Who's the Life of the Party? the Impact of Personal and Party Traits on Partisan Cue-Taking

Abstract

When parties endorse policy positions and priorities, they are thought to send a signal about which policy best serves the interests, or is most consistent with the values, of their followers. Survey research has long confirmed a strong link between partisanship and policy attitudes, but left the causal direction in doubt. More recently, experimental evidence has confirmed that party cues influence the policy views of citizens. Most such research has been conducted in the U.S., which is unusual among democracies for both the small size and great longevity of its party system. To what extent do party cues shape policy opinions in young or multiparty systems? We broaden the investigation to include party systems of varying size and stability. Moreover, while it is clear party cues can be potent, it is equally clear many partisans do not follow their party’s lead. Theoretically, some parties should be more successful cue-givers than others and some citizens more reliable cue-takers than others. We test the extent to which cue-taking is moderated by traits of parties (longevity, position in government) or individuals (experience, knowledge, personality) from a series of survey experiments in Great Britain, Hungary, and Poland

Keywords: partisanship, party cues, political parties, personality, Great Britain, Hungary, Poland, survey experiments