Skip to main content
SpringerLink
Log in

Strategic voting in the second round of a two-round system: The 2014 French municipal elections

  • Original Article
  • Published:
French Politics Aims and scope

Abstract

We examine strategic voting in the second round of the 2014 French municipal elections. We focus on the 96 cities where the number of lists remained constant (three, four, or five) in the two rounds, and we examine the evolution of the vote for these 329 lists from the first to the second round. We show that support for the top two lists (in the first round) systematically increases in the second round at the expense of the other lists. The second list makes as much progress as the first list, ruling out a bandwagon effect. Strategic desertion of the non-viable lists is more pronounced when the distance from the second list is high, and there is close competition between the top two lists. This suggests that voters in these cities behave in a second round of a two-round election as they do under FPTP, provided that there are many candidates/parties and that the second round is held under plurality.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Log in via an institution

Price excludes VAT (USA)
Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout.

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Institutional subscriptions

Similar content being viewed by others

References

  • Abramson, P. R., Aldrich, J. H., Paolino, P. and Rohde, D. W. (1992) Sophisticated Voting in the 1988 Presidential Primaries. American Political Science Review 86(1): 55–69.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Abramson, P. R., Aldrich, J. H., Blais, A., Diamond, M., Diskin, A., Indridason, I. H., Lee, D. J. and Levine, R. (2010) Comparing Strategic Voting Under FPTP and PR. Comparative Political Studies 43(1): 61–90.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Alvarez, R. M., Boehmke, F. J. and Nagler, J. (2006) Strategic voting in British elections. Electoral Studies 25(1): 1–19.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Ansolabehere, S. and Iyengar, S. (1994) Of Horseshoes and Horse Races - Experimental Studies of the Impact of Poll Results on Electoral-Behavior. Political Communication 11(4): 413–430.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Bischoff, I. and Egbert, H. (2013) Social information and bandwagon behavior in voting: An economic experiment. Journal of Economic Psychology 34: 270–284.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Black, J. H. (1978) Multi-Candidate Calculus of Voting—Application to Canadian Federal Elections. American Journal of Political Science 22(3): 609–638.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Blais, A., Nadeau, R., Gidengil, E. and Nevitte, N. (2001) Measuring strategic voting in multiparty plurality elections. Electoral Studies 20(3): 343–352.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Blais, A. (2002) Why is there so little strategic voting in Canadian plurality rule elections? Political Studies 50(3): 445–454.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Blais, A. (2004) Strategic voting in the 2002 French Presidential Election. In: M.S. Lewis-Beck (ed.) The French Voter: Before and After the 2002 Elections. New York: Palgrave, pp 93–109.

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  • Blais, A., Aldrich, J. H., Indridason, I. and Levine, R. (2006) Do Voters Care about Government Coalitions? Party Politics 12: 691–705.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Blais, A. and Gschwend, T. (2011) Strategic Defection across Elections, Parties, and Voters. In: R.J. Dalton and C.J. Anderson (eds.) Citizens, Context, and Choice: How the Political Context Shapes Electoral Behavior. Oxford: Oxford University Press, pp. 176–196.

    Google Scholar 

  • Burden, B. C. (2005) Minor parties and strategic voting in recent US presidential elections. Electoral Studies 24(4): 603–618.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Cain, B. E. (1978) Strategic Voting in Britain. American Journal of Political Science 22(3): 639–655.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Cox, G. (1997) Making Votes Count: Strategic Coordination in the World’s Electoral Systems. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • Dolez, B. and Laurent, A. (2010) Strategic voting in a semi-presidential system with a two-ballot electoral system. The 2007 French legislative elections. French Politics 8(1): 1–20.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Gschwend, T. (2007) Ticket-splitting and strategic voting under mixed electoral rules: Evidence from Germany. European Journal of Political Research 46(1): 1–23.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Mehrabian, A. (1998) Effects of poll reports on voter preferences. Journal of Applied Social Psychology 28(23): 2119–2130.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Parodi, J.-L. (1983) Dans la logique des élections intermédiaires. Revue politique et parlementaire 903, avril: 42–70.

Download references

Acknowledgements

We thank the reviewers of this article for their constructive suggestions.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Université de Paris1, Paris, France

    Bernard Dolez

  2. CERAPS, Université de Lille, Lille, France

    Annie Laurent

  3. Université de Montréal, Montreal, QC, Canada

    André Blais

Authors
  1. Bernard Dolez
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  2. Annie Laurent
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  3. André Blais
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Annie Laurent.

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this article

Dolez, B., Laurent, A. & Blais, A. Strategic voting in the second round of a two-round system: The 2014 French municipal elections. Fr Polit 15, 27–42 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1057/s41253-016-0010-9

Download citation

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/s41253-016-0010-9

Keywords

Search

Navigation