This volume re-examines how the incentives created by specific electoral institutions affect the behaviour of voters and party elites. It provides the first systematic analysis of multi-level politics at three distinct levels: regional, national, and European Parliament elections.

National-level elections receive more attention from scholars and the media than elections at other levels, even though in many European countries the importance of both regional and European levels of government has grown in recent years. The growing importance of multiple electoral arenas suggests that scholars should be cautious about examining single levels in isolation. Taking the multilevel structure of electoral politics seriously requires a re-examination of how the incentives created by electoral institutions affect the behaviour of voters and party elites. The standard approach to analysing multilevel elections is the second-order election (SOE) model, in which national elections are considered to be first-order elections while other elections are second order. However, this model does not provide micro mechanisms that determine how elections in one arena affect those in another, or explain variations in individual voting behaviour. The objective of this book is to explain how party and voter behaviour in a given election is affected by the existence of multiple electoral arenas. It provides original qualitative and quantitative data to examine European, national, and subnational elections in France, Germany, and Spain from 2011-2015. The volume examines party mobilization efforts across multiple electoral arenas, as well as decisions by individual voters with respect to turnout, strategic voting, and accountability. This book provides the first systematic analysis of multilevel electoral politics at three different levels across multiple countries. Comparative Politics is a series for researchers, teachers, and students of political science that deals with contemporary government and politics. Global in scope, books in the series are characterised by a stress on comparative analysis and strong methodological rigour. The series is published in association with the European Consortium for Political Research. For more information visit: www.ecprnet.eu. The series is edited by Emilie van Haute, Professor of Political Science, Université libre de Bruxelles; Ferdinand Müller-Rommel, Director of the Center for the Study of Democracy, Leuphana University; and Susan Scarrow, Chair of the Department of Political Science, University of Houston.

A study of territorial dynamics within party organizations in multi-layered systems. This book contributes to a new approach in party research which acknowledges the importance of multi-layered institutional framing. It includes an analysis of vertical linkages and sub-state autonomy in Austrian, Belgian, British, German and Spanish parties.

An exploration of the role that special interest groups play in modern democratic politics.

This is an open access title available under the terms of a CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 International licence. It is free to read at Oxford Scholarship Online and offered as a free PDF download from OUP and selected open access locations. Electoral Shocks: The Volatile Voter in a Turbulent World offers a novel perspective on British elections, focusing on the role of electoral shocks in the context of increasing electoral volatility. It demonstrates and explains the long-term trend in volatility, how shocks have contributed to the level of electoral volatility, and also which parties have benefited from the ensuing volatility. It follows in the tradition of British Election Study books, providing a comprehensive account of specific election outcomes- the General Elections of 2015 and 2017-and a more general and novel approach to understanding electoral change. The authors examine five electoral shocks that affected the elections of 2015 and 2017: the rise in immigration after 2004, particularly from Eastern Europe; the Global Financial Crisis prior to 2010; the coalition government of the Conservatives and the Liberal Democrats between 2010 and 2015; the Scottish Independence Referendum in 2014; and the European Union Referendum in 2016. The focus on electoral shocks offers an overarching explanation for the volatility in British elections, alongside the long-term trends that have led to this point. It offers a way to understand the rise and fall of the UK Independence Party (UKIP), Labour's disappointing 2015 performance and its later unexpected gains, the collapse in support for the Liberal Democrats, the dramatic gains of the Scottish National Party (SNP) in 2015, and the continuing period of tumultuous politics that has followed the EU referendum and the General Election of 2017. It provides a new way of understanding electoral choice in Britain, and also beyond, and a better understanding of the outcomes of recent elections.

One of the key shifts in contemporary politics is the trend towards greater personalization. Collective actors such as political parties are losing relevance. Citizens are slowly dealigning from these actors, and individual politicians are therefore growing in importance in elections, in government, within parties, and in media reporting of politics. A crucial question concerns how this new pattern could be restructuring politics over the long run - notably, whether the personalization of politics is changing the institutional architecture of contemporary democracies. The authors show that the trend towards personalization is indeed changing core democratic institutions. Studying the evolution of electoral systems in thirty-one European democracies since 1945, they demonstrate that, since the 1990s, there has been a shift towards more personalized electoral systems. Electoral systems in most European countries now allow voters to express preferences for candidates, not just for political parties. And the weight of these voters' preferences in the allocation of seats has been increased in numerous countries. They examine the factors that appear to be driving this evolution, finding that the personalization of electoral systems is associated with the growing gap between citizens and politics. Politicians and legislators appear to perceive the personalization of electoral systems as a way to address the democratic malaise and to restore trust in politics by reducing the role of political parties in elections. The book also shows, however, that whether these reforms have had any success in achieving their aims is far less clear. Comparative Politics is a series for students, teachers, and researchers of political science that deals with contemporary government and politics. Global in scope, books in the series are characterised by a stress on comparative analysis and strong methodological rigour. The series is published in association with the European Consortium for Political Research. For more information visit: www.ecprnet.eu. The Comparative Politics series is edited by Emilie van Haute, Professor of Political Science, Universite libre de Bruxelles; Ferdinand Muller-Rommel, Director of the Center for the Study of Democracy, Leuphana University; and Susan Scarrow, Chair of the Department of Political Science, University of Houston.