Citizens’ Definitions of Fulfilled Election Promises

Abstract

Earlier chapters of this book have shown that there is a widespread perception that parties usually break their election promises. We have also seen that this negative view of parties’ election promises expresses something more than people’s general distrust in politicians. In this chapter, I will dig deeper into what individuals mean when they say that parties usually break their promises. With the help of interviews with citizens, I will discuss whether or not — and in what way — citizens’ definitions of fulfilled election promises can help us understand the pledge puzzle: can the difference between scholars’ and citizens’ conclusions be explained by differences in definitions? The focus of the analyses are the words and the formulations that people use themselves when they explain what they mean by broken and fulfilled election promises.