Alexander C. Pacek

Macroeconomic Conditions and Electoral Politics in East Central Europe

While the economic voting literature is extensive, scholars have paid relatively little attention to the question of how or whether the economy affects voting behavior in nonWestern democracies. I address this issue by examining national elections in three recent East Central European democracies: Bulgaria, the former Czech and Slovak Federated Republic, and Poland. Using aggregate interregional data, the macroeconomic impact on turnout and voter choice is assessed in elections held from 1990 to 1992. I argue that the effect of economic adversity on turnout is withdrawal and that the effect on party choice is punishment for incumbents held responsible for economic reform and reward for both mainstream and extremist challengers. Implications for the study of elections and the future of electoral politics in East Central Europe are discussed.

Transitional winners and losers: Attitudes toward EU membership in post-communist countries

Joshua A. Tucker is Assistant Professor of Politics and International Affairs, PrincetonUniversity, 322 Bendheim Hall, Princeton, NJ 08544 (jtucker@princeton.edu).Alexander C. Pacek is Associate Professor of Political Science, Texas A&M University,College Station, Texas 77843 (e339ap@polisci.tamu.edu). Adam J. Berinsky is AssistantProfessor of Politics, Princeton University, 41 Corwin Hall, Princeton, NJ 08544(berinsky@princeton.edu).We thank Guy Whitten, Randy Stevenson, Christopher Anderson, Jan Leighley, andBenjamin Radcliff for useful comments and support and Sara De Master and JamesMcGhee for research assistance. We also wish to thank the anonymous reviewers fortheir helpful comments and suggestions. All data analysis was conducted using Stata 6.0and Clarify 1.3. A previous version of this article was presented at the 2001 Annual Con-ference of the Midwest Political Science Association. Authors’ names are listed in reversealphabetical order.

The Political Economy of Competitive Elections in the Developing World

Theory: Theories of economic voting are applied to competitive elections in the developing world. Hypotheses: The effect of the macroeconomy on electoral support for incumbent parties is mitigated by the impact of the economy on turnout and the relative sensitivity of voters to recession and growth. Method: Pooled time series data on aggregate electoral data for eight developing countries are analyzed using least squares with dummy variables (LSDV). Results: Economic decline imposes enormous electoral costs on governments, but economic growth provides no electoral benefits.

Economic Voting and the Welfare State: A Cross-National Analysis

We examine the question of economic voting in the major industrial democracies. Using pooled time series data for 17 nations from 1960 to 1987, we argue that the magnitude and nature of the relationship between economic conditions and the vote depends upon the level of welfare state development. We find that (a) in countries with low to moderate levels of welfare spending, the economy has a more dramatic effect on the vote when things are good than when things are bad, and (b) the economy plays less of a role in states with high levels of spending, regardless of the direction of economic change. The implications for voting behavior, democratic accountability, and welfare policy are discussed.

Disenchanted or Discerning: Voter Turnout in Post-Communist Countries

Voter turnout in post-communist countries has exhibited wildly fluctuating patterns against a backdrop of economic and political volatility. In this article, we consider three explanations for this variation: a “depressing disenchantment” hypothesis that predicts voters are less likely to vote in elections when political and economic conditions are worse; a “motivating disenchantment” hypothesis that predicts voters are more likely to vote in elections when conditions are worse; and a “stakes” based hypothesis that predicts voters are more likely to vote in more important elections. Using an original aggregate-level cross-national time-series data set of 137 presidential and parliamentary elections in 19 post-communist countries, we find much stronger empirical support for the stakes-based approach to explaining variation in voter turnout than we do for either of the disenchantment-based approaches. Our findings offer a theoretically integrated picture of voter participation in the post-communist world, and, more broadly, contribute new insights to the general literature on turnout.

Macroeconomic Conditions, Voter Turnout, and the Working-class/Economically Disadvantaged Party Vote in Developing Countries:

Working and lower status citizens are more sensitive to macroeconomic fluctuations than their better-off counterparts in the developing world, due to the higher personal stakes involved. This heightened sensitivity affects fluctuations in voter turnout and voter choice across developing democracies. Macroeconomic downturns result in increased voter participation as more lower status voters express their grievances at the polls. This benefits political parties and coalitions with expressly working- and lower-class appeals. This article describes the impact of shifts in voter turnout on party support, the impact of macroeconomic shifts on voter turnout, and the impact of macroeconomic shifts on support for parties that are working-class/economically disadvantaged oriented using regression analysis of aggregate pooled time-series data from 10 countries in Latin America, the Caribbean, Africa, and Asia. Although increased turnout primarily helps parties that are working-class/economically disadvantaged oriented, as is the case in the industrial world, the economic effect on party support is substantially greater.

Electoral Participation, Ideology, and Party Politics in Post-Communist Europe

The relationship between voter participation and party fortunes has received much attention in the voting behavior literature. Specifically, a number of studies on the advanced industrial democracies postulate that left-of-center parties benefit from higher turnout. This article extends that argument to a quite different context: the economically and politically volatile post-communist world. Using aggregate data from 15 post-communist countries between 1990 and 1999, we test the turnout-party vote linkage. We find that, indeed, increased turnout benefits left parties, particularly the successor communist parties, while adversely affecting conservative and nationalist parties.

Voter Participation and Party-Group Fortunes in European Parliament Elections, 1979-1999: A Cross-National Analysis

Scholars have addressed the relationship between voter participation and party electoral fortunes for some time. Specifically, a number of studies postulate that left-of-center parties are the primary beneficiaries of higher rates of voter turnout. This research note extends this argument to a classic “low turnout” environment: the elections to the European Parliament. Using data from 11 members of the European Union between 1979 and 1999, we test the turnout-party vote linkage through pooled cross-national time series analysis. We find that, indeed, increased turnout benefits the left party groups in the European Parliament. We conclude with some implications for this finding.

Economics and the Left Party Vote in Scandinavia: A Cross‐National Analysis

While the literature on economic voting is vast, relatively little is known about how the economy affects party vote shares in Scandinavia per se. This article argues that left of center parties rather than incumbent governments per se bear the brunt of economic judgments at the voting booth. In large part this is due to these parties’ preeminent role in establishing and maintaining the institutional welfare systems of these countries. We examine this hypothesis using pooled time-series data for Denmark, Finland, Norway, and Sweden from 1960 to 1991.

Organized Labor, Democracy, and Life Satisfaction A Cross-National Analysis

In this paper we attempt to assess how labor unions affect cross-national variation in life satisfaction. We argue that cross-national differences in the extent of labor organization play a significant role in determining why citizens in some nations express greater subjective satisfaction with life than others. We examine this proposition using data on nations that cover the political and economic spectrum. To anticipate our findings, we show that individual union membership has a consistent positive effect on individual well-being. Our main focus, though, is the effects of the national level of union density on the general, overall level of satisfaction within a country, considering both union members and nonmembers. We find that union density is strongly associated with the general level of well-being but that this effect is conditioned, as we expect, by the level of democracy: in democratic countries, union density produces greater levels of life satisfaction, while in highly authoritarian settings, it appears to reduce satisfaction. In each case, these effects obtain for members and nonmembers alike, thus highlighting the importance of labor unions for the general, overall level of quality of life across nations.