Regional and National Elections in Eastern Europe

Territoriality of the Vote in Ten Countries

Arjan H. Schakel, Arjan H. Schakel, Arjan H. Schakel

• Publisher: Palgrave Macmillan
• Year: 2017
• ISBN:
  9781137517876
• Topic: Politics & International Relations
• Subtopic: Political Campaigns & Elections
• Index: Politics & International Relations

This book is the second of two studies which systematically explore territoriality of the vote in Europe. They investigate when and where voters treat regional elections differently from national contests and aim to increase our understanding of the dynamics of electoral competition, which have become increasingly multifarious and complex in many countries due to the establishment and strengthening of regional government. This volume brings together leading experts on elections who analyze differences between regional and national electoral outcomes in ten East European countries since 1990. Based on a common analytical framework, each chapter investigates congruence between regional and national elections and traces and explains second-order and regional election effects. The editors applied a similar analytical framework in Regional and National Elections in Western Europe (Palgrave, 2013) which focused on 13 West European countries, enabling the authors to compare regional electoral dynamics between Eastern and Western Europe and observe to what extent explanations for territorial heterogeneity in the vote in the West also apply to the East. This book will be of particular interest to advanced students and scholars in the fields of comparative politics, regional studies, Eastern-European politics, and democratization.

Table of contents

• Acknowledgements
• Contents
• Contributors
• List of Figures
• List of Tables
• List of Maps
• 1: Introduction: An Analytical Framework for Studying Territoriality of the Vote in Eastern Europe
• 2: Bosnia and Herzegovina: An Archetypical Example of an Ethnocracy
• 3: Croatia: Elections for Weak Counties When Regionalization Is Not Finished Yet
• 4: Czech Republic: Regional Elections Without Regional Politics
• 5: Hungary: Are Neglected Regional Elections Second-Order Elections?
• 6: Poland: Nationalization Despite Fear of Regionalization
• 7: Romania: Regional Persistence in a Highly Nationalized Party System
• 8: Russia: Nationalization Achieved Through Electoral and Institutional Engineering
• 9: Serbia and Montenegro. From Centralization to Secession and Multi-ethnic Regionalism
• 10: Slovakia: The Unbearable Lightness of Regionalization
• 11: Turkey: Provincial Elections as a Barometer of National Politics
• 12: Conclusion: Towards an Explanation of the Territoriality of the Vote in Eastern Europe
• Bibliography
• Index