Party Competition under the German mixed electoral system

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In this project we investigate the centripetal and centrifugal effects on party competition which can be traced back to the mixed electoral system for German Bundestag elections (proportional system linked with plurality system). First, an adequate spatial model will be selected from the rich pool of formal models of party competition and modified so that it fits the German situation with more than one policy dimension. Second, the federal elections have to be identified for which the necessary survey data are available for secondary analyses so that policy spaces can be constructed. The most important position issues of an election campaign have to be mapped to this space, including both the policy preferences of voters and the perceived positions of parties. In addition, party valences have to be taken into account, that is the popularity of parties insofar as it is independent from the policy standpoints of a party. Third, the hypotheses derived from the model will be tested, as for instance the obvious one that plurality election in single member constituencies has centripetal effects, whereas national proportional systems boost centrifugal tendencies of party competition. The hypothesis test in this third part will compare the party equilibrium configuration which will be computed under the assumption of two separate tiers of the electoral system. Fourth, a model of party competition in mixed electoral systems has to consider interactions or contamination between the plurality and proportional section of the electoral system both at the level of voters and of parties. Such a refined model will be developed. The results of this project will also help to evaluate mixed electoral systems from a normative viewpoint.