Article (Scientific journals)
Inequality in Party-voter Opinion Congruence: A Matter of Choices Made or Choices Given?
Lesschaeve, Christophe
2017In Representation, 53 (2), p. 153-166
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Keywords :
congruence; inequality; correct voting
Abstract :
[en] Studies on the agreement, or congruence, between voters and parties have often found more congruence between higher educated voters and the parties for which they vote than between lower educated voters and their party selections. The literature offers two explanations for this finding. The first argues that lower educated voters vote ‘incorrectly’, selecting less congruent parties at the ballot box, despite the presence of a better alternative. The second posits that they lack policy offers for which to vote. This paper seeks to detangle these two explanations. Based on a dataset containing the positions of Belgian voters and parties on 23 policy statements, we find that inequality in opinion congruence is primarily the result of incorrect voting by lower educated voters. However, given Belgium’s political system—which increase the likelihood of policy offers attuned to lower educated voters, the education bias in parties’ policy offers is surprisingly high.
Disciplines :
Political science, public administration & international relations
Author, co-author :
Lesschaeve, Christophe ;  University of Luxembourg > Faculty of Language and Literature, Humanities, Arts and Education (FLSHASE) > Identités, Politiques, Sociétés, Espaces (IPSE)
External co-authors :
no
Language :
English
Title :
Inequality in Party-voter Opinion Congruence: A Matter of Choices Made or Choices Given?
Publication date :
2017
Journal title :
Representation
ISSN :
1749-4001
Publisher :
Routledge
Volume :
53
Issue :
2
Pages :
153-166
Peer reviewed :
Peer Reviewed verified by ORBi
Available on ORBilu :
since 09 November 2017

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