In this episode, I talk to Markus Wagner, who is Professor of Quantitative Party and Election Research at the University of Vienna. Our conversation will focus on his 2014 article “Left-Authoritarians and Policy Representation in Western Europe: Electoral Choice across Ideological Dimensions” The article (https://bit.ly/3fgtHJ4) is co-authored with Zoe Lefkofridi and Johanna Willmann.
In the article, the authors investigate the electoral preferences of left-authoritarian voters in Western Europe. Left-authoritarian voters are those that hold left-wing economic preferences and favor for example higher levels of redistribution but combine these preferences with more authoritarian positions on cultural issues. Because there are only very few parties that combine left-wing economic with more authoritarian positions, these voters often do not find direct representation in the party system. So they have to decide if they rather vote with their economic or cultural preferences. In their analysis, the authors find that issue salience plays a key role in determining which parties left-authoritarian voters prefer in the end.
Later in the podcast, we talk about the role that left-authoritarian voters play for the transformation of European politics more generally. Can their changing electoral preferences explain why mainstream party support has declined and other parties such as the radical right have increased their support? What are other important groups in the electorate that make us understand these changes?
Markus and I will talk about these and other questions in the next 45 minutes. For more information about Markus and his research you can follow him on twitter under “at” markuswagnerat or visit his website markuswagner.net
I hope you enjoy the conversation
Political science recommendation:
Thau, Mads. 2019. How Political Parties Use Group-Based Appeals: Evidence from Britain 1964–2015. Political Studies: 67(1). https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/0032321717744495
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