Responsiveness of Parties and Party Systems to the New Politics

Abstract

In the past decade the dominant theme of comparative electoral research has changed from explaining the stability of partisan alignments to explaining the dynamics of partisan change. Citizens have presented new demands and new challenges to the established parties, and the evidence of substantial partisan change is now obvious². Party systems are more fractionalized; many established parties have fragmented and a growing number of new parties have been created. Fluctuations in voting results also have increased. Voting in most European democracies is now characterized by higher levels of partisan volatility at the aggregate and individual levels. In several nations, popular attachments to political parties have weakened the underlying base of stable voting patterns.

I would especially like to thank Svante Ersson and Jan-Erik Lane for granting me ac?cess to their party characteristics data. I also would like to thank Sten Berglund for his comments on an earlier version of this paper, and Chinsoo Bae and Billy Spangle for their assistance in preparing this research.