Elisabeth Gidengil
- Published in print:
- 2013
- Published Online:
- January 2015
- ISBN:
- 9780199259007
- eISBN:
- 9780191803406
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
- DOI:
- 10.1093/acprof:osobl/9780199259007.003.0009
- Subject:
- Political Science, Comparative Politics
This chapter asks whether leaders systematically matter more to certain types of voters and systematically less to others. It explores a number of possibilities. The rise of leader-centred politics ...
More
This chapter asks whether leaders systematically matter more to certain types of voters and systematically less to others. It explores a number of possibilities. The rise of leader-centred politics thesis, which emphasizes the changing nature of media coverage and the weakening of partisan ties, raises two possibilities, namely that leaders are more important to voters who are more exposed to television news and to voters who lack strong partisan ties. The partisan dealignment thesis suggests that as voters’ ties to political parties have weakened, the number of voters who decide how to vote during the campaign itself has grown, therefore raising the possibility that leaders carry more weight with these ‘late-deciders’. Finally, there is the role of political sophistication that raises one last question: do leaders matter more to unsophisticated voters, or are they just as important to the politically sophisticated?Less
This chapter asks whether leaders systematically matter more to certain types of voters and systematically less to others. It explores a number of possibilities. The rise of leader-centred politics thesis, which emphasizes the changing nature of media coverage and the weakening of partisan ties, raises two possibilities, namely that leaders are more important to voters who are more exposed to television news and to voters who lack strong partisan ties. The partisan dealignment thesis suggests that as voters’ ties to political parties have weakened, the number of voters who decide how to vote during the campaign itself has grown, therefore raising the possibility that leaders carry more weight with these ‘late-deciders’. Finally, there is the role of political sophistication that raises one last question: do leaders matter more to unsophisticated voters, or are they just as important to the politically sophisticated?
