Party system issue agendas are formed by the topics that individual parties decide to
address, and these salience decisions are likely to be strategic. Two key strategies are …

Do parties listen to their voters? This article addresses this important question by moving
beyond position congruence to explore whether parties respond to voters' issue priorities. It …

Legislative speeches are an important instrument for parties and members of parliament
(MPs) to signal their positions and priorities. This raises the question of who speaks when …

The concept of the niche party has become increasingly popular in analyses of party
competition. Yet, existing approaches vary in their definitions and their measurement …

Coalition parties have to reconcile two competing logics: they need to demonstrate unity to
govern together, but also have to emphasize their own profile to succeed in elections. We …

Parties can choose to concentrate on topics which other parties cover relatively little. In such
cases, they have a programmatic niche profile compared with their mainstream rivals. We …

Why do coalition parties settle some policy issues in great detail, whereas other issues are
hardly mentioned in coalition agreements? Coalition agreements are important policy …

Although democracy is, in principle, the antithesis of dynastic rule, families with multiple
members in elective office continue to be common around the world. In most democracies …

Populist radical right‐wing parties (PRRPs) in Western Europe have almost without
exception shifted their position on distributive issues, abandoning their earlier support for a …

This article analyzes the impact of economic voting in federal elections for the German
parliament. It combines theories of coalition politics and cabinet decision making—like prime …