Associationism and Electoral Participation: A Multilevel Study of 2000 Spanish General Election

Abstract

This work presents an application of the multilevel analysis techniques to the study of the abstention in the 2000 Spanish general election. The interest of the study is both, substantive and methodological. From the substantive point of view the article intends to explain the causes of abstention and analyze the impact of associationism on it. From the methodological point of view it is intended to analyze the interaction between individual and context with a modelisation that takes into account the hierarchical structure of data. The multilevel study of this paper validates the one level results obtained in previous analysis of the abstention and shows that only a fraction of the differences in abstention are explained by the individual characteristics of the electors. Another important fraction of these differences is due to the political and social characteristics of the context. Relating to associationism, the data suggest that individual participation in associations decrease the probability of abstention. However, better indicators are needed in order to catch more properly the effect of associationism in electoral behaviour.

Note: Downloadable document is in Spanish.

Keywords: Electoral abstention in Spain, multilevel modelling

JEL Classification: C89, D72