Description: This book investigates strategic coordination in elections worldwide. Although the classics of electoral studies have dealt with issues of coordination, this is the first book that employs a unified game-theoretic model to study strategic coordination--including both strategic voting and strategic entry--worldwide and that relies primarily on constituency-level rather than national aggregate data in testing theoretical propositions about the effects of electoral laws.
Review Quotes: "This book is a unique contribution to the fields of comparative politics and formal political theory. It offers a model integrating many diverse aspects of electoral competition that together bring into existence systems of national poltical parties. Gary Cox combines social choice theory, public choice theory, spatial theory, and the institutional approach to electoral studies to reach a new level of understanding of political competition in democracies. Gary Cox's new book is not only a theoretical study, but also a useful reference on comparative electoral institutions. ...the suthor also draws attention to such often overlooked institutions as rules of candidate nomination and party registration." Olga Shvetsova, Political Science Quarterly