2009’: the value of ‘celebrity candidates’ in an open-list PR voting system’, Representation 50(4): 453–470.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bergman, M.E., Shugart, M.S. and Watt, K.A. (2013), ‘Patterns of intraparty competition in open-lists & SNTV systems’, Electoral Studies 32: 321–333.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Biezen, I van and Poguntke, T. (2014), ‘The decline of membership-based politics’, Party Politics 20(2): 205–216.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bille, L. (2001), ‘Democratizing a democratic procedure: myth or reality? Candidate selection in Western European Parties, 1960-1990’, Party Politics 7(3): 363–380.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cain, B., Ferejohn, J. and Fiorina, M. (1987), The Personal Vote: Constituency Service and Electoral Independence, Cambridge: Harvard University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Carey, J.M. and Shugart, M.S. (1995), ‘Incentives to cultivate a personal vote’, Electoral Studies 14(4): 417–439.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cross, W., Kenig, O., Pruysers, S. and Rahat, G. (2016), The Promise and Challenge of Party Primary Elections: A Comparative Perspective, Montreal: McGill & Queen’s University Press.Google Scholar
Dahlgaard, J.O. (2016), ‘You just made it: individual incumbency advantage under proportional representation’, Electoral Studies 44: 319–328.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Dalton, R. and Wattenberg, M. (eds) (2000), Parties Without Partisans: Political Change in Advanced Industrial Democracies, New York: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Dassonneville, R. (2018), ‘Electoral volatility and parties’ ideological responsiveness’, European Journal of Political Research 57(4): 808–828.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Dettman, S., Pepinsky, T. and Pierskalla, J. (2017), ‘Incumbency advantage and candidate characteristics in open-list proportional representation systems: evidence from Indonesia’, Electoral Studies 48: 111–120.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Drummond, A. (2006), ‘Electoral volatility and party decline in western democracies: 1970–1995’. Political studies 54(3): 628–647.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Duverger, M. (1967), Political Parties. Their Organization and Activity in Modern State, London: Methuen.Google Scholar
Ecevit, Y.A. and Kocapınar, G. (2018), ‘Do party lists matter? Political party strategies in legislative candidate nominations’, Parliamentary Affairs 71(3): 697–716.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Evans, J. (2002), ‘In defence of Sartori’, Party Politics 8(2): 155–174.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Galasso, V. and Nannicini, T. (2015), ‘So closed: Political selection in proportional systems’, European Journal of Political Economy 40: 260–273.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gallagher, M. (1988), ‘Introduction’, in Gallagher, M. and Marsh, M. (eds), Candidate Selection in Comparative Perspective: the Secret Garden of Politics, London: Sage, pp. 1–19.Google Scholar
Golden, M.A. and Picci, L. (2015), ‘Incumbency effects under proportional representation: leaders and backbenchers in the Postwar Italian Chamber of Deputies’, Legislative Studies Quarterly 40: 509–538.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hazan, R. and Rahat, G. (2010), Democracy Within Parties. Candidate Selection Methods and Their Political Consequences, Oxford: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Helander, V. (1997), ‘Finland’, in Norris, P. (ed.), Passages to Power: Legislative Recruitment in Advanced Democracies, New York: Cambridge University Press, pp. 56–75.Google Scholar
Isotalo, V., Mattila, M. and von Schoultz, Å. (2020), ‘Ideological mavericks or party herd? The effect of candidates’ ideological positions on intra-party success’, Electoral Studies 36: 1–12.Google Scholar
Karvonen, L. (2010), The Personalisation of Politics. A study of Parliamentary Democracies, Colchester: ECPR Press.Google Scholar
Katz, R. and Mair, P. (1995), ‘Changing models of party organization and party democracy: the emergence of the Cartel Party’, Party Politics 1(5): 5–28.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Katz, R. and Mair, P. (2002), ‘The ascendancy of the party in public office: party organizational change in 20th century democracies’, in R. Gunther, J.R. Montero and J.J. Linz (eds), Political Parties: Old Concepts and New Challenges, Oxford: Oxford University Press, pp. 113–135.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Katz, R. and Mair, P. (2018), Democracy and the Cartelization of Political Parties, Oxford: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Koskimaa, V. (2016), Towards leadership democracy: the changing balance of power in three Finnish parties, 1983-2012. PhD thesis. Tampere: University of Tampere.Google Scholar
Koskimaa, V. (2020), ‘The “genetic” effect: can parties’ past organizational choices condition the development of their internal distribution of power in the cartel party era? Evidence from Finland, 1983–2017’, Politics 40: 3.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lees-Marshment, J. (ed.) (2012), Routledge Handbook of Political Marketing, Routledge: Abingdom.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
McAllister, I. (2007), ‘The personalisation of politics’, in Dalton and Klingemann (eds), The Oxford Handbook of Political Behavior, Oxford: Oxford University Press, pp. 571–588.Google Scholar
Mickelsson, R. (2007), Suomen Puolueet. Historia, Muutos ja Nykypäivä, Tampere: Vastapaino.Google Scholar
Moral, M., Ozen, H.E. and Tokdemir, E. (2015), ‘Bringing the incumbency advantage into question for proportional representation’, Electoral Studies 40: 56–65.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Norris, P. and Lovenduski, J. (1993), ‘“If only more candidates came forward”: supply-side explanations of candidate selection in Britain’, British Journal of Political Science 23(3): 373–408.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Norris, P. and Lovenduski, J. (1995), Political Recruitment: Gender, Race and Class in the British Parliament, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Paloheimo, H. and Raunio, T. (2008), ‘Puolueiden rooli ja tehtävät demokratiassa’, in H. Paloheimo and T. Raunio (eds), Suomen puolueet ja puoluejärjestelmä, Helsinki: WSOY, pp. 11–25.Google Scholar
Panebianco, A. (1988), Political Parties: Organization and Power, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Passarelli, G. (2015), ‘The Presidentialization of parties: why, when, where’, in G. Passarelli (ed.), The Presidentialization of Political Parties. Organizations, Institutions and Leaders, Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan. 235–263.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Passarelli, G. (2020), Preferential Voting Systems. Influence on Intra-Party Competition and Voting Behaviour, Cham: Palgrave Macmillan.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Poguntke, T. and Webb, P. (eds) (2005), The Presidentialization of Politics, A Comparative Study of Modern Democracies, Oxford: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Put, G.-J. and Maddens, B. (2013), ‘The selection of candidates for eligible positions on PR lists: the Belgian/Flemish Federal Elections 1999–2010’, Journal of Elections, Public Opinion and Parties 23(1): 49–65.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Rahat, G. (2013), ‘What is democratic candidate selection?’ in W. Cross and R. Richard (eds), The Challenges of Intra-Party Democracy, Oxford: Oxford University Press, pp. 136–149.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Rahat, G., Hazan, R. and Katz, R. (2008), ‘Democracy and political parties. On the uneasy relationships between participation, competition and representation’, Party Politics 14(6): 663–683.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Rehmert, J. (2020), ‘Party elites’ preferences in candidates: evidence from a conjoint experiment’, Political Behavior.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Renwick, A. and Pilet, J.-B. (2016), Faces on the Ballot. The Personalization of Electoral Systems in Europe, Oxford: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sandri, G. and Seddone, A. (2015), ‘Introduction: primary elections across the world’, in Sandri, G., Seddone, A. and Venturino, F. (eds), Party Primaries in Comparative Perspective, London: Routledge, pp. 1–20.Google Scholar
Sartori, G. (1976), Parties and Party Systems: A Framework for Analysis, Vol. 1, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Scarrow, S. (2015), Beyond Party Members: Changing Approaches to Partisan Mobilization, Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
von Schoultz, Å. (2018), ‘Electoral systems in context Finland’, in Herron, E., Pekkanen, R. and Shugart, M.S. (eds), Oxford Handbook of Electoral Systems, Oxford: Oxford University Press, pp. 601–626.Google Scholar
von Schoultz, Å. and Papageorgiou, A. (2019), ‘Policy or person? The electoral value of policy positions and personal attributes in the Finnish open-list system’, Party Politics.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Shugart, M.S. (2005), ‘Comparative electoral system research’, in M. Gallagher and P. Mitchell (eds), The Politics of Electoral Systems, Oxford: Oxford University Press, pp. 25–56.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Shugart, M.S. and Taagepera, R. (2017), Votes from Seats. Logical Models of Electoral Systems, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Shugart, M.S., Valdini, M.E. and Suominen, K. (2005), ‘Looking for locals: voter information demands and personal vote-earning attributes of legislators under proportional representation’, American Journal of Political Science 49(2): 437–449.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Strøm, K. (1990), ‘A behavioral theory of competitive political parties’, American Journal of Political Science 34(2): 565–598.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sundberg, J. (1997), ‘Compulsory party democracy: Finland as a deviant case in Scandinavia’, Party Politics 3(1): 97–117.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
van Biezen, I, Mair, P. and Poguntke, T. (2012), ‘Going, going, … gone? The decline of party membership in contemporary Europe’, European Journal of Political Research 51(1): 24–56.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
V-dem (14 December 2018), Autocratization in Hungary and Turkey. V-dem: V-Dem: Global Standards, Local Knowledge. https://www.v-dem.net/en/news/autocratization-hungary-and-turkey/ 23.6.2021.Google Scholar
Supplementary material: File

Koskimaa et al. supplementary material

Koskimaa et al. supplementary material

Download Koskimaa et al. supplementary material(File)
File 215.4 KB