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The extensive estimates of party policy preferences produced by the CMP (Comparative Manifesto Project, now MARPOR) have proved robust and valid over a wide variety of research applications. But all estimates carry some error. We demonstrate that one of the two existing assessments of non-systematic error in the CMP data strongly overstates their reliability while the other understates it, leaving much potential for mis-estimation. We develop a new method which extends classical test theory and directly estimates overall data reliability; reliabilities and standard errors of measurement for each party system; and standard errors of measurement for each data-point. These should facilitate use of the CMP policy scores which are usually the only ones available for extended party and policy research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In practice, democracies privilege plurality parties. Theories of the democratic process challenge the democratic credentials of this practice. Abstract social choice theory wonders whether an electoral majority even exists. A more optimistic line of argument, prominent in research on collective representation, assumes that the policy position of the median voter embodies the majority electoral preference. The conflict between what democracies actually do and what two leading theories of the democratic process say calls for a comparative inquiry into electoral majoritarianism. For each of a dozen countries, the authors ask whether any political party commands a predominant majoritarian position among voters—that is, is a Condorcet winner—and, if so, which party it is. They find that a Condorcet winning party exists in all 12 countries and that the plurality party can lay more claim to representing the popular majority than the left—right median party. These findings have important implications for the study of democratic representation, which the authors consider in their conclusions. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

The extent and ways in which popular preferences influence government policy are absolutely central to our understanding of modern democracy. Paul Warwick's discussion of these in the European Journal of Political Research in 2010 puts itself at the heart of the debate with its critique of the median mandate theory of McDonald and Budge, proposing an alternative 'bilateralist' concept of representation. This article questions whether this concept has much to add to our theoretical understanding of representational processes. However, Warwick's further conceptual points deserve serious consideration. These concern the time horizons within which representative processes work, and the status of the median position given multi-motivated voting. At the evidential level, Warwick argues that survey-based measures of voter and party left-right positions fail to produce the correspondence between median and government policy positions that median mandate theory would have us expect. However, survey-based measures of median voter and party placements obscure important cross-national variation. Using the Comparative Study of Electoral Systems (), as Warwick does, this article shows that survey respondents norm their own and their country's party positions to their national context. The consequence is to make the political centre in all nations appear similar. Allowing for the relevant cross-national differences brings the relationship between the median voter and government position back in line with expectations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Elections are the defining institution of democracy, in the sense of directly linking popular preferences to public policy. Which programme gets chosen depends on the outcome of the election. However, voters' choices are very much constrained by the policy packages parties put forward in the first place. In most representative elections, no alternatives can be voted on apart from those advocated by established parties, who thus play a role almost equal to electors in defining the election outcome. This article examines the policy choices offered by parties in their published programmes over 17 post-war democracies—uncovering a wide variety of patterns with only limited links to type of election system or number of parties. Voters always have a choice, though in some countries it is more limited and less nuanced than in others. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article argues that the rise of political parties has rendered classical distinctions between direct and representative democracy largely obsolete. This is particularly true for representative democracy where, rather than selecting candidates as individuals, electors are now asked to choose between party policy packages. Party-mediated rather than unmediated policy voting is also the order of the day so far as direct democracy is concerned. The real contrast between the two thus boils down to periodic voting on medium- term party programmes versus frequent votes on individual policy. We argue here that there is a place for both in any modern democracy that truly aims at creating a necessary connection between public policy and popular preferences. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Most discussions of democratic theory assume that parties should offer clear choices to voters but also show themselves sensitive to public concerns. Under certain circumstances, however, party convergence on these may preclude electoral choice, thus creating conflict between two democratic 'goods'. We examine possible tradeoffs between choice and responsiveness, and see which actually occur in 16 postwar democracies. Party policy positions turn out to be more strongly related to party ideology than popular concerns, thus privileging differentiation and choice over sensitivity and responsiveness. Implications for democratic theory and practice are considered. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses the party policy and ideology of the Labour Party in Great Britain from 1997 to 2001. It analyzes the British party manifestos and the Five Year Plans for comprehensive social development issued by any organisation in democratic societies. It evaluates the left-right movement of the parties and the separation of Labour from Conservatives and Liberal Democrats in 1945. It compares the manifestos with campaign handling of policy issues and public opinion. It assesses the elections and the creation of a left-right scale from manifesto emphases.

The country tables of the data collection `Political Data 1945-1990. Party Government in 20 Democracies' (European Journal of Political Research, Vol. 24, No. 1 (July 1993), PP. 1-119) are updated and corrected to the end of 1995. Errors and omissions on the level of separate Ministers and/or Ministries have been corrected as well. These are listed as 'changes/corrections' in the corresponding tables in the original data collection. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article discusses various reports published within the issue, including one on the relationships of political parties in industrialized parliamentary democracies and another on postwar developments in representative government countries.

In the Context of a general policy-based theory of how parties behave in democratic governments, a specific hypothesis on party factional behaviour is proposed and tested for the post-war period in 20 democracies. The hypothesis is that reshuffles (replacements and transfers of individual between ministries) are more frequent where Prime Ministers have more freedom of action and decline where they have less freedom. As Prime Ministerial power is greatest in single-party governments, these are expected to produce more reshuffles - an expectation strongly confirmed by the evidence. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Our review and evaluation focus on the theoretical adequacy of spatial representations of voting and party competition based on survey data. Key assumptions underlying discussion are: (1) voting cannot be properly explained without regard to party competition and vice versa; (2) the type of input crucially determines the nature of the space produced; (3) there is a basic and far-reaching distinction between pure policy-spaces with untrammelled party movement, and other spaces used to represent voting and party competition; (4) explanation requires the use of variables conceptually and if possible temporally antecedent to voting choice. Judged by these criteria current dimensional analyses reveal severe technical limitations (Section 2) and formalizations of their associated hypotheses also reveal theoretical limitations (Section 3). Both prompt an examination and formalization of other approaches not yet common in dimensional analysis (Section 41, which enhance its explanatory potential and foster convergence with other research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article provides explanation and prediction on the general election of 1979 in Great Britain. The difficult task of predicting election outcomes in advance needs to be undertaken although satisfactory explanation of voting and party competition cannot successfully be achieved through any one approach. Estimates of issue-effects, the key element in any prediction, have previously been made on the basis of survey materials, computer simulations and econometric analyses. This paper utilizes a new sources of data-records of the issues involved in election campaigns. By relating these systematically to outcomes, issue-effects can be estimated and compared with others for mutual validation. The approach used here allows for prediction of future election results from current accounts of campaign issues, and provides an explanation of why these should have the effects they do. This is illustrated with the general election of 1974 in Great Britain, when predictions of vote were made six weeks in advance of the actual result.

Rational choice models are increasingly used in explanations of voting and elections, their adoption is often urged, rather uncritically on the grounds that they provide a unified and exact explanation across social science. Far from doing so, however, their definitions of 'rationality' may differ radically even within a limited area, such as party and voting behaviour. Shifts of meaning from one model to another may be obscured by mathematical formalism, which concentrates attention on the derivation of conclusions from basic assumptions, rather than on the practical relevance of their relationship to the assumptions behind other models. A mathematical formulation may not, however, be the most relevant for purposes of electoral explanation. Rigorous verbal formulations can represent electors' and and politicians' decision procedures more realistically, while remaining generally accessible and supporting detailed inter-comparisons of their working assumptions. Through these, rational choice explanations can be brought closer together and decisions between them made with a clear knowledge of what is involved, thus providing a better basis for cumulative research. The process of theoretical evaluation and assimilation is illustrated here with two original theories of voting and party competition. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]