Campaign organizers and the media appear to agree that voters'
perceptions of party leaders have an important impact in elections:
considerable effort is made to ensure that leaders look good, speak
well, and that they are up in the polls. In contrast, the academic
literature is much more divided. Some suggest that leaders play an
important role in the vote calculus, while others argue that in
comparison to other factors, perceptions of leaders have only a
minimal impact. This study incorporates data from thirty-five
election studies across seven countries with varying institutional
environments, and takes both a broad and in-depth look at the role
of leaders. A few noteworthy conclusions emerge. First, voters
evaluate leaders' traits in terms of two main dimensions, character
and competence. Second, voters perceive leaders within the
framework of a partisan stereotype in which the party label of the
leader imbues meaning; more specifically, leaders of Conservative
parties are seen to be more competent while Left leaders are seen
to have more character. Third, and most importantly, leaders
matter: they affect voters' decisions and have a discernible effect
on the distribution of votes in an election. Fourth, there are
consistent differences in the perception of party leaders according
to voters' level of political sophistication. While all voters
evaluate party leaders and consider leaders in their vote calculus,
the more sophisticated do so the most. This book argues that
personality plays an important role in elections, and that in a
healthy democracy, so it should. Comparative Politics is a series
for students, teachers, and researchers of political science that
deals with contemporary government and politics. Global in scope,
books in the series are characterised by a stress on comparative
analysis and strong methodological rigour. The series is published
in association with the European Consortium for Political Research.
For more information visit: www.essex.ac.uk/ecpr The Comparative
Politics Series is edited by Professor David M. Farrell, School of
Politics and International Relations, University College Dublin,
Kenneth Carty, Professor of Political Science, University of
British Columbia, and Professor Dirk Berg-Schlosser, Institute of
Political Science, Philipps University, Marburg.
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