Title

Citizens' Confidence In Government, Parliament And Political Parties

Abstract

This article explores citizens' confidence in political institutions in relation to policy responsiveness within and across countries. The core premise of the mandate theory is that democratic elections deliver the median preferences in policy making to satisfy most citizens' interests. Thus, citizens will display greater confidence toward their political institutions when they perceive that their preferences are pursued in policy making. Twelve consolidated and new democracies from the World Values and European Values Surveys and the Comparative Manifesto Project data sets are analyzed. The findings suggest, first, that individuals across the twelve countries display lower confidence toward political parties than toward parliament or government. Second, weak ideological attachment between individuals and the median policy-making positions in parliament lessens overall citizens' confidence in political institutions. At the institutional level, citizens' confidence for each political institution is most positively affected by the inclusion of the median party in policy processes. © 2017 Wiley. All rights reserved.

Publication Date

1-1-2007

Publication Title

Politics and Policy

Volume

35

Issue

3

Number of Pages

496-521

Document Type

Article

Personal Identifier

scopus

DOI Link

https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1747-1346.2007.00070.x

Socpus ID

51249147183 (Scopus)

Source API URL

https://api.elsevier.com/content/abstract/scopus_id/51249147183

This document is currently not available here.

Share

COinS