Analyzing the Greek elections results of 2000 under different spatial structures

The paper attempts to empirically explain the vote shares received by political parties across municipalities in Greece during the national elections of 2000, in terms of demographic, educational, occupational and other factors under two territorial specifications: one based on the conventional sub-regional organization of the country, the other based on that spatial patterns of residuals. It finds that by departing from the approach which relies on typical spatial dummies (a) the regression-fit improves considerably, and (b) a good number of spatial effects which might ordinarily be blurred within conventional partitions may be important and, at the very least, their distinct impact ought to be considered. The lesson is probably useful to readers interested in identifying through statistics, health, education, crime or other policy areas.