DISSERTATION ABSTRACT
The Bipolar Voter: On the Effects of Political Polarization on Voter Turnout and Voting Behavior
Political polarization has considerably increased in most established democracies in the last decades. Such increase corresponds not only to parties and their candidates' policy and ideological stands diverging from party system centers, but also to mass publics' perceptions of party and elite polarization, and increasingly polarized ideological, policy, and partisan attitudes. This project investigates the attitudinal and behavioral consequences of the interaction between party, elite, and electoral polarization. Coupling cross-national and cross-temporal analyses of established European democracies with in-depth case studies on the United States and on Turkey, it seeks to answer how increasing party and elite polarization interactively affect mass public's ideological, policy, and partisan attitudes, and, relatedly, their turnout and voting behaviors in party systems with varied electoral rules. I argue that political parties strategically take polarized positions to differentiate themselves from their opponents and to mobilize policy-conscious individuals in the short run. In the longer run party polarization works to change the distributions of policy, ideological, and partisan attitudes of the electorate. Individuals' higher utilities from voting for parties better representing their polarized ideological, policy, and partisan preferences decreases their abstention due to indifference and due to alienation, and increase their support for parties and their candidates taking more polarized stands. These findings run contrary to previous literature suggesting that increasing polarization depresses political participation and to the conventional understanding that political parties position themselves in response to the electorate's policy and ideological preferences.
Dissertation Committee Members: Michael D. McDonald (Chair), Olga V. Shvetsova, Robin E. Best , and James F. Adams.
Political polarization has considerably increased in most established democracies in the last decades. Such increase corresponds not only to parties and their candidates' policy and ideological stands diverging from party system centers, but also to mass publics' perceptions of party and elite polarization, and increasingly polarized ideological, policy, and partisan attitudes. This project investigates the attitudinal and behavioral consequences of the interaction between party, elite, and electoral polarization. Coupling cross-national and cross-temporal analyses of established European democracies with in-depth case studies on the United States and on Turkey, it seeks to answer how increasing party and elite polarization interactively affect mass public's ideological, policy, and partisan attitudes, and, relatedly, their turnout and voting behaviors in party systems with varied electoral rules. I argue that political parties strategically take polarized positions to differentiate themselves from their opponents and to mobilize policy-conscious individuals in the short run. In the longer run party polarization works to change the distributions of policy, ideological, and partisan attitudes of the electorate. Individuals' higher utilities from voting for parties better representing their polarized ideological, policy, and partisan preferences decreases their abstention due to indifference and due to alienation, and increase their support for parties and their candidates taking more polarized stands. These findings run contrary to previous literature suggesting that increasing polarization depresses political participation and to the conventional understanding that political parties position themselves in response to the electorate's policy and ideological preferences.
Dissertation Committee Members: Michael D. McDonald (Chair), Olga V. Shvetsova, Robin E. Best , and James F. Adams.