Friction and Party Manifesto Change in 25 Countries, 1945-98

1. Friction and Party Manifesto Change in 25 Countries, 1945-98 S. Walgrave and M. Nuytemans Francesco Russo Comparative Politics A.Y. 2009-10

2. Framework • Introduction • Agenda-setting approach and notions of cognitive and institutional friction • Seven hypotheses in party program change • Presentation of data (L-Kurtosis) • Empirical analysis testing • Results and perspectives

3. Introduction 1 • If society changes  politics must change i.e. the political agenda must react to the societal agenda BUT • Capacity of political systems to respond to societal demands is limited Political agendas are not in tune with the outside world

4. Introduction 2 • Jones and Baumgartner in the Politics of Alternative (2005) introduce the notion of Friction: political institutions are affected by resistance to change leading to a situation of limited change or incrementalism alternating with short burst of intense and dramatic change.

5. Introduction 3 • Argument: adaptation process of party preferences • 3 questions: • To what extent do party preferences change over time? • Are trere any differences between parties in the way they adapt to changing demands? • What determines change pattern differences?

6. Introduction 4 • Empirical data are produced by the Manifesto Research Group (MRG) • To what extent the emphasis of party manifestos on policy issues changes between elections? • What are the features of parties and party systems that account for differences between parties?

7. Political Parties and Party Manifestos: change and friction • Parties are central political actors because they link citizens’ preferences with policies • Although manifestos are not well known they form the core of a party’s plan  party manifestos matter for policy making because they affect the political agenda and steer policy attention on certain issues

8. Change and friction- Downs • How parties make the difference in the representation process? • Parties try to convince the voters without adapting their programmes according to their preferences • Parties shift positions and try to get closer to the electorate • dynamic representation: electoral competition + need of extra votes may lead to constant and smooth adaptation of parties (Downs et alii)

9. Change and friction- Budge • Parties have no or imperfect information about whether they will win or not the elections, nor about the median voter’s position  move little or incrementally because they do not want to loose votes  No smooth adaptation but hardly changeable and incremental party manifestos (Budge)

10. Change and Friction 3 • From a rationalist point of view, party manifestos tend to maximize voters  they are expected to change smoothly BUT in reality they are not flexbile and changeable. Why? Because of friction in political institutions (Jones and Baumgartner)

11. Friction and change 4 • Stimuli from the outside are filtred or ignored  policies slowly drift away from reality and loose their adequacy • Incrementalism: policies get locked into closed policy subsystems with a monopoly • Extreme change (lagging behind&catching up)

12. Friction and change 5 • Does this process characterize only insitutions or political parties and party manifestos too? • Cognitive limitations: lack of time and information  priorities are determined by emotions/ideologies • Institutional limitations: party programmes are the only authoritative policy statement wholly accepted by memebers  changing programmes is very difficult and very often not convenient

13. Friction and change 6 • Are there any differences? • Compared to other political institutions party programme change are expected to be moderately punctuated • Parties have very strong incentives for adapting swiftly to incoming signals. It is a matter of survival for parties

14. Causes of party manifesto change 1 • Why are some parties capable of responding smoothly and moderately to changing incoming information while others are not? Is it because of the parties or of the political system? • Literature on party manifesto change can be summarised in 7 testable hypotheses:

15. Causes of party manifesto change: hypotheses • in a two-party system or in a system with limited party systemfractionalization, party manifesto changes will be less characterized by friction and punctuations than in a multiparty system • opposition parties’ manifestos adapt smoother and are less characterized by friction and punctuations than government party programs • parties with a central ideological position adapt smoother and their program changes are less characterized by friction and punctuations than ideologically extreme parties • parties losing elections change their program more smoothly and in a less punctuated way than parties winning elections

16. Causes of party manifesto change: hypotheses • small parties change their manifestos more smoothly and are less hindered by friction than large parties • party systempolarization leads tomore friction and punctuations in manifesto changeswhile less polarized party systems are characterized by smooth and nonfrictional adaptation • manifesto change in the first half of the postwar era is characterized by a punctuated patternwhile manifesto change from the 1970s onwards is a smoother and less frictional process

17. Data and Methods • Dataset provided by the MRG • 25 countries in 50 years (1945-98) • Countries were all Western European democrecies (+ others) • 56 different issue codes (informative and directional) • Total number of parties: 288 for 364 different national elections • 2 periods: 1945-71/1971-98 • Only parties that took part in 4 competitions were included

18. Data and Methods • Dependent variable: the study of Manifesto party changes • Independent variables: party system fractionalisation, opposition vs. Government, ideological position of a party,electoral fate of a party, party size, party system polarisation • Distributive index: L-Kurtosis If change is punctuated the LK will be high If change is not punctuated the LK is low

19. Analysis • LK scores range from 0 to 1, where 1 means that the distribution of changes is leptokurtotik in the middle of the distribution (many extreme changes) and few cases in the shoulder of the distribution (moderate changes) • Manifesto change is punctuated (0.41): parties do not change smoothly their manifestos. They tend to stick the status quo and shift their programmatic issues attention incrementally. • Central peak: frequent no change. Weak shoulders: infrequent moderate change Long tails: frequent extreme change  most of the parties hardly adapt their attention to issues • T1: differences between countries are substantial and significant • T2: differences between party types are bigger between countries

20. Bivariate analyses • H7: in recent years party manifestos have become more flexible. The evidence shows the opposite. They are more punctuated and characterized by friction than before. • Parties became more rigid and firm while voters less rigid and free floating (T4)

21. Multivariate analysis • Are there any other robust patterns of party manifesto change that apply to the whole post-war period? Can we measure the impact of the different explainingh variables? (T5)

22. Conclusion and Discussion • Party programmes change incrementally or dramaticcally and moderate changes are exceptional • There is a tremendous resistance to change (frictions) • Differences between parties are substantial: some have more smoothly shifting manifestos, others hardly change it • Party manifestos are influenced by feautures of parties and political system in which the party operates

23. Conclusion and Discussion • Party leadership change: long-standing leadershiop can be expected to be characterized by a punctuated manifesto change pattern • Causal link b/w the independent (parties, party siystems) and dependent variables (party change) associations can be up side down • Party programs are not flexible • Party role in democracy? Should parties adapt smoothly to the environment or should they offer stable choices?