Updated Agenda: Shift in Political Discourse with New Zealand’s Electoral Change

• In Event: Intra-Party Agenda Setting in Advanced Industrialized Democracies

Abstract

Theories of political representation expect that a more proportional electoral system, will lead to a greater number of parties and an increased diversity of policy issues discussed. Rarely is it possible to see the transformation of a party system - New Zealand is a unique example of such a case that transitions from SMD to MMP in the 1990s. What happens to intra-party organization and party agendas as a system becomes more proportional, opening the door for new parties and new issues to be raised? Looking at parliamentary debates and oral questions from 1987-2010, we analyze the topics discussed pre and post-electoral reform using text analysis. Following along the literature of party expansion, we expect that following the electoral change parties will address more topics and provide greater emphasis to non-traditional issues due to the increased competition between parties. With this expansion of parties, we also expect to see signalling and transactional behavior between parties due to the need for coalition formation. We find that electoral system change results in a greater number of issues being discussed though this effect is slow to develop. With more parties, more issues are raised providing increased representation.

Authors

• Christine A Sylvester, University of Strathclyde

• Julia Maynard, University of Michigan