This paper aims to contribute to the nascent field of research on affective polarisation in liberal democracies by reflecting on the conceptual ambiguities as well as potentials inherent in the concept. Based on a systematic, critical review of 78 articles, I discuss three main ambiguities in...

Political parties are often argued to compete for voters by stressing issues they feel they own - a strategy known as 'selective emphasis'. While usually seen as an electorally rewarding strategy, this article argues that cultivating your themes in the public debate is not guaranteed to be...

Despite being a consolidated democracy with free and fair elections and having a political system with intense party competition, a relatively vibrant civil society, and a functioning federal set-up, India still ranks poorly in terms of the coverage, generosity, efficiency, and quality of its...

Competition between political parties is a process that unfolds over time whereas formal theories of party competition have tended to take an essentially static, or one-shot, approach. This leaves some gaps in our understanding of the dynamics of campaigning. The aim of this paper is to make up...

We propose a theory of party competition (two parties, single-issue) where citizens acquire party membership by contributing money to a party, and where a member’s influence on the policy taken by her party is proportional to her campaign contribution. The polity consists of informed and...

As the legislative body of the European Union, the European Parliament groups 732 elected representatives from over 170 national political parties from 25 member states. At the EP level, these members are affiliated with seven major party groups representing distinct policy positions. In this...

This paper proposes a simple model of political supporters in an environment of spatial political competition. We assume that supporters are driven by sympathy for a candidate with similar preferences on their side of the policy space and by fear of a candidate with different preferences on the...

Japan's ruling party is a prime example of a dominant party. While dominant parties in other democracies around the world have lost their grip on power or have even disappeared altogether, the LDP is still going strong. What explains the success of the party? How did the LDP acquire its dominant...