Fair Elections and Democracy: Research about Voting

In democracies we think of fair elections as an essential "social good." The United States is currently focused on a critical mid-term election. The popular press, media, and most conversations seem to circle around issues related to voting access and voter engagement. The polarized, fragmented news environment is of concern to those who believe accurate information is essential to citizens who are making important choices about candidates and initiatives.

Clearly, such questions are of interest to scholars across the world. Here are some open access articles with links and abstracts. This multidisciplinary collection includes studies that utilized a variety of qualitative and quantitative methods.

What do scholars have to say?

Benson, J. (2019). Deliberative democracy and the problem of tacit knowledge. Politics, Philosophy & Economics, 18(1), 76–97. https://doi.org/10.1177/1470594X18782086

Abstract. This article defends deliberative democracy against the problem of tacit knowledge. It has been argued that deliberative democracy gives a privileged position to linguistic communication and therefore excludes tacit forms of knowledge which cannot be expressed propositionally. This article shows how the exclusion of such knowledge presents important challenges to both proceduralist and epistemic conceptions of deliberative democracy, and how it has been taken by some to favour markets over democratic institutions. After pointing to the limitations of market alternatives, deliberative democracy is defended by arguing that tacit knowledge can be brought into deliberation through the mechanism of trust in testimony. By trusting the testimony of a speaker, deliberators are able to act on knowledge even without it being explicitly expressed. The article then goes on to discuss the implications of this defence for deliberative theory, and particularly, the forms of reason which deliberative democrats must see as legitimate.

Breitenstein, S. (2019). Choosing the crook: A conjoint experiment on voting for corrupt politicians. Research & Politics, 6(1). https://doi.org/10.1177/2053168019832230

Abstract. The coexistence of harsh disapproval of corruption and the limited electoral consequences of malfeasant behavior remains a conundrum in social sciences. While elections should be used to hold politicians accountable, evidence shows that voters only mildly punish corrupt politicians. This paper assesses the trade-off hypothesis, which suggests that voters forgive corrupt candidates when these candidates provide other valued outcomes. It distinguishes two possible factors against which integrity can be traded—partisanship and economic performance—and tests them in a multidimensional experiment. With the results of an original conjoint analysis, this paper provides compelling evidence for the relative importance of corruption when casting a vote and the mitigating effects of other valued candidate characteristics. Even when obtaining highly credible information, partisanship determines the vote to the same extent as corruption. Additionally, co-partisanship and a strong economic performance moderate the negative effect corruption has on the vote.

Cohen, M. J., & Smith, A. E. (2016). Do authoritarians vote for authoritarians? Evidence from Latin America. Research & Politics, 3(4). https://doi.org/10.1177/2053168016684066

Abstract. During the 2016 presidential election campaign in the United States, scholars argued that authoritarian visions of the family are associated with support for Donald Trump, a candidate also noted to exhibit authoritarian or illiberal tendencies. Though it is plausible that “authoritarian” citizens (defined by parenting attitudes) vote for “authoritarian” candidates (defined by disrespect for democratic institutions), past research provides relatively little guide regarding this relationship. One reason is that few US candidates announce overtly authoritarian views. Latin America, by contrast, has had many such candidates. We take advantage of this variation using the 2012 AmericasBarometer, which applied a battery of authoritarian parenting attitudes. We first describe mass authoritarianism across Latin America, showing it is associated with many social attitudes. We then examine authoritarians’ voting behavior, distinguishing between support for “mano dura” (“strong arm”) candidates, who are usually rightists, and for candidates threatening violations of general civil liberties, who are often leftists in Latin America. We find that authoritarians tend to vote for right-wing authoritarian candidates, while authoritarianism boosts support for candidates threatening civil liberty violations only among citizens identifying on the ideological right. Education is the most consistent determinant reducing support for both leftist and rightist authoritarian candidates.

Dawson, S. (2022). Poll Wars: Perceptions of Poll Credibility and Voting Behaviour. The International Journal of Press/Politics, 0(0). https://doi.org/10.1177/19401612221087181

Abstract. Pre-election opinion polls are an increasingly prominent aspect of political campaigns, yet they often vary in terms of their results, sources, and where they are published. Citizens are therefore increasingly confronted with the proposition of which polls to give more credence to than others in shaping their voting behaviour. This study investigates the relationship between subjective determinations of poll credibility and voting behaviour in the polarised context of Turkish mayoral elections. The theoretical perspective of motivated reasoning is employed to consider how individuals determine and act upon credible opinion polls in mixed information environments. Using an original two-step experimental approach conducted in 2020, this paper establishes that while the effects of opinion poll credibility on party choice are limited to the strategic considerations of the supporters of smaller parties, opinion polls can have considerable demobilising effects when polling environments are conflicting or deemed not credible. The findings produced in this study are more suggestive of accuracy-seeking than directional motivations, and they have considerable implications for how we think about the relationship between polls, politicians, and voters.

Hansen, E. R., & Treul, S. A. (2021). Inexperienced or anti-establishment? Voter preferences for outsider congressional candidates. Research & Politics, 8(3). https://doi.org/10.1177/20531680211034958

Abstract. Do US voters prefer inexperienced candidates? Candidates who have never held elected office before have had greater success in recent presidential and congressional elections. However, it could be that voters prefer the type of anti-establishment rhetoric that such candidates use more than the lack of experience itself. We conduct a 2x2 factorial experiment that manipulates a fictitious congressional candidate’s experience and rhetoric toward the political system. Results from a nationally representative Qualtrics sample and two follow-up studies from Mechanical Turk show that respondents evaluate the candidate more positively when he uses anti-establishment rhetoric instead of pro-establishment rhetoric. Though the findings are mixed, we find weak and inconsistent evidence that respondent prefer inexperienced candidates to experienced ones. The results suggest that outsider candidates receive an electoral boost by using anti-establishment messaging, but that candidates’ political résumés matter less to potential voters.

Hargittai, E., & Karaoglu, G. (2018). Biases of Online Political Polls: Who Participates? Socius, 4. https://doi.org/10.1177/2378023118791080

Abstract. With a large portion of the population online and the high cost of phone-based surveys, querying people about their voter preference online can offer an affordable and timely alternative. However, given that there are biases in who adopts various sites and services that are often used as sampling frames (e.g., various social media), online political polls may not represent the views of the overall population. How are such polls biased? Who is most likely to participate in them? Drawing on a national survey of voter-eligible American adults administered in summer 2016, this paper shows that background characteristics (i.e., age, gender, race, education, and employment status) as well as Internet experiences and skills relate to who casts votes in online political polls.

Hassell, H. J. G. (2017). Teaching voters new tricks: The effect of partisan absentee vote-by-mail get-out-the-vote efforts. Research & Politics, 4(1). https://doi.org/10.1177/2053168017694806

Abstract. In the last few years policy innovators have implemented a variety of new voting reforms aimed at increasing the ways voters can cast their ballot and with it voter turnout. While these efforts have largely suggested that the net effect of these reforms has been minimal, scholars have not analyzed the effectiveness of the use of these methods by partisan campaigns to increase targeted turnout or to change the methods voters use to cast their ballot. In collaboration with a state party organization, I examine the effect of a partisan get-out-the-vote effort using an absentee vote-by-mail push. I find that these get-out-the-vote efforts to target voters using absentee ballot request forms are effective at shifting more voters to vote absentee. However, while pushing absentee vote-by-mail balloting may bank votes for a campaign before Election Day, the overall effect of partisan campaigns’ use of absentee ballot efforts to increase turnout appears limited.

McGauvran, R. J., & Stewart, B. (2021). Turning discontent into votes: Economic inequality and ethnic outbidding. Research & Politics, 8(4). https://doi.org/10.1177/20531680211067881

Abstract. Ethnic outbidding, where parties adopt ever more extreme positions to capture electoral advantage, has become an increasingly common practice among ethnic parties. As economic issues have often served as a catalyst for ethnic tension, increasing levels of economic inequality should lead parties to adopt more extreme positions in an attempt to outbid one another. Furthermore, as their economic and ethnic platforms will appeal to the same ethnically defined constituency, ethnic outbidding should be more effective where inequality is high. Using a sample of over 150 ethnonational parties in Europe between 2011 and 2017, this paper finds that inequality is linked to increasing ideological extremism along a number of policy dimensions. Employing local-level voting data for Romania and Slovakia, we show that higher inequality makes adopting a more ideological extreme position a more successful electoral strategy, especially where economic issues are ethnically salient.

McGhee, E., Paluch, J., & Romero, M. (2022). Vote-by-mail policy and the 2020 presidential election. Research & Politics, 9(2). https://doi.org/10.1177/20531680221089197

Abstract. Mail voting became unusually controversial in the 2020 presidential election. Many observers, including former President Trump, believed that more accessible vote by mail would encourage higher turnout at the expense of Republicans. While the literature has tested some of these claims, it has not offered a more comprehensive causal assessment of vote-by-mail policy, nor has any study looked at these questions in the context of the extraordinary 2020 election. We examine the effect of mail ballot access policies both before and during the 2020 pandemic election with county-level data and a variety of methodological approaches. Our results suggest that making it easier to vote by mail—especially mailing every voter a ballot—generally does increase turnout, both before and during the 2020 election. By contrast, the same policies do not have robust partisan effects, and in many models, they tilt the results in a more Republican direction. While some of our findings are sensitive to model specification, the positive turnout effect of mailing every voter a ballot is robust to many alternative approaches. The confirmation of the existing understanding of universally mailed ballots suggests the basic dynamics of the reform are immune to a wide range of disruptive forces.

Metag, J., & Gurr, G. (2022). Too Much Information? A Longitudinal Analysis of Information Overload and Avoidance of Referendum Information Prior to Voting Day. Journalism & Mass Communication Quarterly, 0(0). https://doi.org/10.1177/10776990221127380

Abstract. Previous research has mostly ignored that citizens could experience information overload from a single issue extensively covered in the news. Especially when it comes to issues upon which citizens decide directly in a referendum, overload and avoidance would be problematic from a democracy theory perspective. This study investigates overload and avoidance at the issue level based on a three-wave panel survey on a referendum in Switzerland and finds weak information overload at the aggregate level. However, citizens become increasingly overloaded during the period of extensive news coverage which leads to avoidance of news on the issue but not of interpersonal discussions.

Plescia, C., Sevi, S., & Blais, A. (2021). Who Likes to Vote by Mail? American Politics Research, 49(4), 381–385. https://doi.org/10.1177/1532673X211005684

Abstract. Interest in voting by mail has increased during the coronavirus as a way to avoid in person contact. In this study, we conducted a survey in February 2020 in the United States to examine citizen preferences to cast their ballot at a polling station, over the internet, or by mail. By including simultaneously internet and mail as alternative voting options to the polling station we aim to disentangle convenience (both alternative options are presumably more convenient) from novelty (internet is more novel than mail and polling station voting). We find that the person who likes voting by mail the most is an older White-American with little interest in politics; and the person who likes voting by mail the least is a younger African-American or Latino with high interest in politics. All in all, the biggest cleavage in citizens’ preferences about how to vote is generational, not ideological.

Slee, G., & Desmond, M. (2021). Eviction and Voter Turnout: The Political Consequences of Housing Instability. Politics & Society, 0(0). https://doi.org/10.1177/00323292211050716

Abstract. In recent years, housing costs have outpaced incomes in the United States, resulting in millions of eviction filings each year. Yet no study has examined the link between eviction and voting. Drawing on a novel data set that combines tens of millions of eviction and voting records, this article finds that residential eviction rates negatively impacted voter turnout during the 2016 presidential election. Results from a generalized additive model show eviction’s effect on voter turnout to be strongest in neighborhoods with relatively low rates of displacement. To address endogeneity bias and estimate the causal effect of eviction on voting, the analysis treats commercial evictions as an instrument for residential evictions, finding that increases in neighborhood eviction rates led to substantial declines in voter turnout. This study demonstrates that the impact of eviction reverberates far beyond housing loss, affecting democratic participation.

Valgarðsson, V. O., & Devine, D. (2022). What Satisfaction with Democracy? A Global Analysis of “Satisfaction with Democracy” Measures. Political Research Quarterly, 75(3), 576–590. https://doi.org/10.1177/10659129211009605

Abstract. Asking citizens “the way democracy works” is the basis of a wide literature on the support citizens have for their political institutions and is one of the most common survey items in political science. Moreover, it is a key indicator for the purported global decline in legitimacy. Yet, its trends, levels, and dynamics are still debated, and conclusions may be erroneous. In this paper, we compile a unique global dataset between 1973 and 2018 encompassing all major cross-national datasets and national election studies in twelve countries to study the dynamics and consistency of “satisfaction with democracy” (SWD) measures globally. Our results show that while trends and between-country differences in democratic satisfaction are largely similar, the levels of satisfaction vary substantially between survey projects, and both trends and levels vary significantly in several widely studied countries. We show that this has consequences at the individual level: opting for one survey over another may alter our conclusions about the relationship between key demographics and SWD. Thus, researchers studying SWD should endeavor to consult diverse survey sources and should be cautious about their conclusions when they do not, especially when it comes to making claims about changes in SWD over time.

Ytre-Arne, B., & Moe, H. (2018). Approximately Informed, Occasionally Monitorial? Reconsidering Normative Citizen Ideals. The International Journal of Press/Politics, 23(2), 227–246. https://doi.org/10.1177/1940161218771903

Abstract. This article identifies gaps between normative ideals and realistic accounts of news use in democracy today. Starting from the widespread but unrealistic ideal of the informed citizen, and its more realistic development through notions of the monitorial citizen, we analyze comprehensive qualitative data on news users’ experiences. We describe these news users as approximately informed, occasionally monitorial. This description emphasizes the limited, shifting, and partial figurations of societal information that citizens are able to obtain through their use of journalistic and social media, and thereby challenges normative ideals. How do monitorial ideals function when the citizens are only occasionally on guard? By zooming in on three key gaps between even a less demanding ideal and actual practices in news use, we underline the need to further reconceptualize our expectations of citizens’ news use.

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