The purpose of the thesis is to identify relationships between economic factors and the probability to vote on populist parties. The results are in turn based on the populist parties’ outcome in the 2006 Swedish election to parliament. Parties below the 4 percent margin, prior to the election, which is the percentage point required to enter the parliament, are defined as populist parties. Furthermore, based on theoretical and previous empirical research, seven economic variables are chosen; disposable income, income distribution, municipal tax rate, unemployment and higher education. In addition to these five, are the number of crime incidents reported, and the share of people born outside of the European Union also included. Moreover, the study is conducted at a regional, or more explicitly, at a municipal level, implying that 290 observations are used for each variable, in a total of five regressions. These are performed to test the diversity of populist parties. The findings confirm that there are obvious relationships between the chosen variables and the probability of voting on populist parties, as the majority of the regressions explain 25 to 35 percent of the variation in the voting decision. These figures seem consistent, since ideological and factual issues are more important to populist party sympathizers. Nevertheless, the results show that when it comes to the economic variables - unemployment, education, disposable income and consequently the municipal tax rate are the ones which concerns people the most when voting on populist parties. Additionally, as the share of people born outside of the European Union increases, the probability of voting in favor of Sverigedemokraterna also increases. Finally, the growth of populist parties or of Sverigedemokraterna in particular, forces the conventional parties to adopt similar political standpoints in order to gain votes. Implying that if the present economic and political situation persists, populist parties’, especially Sverigedemokraterna’s policies will thrive in Swedish politics. / Avsikten med denna studie är att identifiera samband mellan ekonomiska faktorer och sannolikheten att rösta på populistpartier. Genomförandet är i sin tur baserat på 2006 års riksdagsvalresultat. Partier som innan valet befann sig under 4 procentsmarginalen definieras som populistiska partier. Grundat i tidigare forskning och teori, har sju ekonomiska variabler valts; disponibel inkomst, inkomstfördelning, kommunskatt, arbetslöshet och högre utbildning. Förutom dessa fem, är även antalet anmälda brott och andelen människor födda utanför den Europiska Unionen inkluderade. Vidare utförs studien på regional, närmare bestämt kommunalnivå, där 290 observationer används för varje variabel, i totalt fem regressioner. Detta med syfte att testa populistpartiers mångfald. De empiriska resultaten bekräftar att det finns uppenbara samband mellan de valda variablerna och sannolikheten att rösta på populistpartier, då en majoritet av regressionerna förklarar 25 till 35 procent av variationen i röstningsavgörandet. Dessa siffror verkar stämma överens med verkligheten, eftersom ideologi och sakfrågor är viktigare för populistpartianhängare. Gällande de ekonomiska variablerna är det arbetslösheten, utbildningsnivån, disponibla inkomsten och kommunalskatten som påverkar människor mest när de röstar på populistpartier. Det visar sig även att när andelen människor födda utanför den Europiska Unionen ökar, ökar även sannolikheten att man röstar på Sverigedemokraterna. Till sist, tillväxten av populistpartier, speciellt av Sverigedemokraterna, har på senare tid tilltagit, vilket leder till att de konventionella partierna måste anamma likartade politiska ståndpunkter för att kunna få fler röster. Innebärande att om den rådande ekonomiska och politiska situationen består, kommer populistpartiers och i synnerhet Sverigedemokraternas riktlinjer att i framtiden få ett mycket större utrymme i den svenska politiken.

<p>Since the 1970s voting behaviour has changed. Party identification and class voting has declined. As the electorate becomes more volatile, campaign strategy and party image becomes essential. Political communication and mass media now play an important role in election campaigns. Therefore, researchers take an interest in the impact of media on public opinion. The agenda-setting theory maintains that media influence what voters think about and that there is a link between media coverage and voting intentions.</p><p>This minor thesis focuses on the early election campaign prior to the French presidential election in 2007. For the first time, the socialist party organised a primary election in order to nominate their candidate. The aim is to study if media has an impact on public opinion in election campaigns. To reach the aim, I posed the two following research questions: Did the primary election of the socialist party result in higher media coverage of the party than of other political parties? If the media favoured the socialist party during this time, did this have an impact on the voting intentions for the socialist candidate Ségolène Royal? </p><p>In order to reach the aim and answer the questions, I performed a quantitative study. I measured the media coverage of the different political parties in the newspapers during the socialist primary campaign, to find out if the socialist party was favoured by the media. The primary source of information was the two French newspapers <em>Le Monde</em> and <em>Le Figaro</em>, complemented by opinion polls performed by the institute <em>Ipsos</em>.</p><p>The results show that the socialist party was privileged by the press coverage prior to the presidential election. The newspapers wrote more and longer articles about the socialist party than of any other political party at the time of this study. At the same time, voting intentions for Ségolène Royal increased. The media exposure seems to have had a short effect on the public opinion in favour of the socialist candidate. By the results of this study, I conclude that the socialist party was able to influence the agenda-setting in the media by organizing primary elections. I find support for the hypothesis that media coverage during an election campaign has an effect on public opinion.</p>

According to a conventional wisdom, politics is nowadays more personalized than before. The proposition of the personalization of politics is relevant for three specific areas: institutions, media and voting behavior. This dissertation deals with the latter, since it focuses on the influence of party leaders on vote choice. So far the empirical scholarship tested whether “leader effects” have increased overtime (longitudinal studies) or investigated which conditions can enhance or discourage the electoral influence of party leaders (conditionality literature). We argue that both approaches have their limits, the former being based on the customary assumption of linearity, the latter investigating the role of (micro, meso and macro) “characteristics” rather than overarching and dynamic condition(s). This dissertation puts the cursor on a specific overarching condition: the (in)stability of parties and party systems (supply-side complexity). Actually, we argue that the magnitude of leader effects on the vote is conditional to the quality of the electoral environment. We therefore attribute to the “leader variable” a heuristic value: the leader appeal is conceived as an electoral shortcut more likely to be activated in complex electoral environment than in clear and stable contexts. There are two ways of testing the link between (variations in) and supply-side complexity and (variations in) leader effect on the vote. The first requires the adoption of a synchronic perspective, which implies a cross-national and cross-partisan empirical posture. This perspective considers space (i.e. “horizontal”) variations of stability, by assuming that certain parties and party systems are stable, while others are less or not stable. Are leader effects on the vote greater in the latter than in the former? The second one focuses on time (i.e. “longitudinal”) variations of stability. Indeed, electoral contexts vary across time – and not only across spaces - thus modifying the perceptions that voters may have of their electoral environment. When parties and party systems get convulsed, voters lose their frame of references. As such, they become cue-takers and rely more easily on leader appeals. On the contrary, when the political environment becomes clarified, voters will be less encouraged to rely on leader heuristic.This dissertation gives voice to both dimensions (space variation vs time variation). In a first place, we dig into the synchronic perspective. The relationship between supply-side complexity and leader effect on the vote is tested on a sample composed by 20 countries and 125 parties, included within the Comparative Studies of Electoral Systems. In a second place, we chart the magnitude of the leader variable according to longitudinal variations of supply-side complexity. Actually, our analytical effort will henceforth be centered on two distinguished case studies: Poland (1997-2011) and Italy (1996-2013), which have both experienced important variations in the stability of their electoral environment.We demonstrated that de facto differences (i.e. cross national and cross-partisan variations) in terms of stability do not automatically determine the magnitude of leader effects. On the contrary, we detect a link between the leader variable and longitudinal variations of the electoral environment. However, the quality of this link proves to be different in Poland and Italy. In the young democracy of Poland, leader effects and stability seem to be convergent rather than antagonist forces, while the Italian case properly fits our expectations: the convolution of the electoral environment makes voters more sensitive to the leader heuristic. / Doctorat en Sciences politiques et sociales / info:eu-repo/semantics/nonPublished

To what extent are social movements capable of steering voters’ choices in corruptsocieties? Through the exploration of North Macedonia’s 2016 Colourful Revolution street protests, this study introduces an original dataset of 1,066 survey responses from members of the Macedonian electorate and engages in a 65-week-long cumulative tracking of corruption-related news stories in an attempt to shed light upon the effects of anti-corruption movements (ACMs) on the electoral punishment of corrupt incumbents. Building upon the framework of sociotropic corruption voting and highlighting the role of the media as an important awareness-raiser, this study finds strong proofs of corruption acting as a deterrent against the re-election of corrupt incumbents, helping to explain a governing party’s loss of support at the polls. However, it finds no robust correlation between the Colourful Revolutions’s emergence and actions per se and higher media coverage of corruption.

The main purpose of this research is to investigate the perception of South Asian youth on the use of social media in politics. In this research, a comprehensive literature review has been conducted on research ideas based on similar content of the use of social media in politics. Five variables, such as voting behaviour, perceived usefulness, ease of use, political participation and personalization politics have been used to investigate the youth perception regarding the research objectives. In this research positivism research philosophy and descriptive approach has been followed for primary data collection and analysis. Quantitative statistical tools have been used to find out actual results from the study. Frequencies analysis, correlation, Crombach’s Alpha mean, median and mode have been used to evaluate data.  From the analysis, it has been found that the use of social media in politics has a robust impact on the political behaviour of youth on social media. It positively affective the voting behaviour of youth and pursue them to participate in various political activities. The finding of this study reveals that the use of social media in politics has a significant impact on the voting behaviour of people who are using social media in political communication. This research also found that politically interested people get needed information on social media and they get updated about political activities and new policies. The usefulness of social media has a positive impact on the use of social media by youth in political activities. This study also found that social media is easy to use and need less effort to perform communication activities. This pursues youth to use social media in political participation. Another finding is that the use of social media in politics increase youth participation in political activities. The traditional form of communication has a lack of access by the general people. But, digital media allow people to participate in decision making and criticism. This facilitates youth participation in political activities.

This thesis examines the role of emotions in mediating the effects electoral campaigns have on political behavior in Britain. I contend that electoral campaigns, aside from direct effects, can also have indirect effects, manifested through the impact of the emotions they induce. I theorize that, through manipulating the tone, framing and targeting of their messages, electoral campaigns induce specific emotions. Emotions are argued to have a direct effect on turnout (intentions) and a moderating effect on the impact partisanship, policy preference and leader evaluations have on vote choice. Extending the Theory of Affective Intelligence, I hypothesize that individuals who are enthusiastic about their preferred party, or experience anxiety or anger in relation to an out-party, are more likely to turn out, and to cast their vote based on their partisanship. Contrarily, anxiety and anger experienced towards the preferred party are expected to decrease the importance of partisanship and increase the relevance of policy preferences and leader evaluations when voting. While anger experienced towards this party is also hypothesized to also decrease turnout, anxiety is not thought to affect it. To test these propositions, I rely on a multi-methodological approach that uses both panel and experimental data. The panel data was collected in two waves prior to the 2010 British General Election. The laboratory experiment, designed to specifically test the emotion-induction capacity of campaigns, was conducted on British participants in the aftermath of the same elections. The results corroborate the theory. First, the analyses confirm that campaigns, not only can, but actually do induce emotions. Second, it is shown that emotions do influence political behavior as expected. Third, it is established that the effect of the campaign on turnout intentions is partly channeled through emotions. Finally, it is shown that campaign exposure indirectly affects vote choice by increasing the magnitude of the impact emotions have on the effect of partisanship on vote choice. Aside from the literature on campaign effects in Britain, the thesis also contributes to the emerging literature pertaining to the role of emotions in politics. Moreover, it contributes to the field of voting behaviour by extending our understanding of the psychological underpinnings of vote choice.

In this examination project I look into what ways upper secondary school students conceive themselves as politically influenced before they voted for the general election of 2010. The purpose is to examine which influences the upper secondary school surroundings and the classes of civic education are contributing with to students before they voted. As a method, I have used personal, semi-structural interviews on eight upper secondary school students who all voted for a party represented in the parliament. I have asked questions about how they believe their parents, the surroundings of their school and the classes of civic education have influenced them. To separate which influences primarily the upper secondary school and the classes of civic educations have had on the students, I have selected two comparison groups of four students in each. One group contains only parent-influenced students whereas the other group contains only not parent-influenced students.   My findings show that the upper secondary school surroundings have played an important part to both student groups and the outcome may be theoretically generalized to all upper secondary school students studying natural science. The influences related to the classes of civic education have had a diversified outcome, mostly on not parent-influenced students. Therefore, this piece of result cannot be theoretically generalized to all natural science students. Not parent-influenced students also perceive themselves as more influenced by miscellaneous meaningful people, than do parent-influenced students.   I understand the results as students not concurring with their parents politically, are more inclined to chase their political identity among their peer friends and other meaningful people. They are also more open-minded in the teaching moments of political parties, also during the political debate throughout the civic education. Finally, I discuss how the results should be viewed by teachers in civic education and what role the upper secondary school continues to play, as a political socialization agent.

In the Czech Republic, town halls are allowed to issue printed newspapers to inform the residents about local events. The newspapers are funded from municipal budgets and free for the residents, often delivered directly to the mailbox. Apart from being useful source of information, the newspapers may serve also as a platform for election campaign of the incumbent politicians. This fact was the main reason for the amendment of the Press Act in 2013, directing municipalities to issue unbiased news with enough room for all the political stakeholders. The present study uses various secondary data to examine the effects of town hall newspapers on voting decisions during municipal elections held between 1998 and 2014. Econometric analysis finds significant and positive relationship between presence of a newspaper and performance of incumbent politicians. Comparison of election results from 2014 with previous election years suggest that the Press Act amendment has not had substantial impact on this relationship.

This thesis explores the regional differentiation of electoral behaviour and other topics in electoral geography in the Czech Republic. Electoral geography, which studies the geographic aspects of the organisation, process, and results of elections, for a long time developed mainly in Western societies given the absence of free elections in other countries. It began to develop in the Czech Republic in the 1990s and its goal was to explore the process of the transformation of society and the stabilisation of democracy, to compare electoral patterns observed in conditions of stable liberal democracies with the patterns found in transforming states, and to adapt them to the specific conditions of transition countries. Electoral geography focuses mainly on the spatial variations of electoral behaviour. It seeks to determine whether different patterns of electoral behaviour are based on the social structure of the population in the region, whether they are influenced by contextual factors, or whether it is a combination of both. Another important subject studied by electoral geography is the spatial patterns of representation, which however are usually studied in majoritarian electoral systems. The thesis is composed of two basic sections. The first section offers a broader theoretical and...

The diploma thesis deals with topic of relict Czech-German ethnic boundary. In the first part of the thesis theoretical-methodological aspects of the study are discussed with an emphasis on delimitation of Czech-German ethnic boundary in literature. In the past the tendency to draw ethnic boundary as a line prevailed and it was common not to deal with zonal character of ethnic boundaries. In the second part of the thesis the shape of Czech- German ethnic boundary in the Czech lands and its changes from the end of the 19th century to 2001 are studied. In the third part of the thesis the shape of Czech-German ethnic boundary in chosen interest regions is analyzed, and the function of ethnic boundary as a socio-cultural divide of a territory is considered. The aim of the study was to find out if there are differences between Czech and German community in the interest regions. The function of ethnic boundary as a socio-cultural divide was examined in two periods: in an interwar era of the first Czechoslovak republic, and at the beginning of the 21st century, when Czech-German ethnic boundary remains only as a relict boundary. Comparison of both parts along the ethnic boundary in the interest regions was done on the basis of religiosity of population and results of parliamentary elections. Key words:...