Date of Award
4-2014
Document Type
Thesis
Department
Political Science
First Advisor
Patrick Donnay
Abstract
Economic voting, the theory that when the economy is good the party in control gains support and when the economy is bad the party in power suffers. This is a simplistic definition and economic voting is so much more. In this paper I seek to prove how economic voting can be broken down into two categories, sociotropic and checkbook. I do this by looking at two countries in very different situation. Greece is a country going through economic turmoil and is constantly changing which party is in control of the government. It has been suffering especially hard from a debt crisis that has crippled the country’s economy. SYRIZA, the coalition of the radical left, has surpassed the PASOK, the moderate left wing party, in the most recent election. Germany on the other hand has been relatively stable throughout the European debt crisis. The economy has remained stable and Angela Merkel and the Christian Democrats will be in control of the government for third straight term. In Greece I seek to show how sociotropic economic voting is taking place and how radical parties are gaining support. In Germany I show how checkbook economic voting is taking place and why it is.
Recommended Citation
Coen-Tuff, Matthew, "Economic Voting, Sociotropic vs. Checkbook: Cases from Greece and Germany" (2014). Political Science Theses and Capstones. 65.
https://pines.bemidjistate.edu/capstone-polisci/65
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