Laura B. Stephenson

Can Canadians Take a Hint? The (In)Effectiveness of Party Labels as Information Shortcuts in Canada

This paper represents a first look at the usefulness of Canadian political parties as information shortcuts. We present results from a student experiment that tested whether knowing a party’s position on an issue influenced opinion formation. We find that, contrary to the findings in other countries, Canadian political parties are not consistently useful as information cues. The Liberal Party cue is hardly useful, and the Conservative Party cue can be effective, but appears to push partisans toward a more liberal stance on selected opinions. Only the NDP cue appears to fulfill the cue-providing role that the literature expects. Acknowledgements. We would like to thank the IGA Junior Faculty Research Program at UC Davis for providing funding for the project, and Anna Esselment and Josh Morgan for research assistance. Studies of Canadian politics have begun to acknowledge a significant trend toward lower political information levels in Canada (Gidengil et al. 2004, Howe 2003, Fournier 2002). If this is so, how are Canadians determining their political preferences? In common conceptions of democratic governance, citizens elect representatives who reflect their policy preferences (e.g., Ranney 1962). Yet for electoral mandates to be meaningful, citizens must first have opinions on relevant political issues, which requires that the citizens have information. How can citizens overcome this deficiency? Or do they? Of the many suggestions that have been put forward (see Gidengil et al. 2004, ch. 4 for a review), the possibility of using party labels as information shortcuts has yet to be evaluated. It is possible that Canadians could use party labels, and the ideological information they contain, as cues to develop their own opinions. This idea was promoted by Downs (1957) and has found significant support in the American context (Popkin 1994). Party labels are purportedly one of the most useful heuristic aids because they are very accessible and “travel so well” across different decision domains (Huckfeldt et al. 1999). In the United States, party labels help individuals to predict the issue positions of political candidates, determine and organize their own issue positions, and “correctly” select political leaders without possessing “encyclopedic” levels of information (e.g., Downs 1957; Huckfeldt et al. 1999; Lau and Redlawsk 2001; Lodge and Hamill 1986; Popkin 1994; Sniderman, Brody, and Tetlock 1991). In the Canadian context, Jenson (1976) suggested that partisan identification should be viewed through the lens of party labels as voting shortcuts, but despite musings about the possibility of such an information shortcut being utilized by voters (see Gidengil et al. 2004), there has yet to be a systematic investigation of its effectiveness. This paper addresses this gap in the literature, using data collected from an experimental study implemented in the spring of 2004 that sought to understand if and how party labels (Liberal, Conservative, NDP) are used as political cues across a range of political issues by a selected group of Canadian citizens. Extant Theoretical Perspectives In an early study of the United States, Converse found that citizens’ opinions on policy items were unrelated to each other, that people failed to respond to many pressing issues, and that opinions over time were inconsistent (Converse 1964). The implication of these and related findings was that the electorate was hardly capable of making reasonable political decisions. Other research, much of it coming later in time, challenged these claims by arguing that citizens could make reasonable choices with limited information if they rely on information short-cuts, or heuristics (e.g., Downs 1957; Hinich and Munger 1994; McKelvey and Ordeshook 1985, 1986; Neuman 1986; Page and Shapiro 1992; Popkin 1994; Sniderman, Brody and Tetlock 1991). One potential heuristic aid, universally found in competitive party systems, is the party label. Beginning with Downs (1957), it has been argued that one of the primary purposes of political parties is to provide an information short-cut for voters, to help them understand the issue positions and/or ideology of political actors. The utility of party labels has been investigated in a variety of domains, primarily in the U.S. context. In terms of voting, people rely on partisan cues in the voting booth (Lau and Redlawsk 2001; Popkin 1994; Rahn 1993), especially in low information elections (Schaffner and Streb 2002; Squire and Smith 1988). As long as candidates hold issue positions consistent with those of their party, voters are likely to select the “correct” candidate if they are told the party of the candidate (Lau and Redlawsk 2001; Rahn 1993). Furthermore, party cues can help citizens to predict the issue positions of candidates and to place them on an ideological spectrum (e.g., Conover and Feldman 1989; Huckfeldt et al. 1999; Kahn 1994; Koch 2001; Lodge and

The Power of the Dark Side: Negative Partisanship and Political Behaviour in Canada

The origins and implications of partisan identification are well-studied, but negative partisan attitudes—dislike for a particular party—have escaped such scrutiny, even as the politics of negativity enjoys sustained popularity, especially come election time. In this paper we build upon the comparatively modest negative partisanship literature to consider the effects of negative partisan attitudes on a range of political behaviours. There are reasons to suspect that negative and positive partisanship may have different effects; thus, accounting for the unique influence of negative attitudes is important for understanding the full effect of partisanship on political behaviour. Our results, based upon Canadian Election Study data from 2008 and 2011, reveal that, in addition to vote choice, negative partisanship influences voter turnout and a range of political activities, both related and unrelated to parties. These findings provide evidence of the power of the “dark side” of partisanship.

From a two-party-plus to a one-party-plus?: Ideology, vote choice, and prospects for a competitive party system in Canada

Conventional wisdom, buttressed by numerous empirical studies, has questioned the importance of both class and ideological factors on voting behavior in Canada. However, two recent studies of the 1997 Canadian national election [Gidengil et al., Canadian J. Political Sci. 32 (1999) 247; Nevitte et al., Unsteady State: The 1997 Canadian Federal Election, Oxford University Press, Ontario, 2000] indicate that ideological factors played an important role in determining the outcome of the election, since they affected the direction of the vote for the several parties in both Quebec and the rest of Canada. In this paper, we clarify and extend these analyses with data from the 2000 election, as well as the 1997 election. We find that a number of ideological dimensions underlie the issue positions of voters in Quebec and the rest of Canada in both the elections and that these have important implications for the maintenance of the multiparty system that seemed to emerge in the last decade. More specifically, we find that ideological factors affect partisan volatility in Canada, and that the inclusion of these factors improves the explanatory power of a standard vote choice model in both election years. We infer from our findings that ideological differences among Canadian voters can help sustain a multiparty system in the foreseeable future but that it is a system that currently favors the Liberal Party—so much so, in fact, that the ability of any other party to successfully displace the Liberals as the government in the future is problematic. However, there is a curious periodicity to the electoral fortunes of Canadian parties at both the federal and provincial levels. Political parties can govern for years and then experience an electoral disaster of a magnitude sufficient to make them a distinctly minority party.  2003 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Negative Partisanship in a Multi-party System: The Case of Canada

Abstract The origins and implications of partisan identification are well studied, but negative partisan attitudes – dislike for a particular party – have escaped such scrutiny. We argue that the concept of partisanship, especially in a multi-party system, is incomplete until negative sentiments are considered. In this paper, we refine the concept of negative partisanship (NPID) by providing an improved method of operationalizing it, examine its incidence and relationship with positive party identification in a multi-party system, and propose two theories of its origins. Our results, based upon data from five Canadian federal elections, indicate that studying NPID in a multi-party system requires a broader understanding of the mechanisms that lead to negative party attitudes than in a two-party system.

Votes for Women: Electoral Systems and Support for Female Candidates

It is a well-established finding that proportional representation (PR) electoral systems are associated with greater legislative representation for women than single member systems. However, the degree to which different types of PR rules affect voting for female candidates has not been fully explored. The existing literature is also hampered by a reliance on cross-national data in which individual vote preferences and electoral system features are endogenous. In this study, we draw upon an experiment conducted during the 2014 European Parliament (EP) elections to isolate the effects of different PR electoral systems. Participants in the experiment were given the opportunity to vote for real EP candidates in three different electoral systems: closed list, open list, and open list with panachage and cumulation. Because voter preferences can be held constant across the three different votes, we can evaluate the extent to which female candidates were more or less advantaged by the electoral system itself. We find that voters, regardless of their gender, support female candidates, and that this support is stronger under open electoral rules. It is a well-established finding that proportional representation (PR) electoral systems are associated with greater legislative representation for women than single member systems. However, the degree to which different types of PR rules affect voting for female candidates has not been fully explored. The existing literature is also hampered by a reliance on cross-national data in which individual vote preferences and electoral system features are endogenous. In this study, we draw upon an experiment conducted during the 2014 European Parliament (EP) elections to isolate the effects of different PR electoral systems. Participants in the experiment were given the opportunity to vote for real EP candidates in three different electoral systems: closed list, open list, and open list with panachage and cumulation. Because voter preferences can be held constant across the three different votes, we can evaluate the extent to which female candidates were more or less advantaged by the electoral system itself. We find that voters, regardless of their gender, support female candidates, and that this support is stronger under open electoral rules.

Paying attention and the incumbency effect: Voting behavior in the 2014 Toronto Municipal Election

The importance of incumbent evaluations for voting and the existence of an incumbency effect are well-established. However, there is limited research on the effect incumbency has on voters’ engagement with election campaigns. This paper examines whether the use of incumbency as a cue when voting is associated with there being less interest in an election and whether campaign period attentiveness affects incumbent support. We consider these questions using data from the Toronto Election Study, a large-N, two-wave survey of Torontonians conducted around the time of the 2014 Toronto Municipal Election. We find that attentiveness, on its own, does not make voters more likely to support an incumbent or non-incumbent candidate. However, among individuals with high knowledge, attentiveness decreases the likelihood of supporting the incumbent, as opposed to a non-incumbent candidate.

Political Attitudes and Behaviour in a Non-Partisan Environment: Toronto 2014

Voting behaviour in municipal elections is understudied in Canada. Existing research is limited by the type of data (aggregate instead of individual-level) and the cases evaluated (partisan when most contests are non-partisan). The objective of this study is to contribute to this literature by using individual-level data about a non-partisan election. To do so, we use data from the Toronto Election Study, conducted during the 2014 election. Our research goals are to evaluate whether a standard approach to understanding vote choice (the multi-stage explanatory model) is applicable in a non-partisan, municipal-level contest, and to determine the correlates of vote choice in the 2014 Toronto mayoral election in particular. Our analysis reveals that, although it was a formally non-partisan contest, voters tended to view the mayoral candidates in both ideological and partisan terms. We also find that a standard vote choice model provides valuable insight into voter preferences at the municipal level.

Deciding Correctly: Variance in the Effective Use of Party Cues

This chapter extends and tests the generalizability of party labels as information shortcuts to help assess and make decisions about political candidates. We argue that the utility of party labels as information shortcuts depends upon the quality of the party label cues, as well as an individual’s level of political sophistication. Data from a national internet-based experiment in the multi-party setting of Canada allow us to test how well party cues aid with assessments of candidates’ issue stances and voting correctly in a context with less ideologically coherent parties compared to the U.S., where the majority of scholarship has focused. We find evidence that high sophisticates make better use of party labels as information shortcuts when candidates take stances consistent with the party label, and party labels from more ideologically cohesive parties are relied upon to a greater extent than cues from less cohesive parties.

Addressing Europe’s democratic deficit: An experimental evaluation of the pan-European district proposal

Many academics and commentators argue that Europe is suffering from a democratic deficit. An interesting proposal that has been put forward to address this problem is to elect some members of the European parliament in a pan-European district. In this article, we evaluate this proposal using an online experiment, in which thousands of Europeans voted on a pan-European ballot we created. We find that the voting behaviour of European citizens would be strongly affected by the presence or absence of candidates from their own country on the lists. If a pan-European district is created, our findings provide an argument in favour of using a closed-list ballot and establishing a maximum number of candidates from each country on the lists.

Sex (And Ethnicity) in the City: Affinity Voting in the 2014 Toronto Mayoral Election

Do women vote for women and men for men? Do visible minorities vote for minority candidates, and white voters for white candidates? And what happens when a minority woman appears on the ballot? This study tests for the presence of gender and ethnic affinity voting in the Toronto mayoral election of 2014, where Olivia Chow was the only woman and only visible minority candidate among the three major contenders. Our analysis, which draws on a survey of eligible Toronto voters, is the first to examine the interactive effects of sex and ethnicity on vote choice in Canada in the context of a non-partisan election and in a non-experimental manner. We find strong evidence of ethnic affinity voting and show that Chow received stronger support from ethnic Chinese voters than from other minority groups. Our results also reveal that gender was related to vote choice but only when connected with race.