Informative Party Labels With Institutional and Electoral Variation Export

@article{citeulike:5046481, abstract = {We study a model of party formation in which the informativeness of party labels and inter-party ideological heterogeneity are endogenously and jointly determined in response to electoral incentives. Parties use screening to increase the cost of affiliation for politicians whose ideal points diverge from the party platform. Because affiliation decisions are endogenous, increased screening decreases ideological heterogeneity, improving the informativeness of the party label. The model allows us to examine how the level of screening responds to changes in both the institutional and electoral environments. We find that screening (and, consequently, the informativeness of the party label and ideological homogeneity) is decreasing in the power of the executive branch, the polarization of party platforms, and the average size of partisan tides. 10.1177/0951629808090135}, author = {Ashworth, Scott and Bueno de Mesquita, Ethan}, citeulike-article-id = {5046481}, citeulike-linkout-0 = {http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/0951629808090135}, citeulike-linkout-1 = {http://jtp.sagepub.com/cgi/content/abstract/20/3/251}, day = {1}, doi = {10.1177/0951629808090135}, journal = {Journal of Theoretical Politics}, keywords = {election, parties, political\_economy}, month = {July}, number = {3}, pages = {251--273}, posted-at = {2009-07-03 14:38:37}, priority = {4}, title = {Informative Party Labels With Institutional and Electoral Variation}, url = {http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/0951629808090135}, volume = {20}, year = {2008} }

TY - JOUR ID - citeulike:5046481 L3 - citeulike-article-id:5046481 N2 - We study a model of party formation in which the informativeness of party labels and inter-party ideological heterogeneity are endogenously and jointly determined in response to electoral incentives. Parties use screening to increase the cost of affiliation for politicians whose ideal points diverge from the party platform. Because affiliation decisions are endogenous, increased screening decreases ideological heterogeneity, improving the informativeness of the party label. The model allows us to examine how the level of screening responds to changes in both the institutional and electoral environments. We find that screening (and, consequently, the informativeness of the party label and ideological homogeneity) is decreasing in the power of the executive branch, the polarization of party platforms, and the average size of partisan tides. 10.1177/0951629808090135 IS - 3 JF - Journal of Theoretical Politics EP - 273 TI - Informative Party Labels With Institutional and Electoral Variation VL - 20 SP - 251 KW - election KW - parties KW - political_economy AU - Ashworth, Scott AU - Bueno de Mesquita, Ethan PY - 2008/07/01/ UR - http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/0951629808090135 ER -