Negative Partisan identity in Multi-Party Systems

• In Event: Expressive Partisanship in Comparative Perspective

Abstract

Partisanship has become the culprit behind most contemporary issues in American democracy ranging from blind support of the in-party to heightened levels of outparty hostility. Yet, social psychology has long made the case that strong in-group attachments do not have to be accompanied by out-group animosity. Prior research on negative partisanship in the U.S. has provided evidence that strong in-party attachments do not necessarily lead to out-party hostility. Most of that work has focused on the U.S. two-party context. Recent scholarship, however, has shown that multi-party systems in Europe are not immune to strong partisan resentment. Yet, we know little about the origins and effects of negative partisanship in multi-party systems. This manuscript addresses this gap in several ways. First, I design and examine the measurement properties of a multi-item scale that gauges negative partisanship as an identity. Second, I apply this scale to the post-election wave of the Swedish Election Study, examining the impact of negative partisanship on turnout, vote choice, and evaluations of party leaders. Results indicate that negative partisanship is a strong factor in driving vote choice as well as the evaluations of political leaders from the opposing ideological block. Interestingly, these effects surpass the impact of strong party attachments, lending credence to the notion that negative partisanship can exist independently of strong party attachments.

Author

• Alexa Bankert, University of Georgia