Description: This book estimates the effects of economic conditions on the behavior of individual voters and on the outcomes of 42 elections in 15 countries. The conventional wisdom that poor economic conditions hurt governing parties is too simplistic. It does not hold for junior parties in coalition governments, who frequently gain at the expense of larger parties. It also does not hold in countries where responsibility for economic policy is unclear (more often than not). The extent to which the economy affects election outcomes depends strongly on the degree of electoral competition between parties.
Brief description: Wouter van der Brug is associate professor in methods for the social sciences at the Amsterdam School for Communications Research, University of Amsterdam, Netherlands. His work has been published in Comparative Political Studies, the British Journal of Political Science, the European Journal of Political Research, Electoral Studies, Party Politics, the Journal of Theoretical Politics, West European Politics, and Acta Politica. He recently co-authored European Elections and Domestic Politics (with Cees van der Eijk, 2007).
Review Quotes: "Van der Brug and company hit conventional wisdom hard. By their analysis, the economy, after all, influences the voter decision relatively little. The investigation, unique in its construction and provocative in its conclusion, begs to be read by comparative election scholars."
Michael Lewis-Beck, F. Wendell Miller Distinguished Professor of Political Science, University of Iowa