In summary, anti-party sentiment is widespread in advanced industrial
democracies, but such sentiment does not directly translate into anti-party
establishment behaviour. More than two out of three distrustful citizens
continue to vote for one of the established political parties. However, when
voting for an established party, they are much more likely to vote for the
opposition. This suggests that anti-party sentiment is at least partially a
criticism of the ruling parties. Moreover, given the option between either
abstaining or voting for an anti-party party, dissatisfied citizens are more
likely to choose the former. Far-right parties are preferred to their
counterparts on the Left, but equally important is that a large proportion
of the left-wing anti-party voters do, in fact, believe parties care what
individuals think. In other words, the Left attracts both party cynics and
party optimists, whereas supporters of the Right are overwhelmingly cynical
of parties.
The Generalisation of Distrust
Dissatisfaction with political parties has its most direct impact on features of
electoral politics and participation in parties and elections. Yet, because the
system of party government is so closely tied to the democratic process in
most nations, these sentiments have potentially broader implications for
citizen images of government and the democratic process. Indeed, prior
research routinely demonstrates the strong relationship between trust in
parties and other dimensions of political support (e.g. Dalton 2004: ch. 3).
Miller and Listaug (1990) even argued that trust in parties is a major source
of broader system evaluations.
The link between party evaluations and other elements of political
support is demonstrated in Table 7. For instance, the first column displays a
pattern of consistently strong correlations between confidence in parties and
satisfaction with the way democracy works in the nation. These correlations
are among the strongest presented in this study. The next column in the
table shows the relationship between confidence in parties and the belief that
votes make a difference. Again, a lack of party support erodes the belief in
this basic tenet of the democratic process.
Perhaps the most striking finding comes from the last column in Table 7.
The CSES survey asked respondents if they felt the most recent national
election was conducted fairly: sentiments which touch the very legitimacy of
the system of representative democracy. Fair and honest elections are the
norm in the advanced industrial democracies included in this study. But in
several nations there is a significant minority who question the fairness of
elections: Switzerland 7 per cent, Sweden 8 per cent, Spain 9 per cent, the
United States and Britain 15 per cent, and Japan 27 per cent. Moreover,
there is a disturbing link between a lack of confidence in parties and the
belief that elections are not conducted fairly. To use the United States to
illustrate this relationship: a full 90 per cent of those who believe parties care
Public Images of Political Parties 945about the public also believe in the integrity of elections, versus a bare
majority of 51 per cent among those least confident in parties. Certainly, it is
a challenge to the very system of representative democracy when such
doubts exist among a significant part of the electorate.
At least indirectly, there is evidence that such popular doubts about
political parties are fuelling demands for reforms in the structure of electoral
politics. Growing public disenchantment with political parties led to
electoral reforms in Italy, Japan and New Zealand during the 1990s
(Shugart and Wattenberg 2001). There are mounting pressures for electoral
reform in Britain as well, and the current Dutch government is committed to
restructuring that nation’s electoral system. In the United States,
dissatisfaction with parties and politicians stimulated term-limit reforms in
several states. Frankly, we doubt whether these changes in election
procedures will fully address the public’s scepticism. Initial survey evidence
suggests that the reforms in Japan and New Zealand, for instance, did not
restore public confidence in parties (Dalton 2004: ch. 8). In addition, the fact
that distrust in parties extends across different electoral systems and party
configurations suggests that institutional reform will not resolve this
problem. Rather, the urge for reform illustrates the public’s underlying
negativity toward parties and the system of party-led government.
Without addressing the issue of causality, it is clear that party support is
part of a syndrome of general evaluations of the institutions of representative
democracy and the overall evaluations of the democratic process. Thus, it
would be a mistake to treat these measures of party support as distinct from
other measures of political support. A negative image of parties is linked to
negative images of other elements of the democratic process.
TABLE 7
TRUST IN PARTIES AND POLITICAL SUPPORT
Satisfied with
Democracy
Vote Makes a
Difference
Was Election
Fair
Australia .28 .15 –
Britain .28 .15 .08
Canada .35 .22 –
Denmark .37 .11 .18
Germany .28 .13 .11
Japan .17 .13 .30
Netherlands .24 .16 .12
New Zealand .35 .14 .22
Norway .21 .12 .08
Spain .18 .18 .08
Sweden .36 .19 .09
Switzerland .23 .15 .14
USA .23 .20 .25
Average .27 .16 .15
Note: Table entries are the Pearson r correlation between belief that parties care about what
Distrust of Parties and Democratic Governance
It would be premature to write an obituary for political parties. Political
theory and contemporary publics agree that political parties are a necessary
and important component of the democratic process. The positive
contribution of political parties is indisputable, and democracy without
parties is still difficult to imagine.
At the same time, citizens today express widespread scepticism about
political parties as institutions, and the process of representative government
based on political parties. Most citizens believe that parties do not care what
they think, are not sufficiently responsive to public interests, and cannot be
trusted to represent the public’s interests. Such sentiments have also become
more common in the past generation.
Initially, the explanation for such partisan malaise was linked to the
specific history of a nation. Americans supposedly lost trust in parties
because of the scandals and policy failures of government, illustrated by
Watergate, Congressional scandals, revelations on campaign finance, and
similar problems. Italians were alienated by the exposure of corruption in
the political and economic systems. Canadians lost faith because of the
strains of regional tensions reflected in the party system. Germans were
frustrated with the problems that flowed from unification. The research
literature in most nations tells a similar tale of how unique national
conditions produced these patterns.
Such national conditions are undoubtedly relevant, but our data suggest
that spreading dissatisfaction with political parties (and other institutions of
representative government) is a general pattern across the Western
democracies. Rather than coincidental crises or scandals separately affecting
these nations, it seems more likely that these trends represent a broader
change in the role and image of partisan politics in contemporary
democracies. It is certainly possible that trust in parties might rebound as
elites attempt to change these opinions, such short-term change is likely (but
also likely to be temporary). In the long term, we suspect that citizen images
of government have changed in ways that will continue to limit popular
support for parties and the traditional pattern of party government.
If we accept this conclusion, then we must consider the implications of
continuing public distrust of political parties. Our findings suggest that
distrust of parties has contributed to the erosion of voting turnout and
campaign activity in Western democracies. If growing proportions of the
public believe that parties do not care about their opinions, why should
these individuals then care to vote? Instead, distrust is likely to spawn more
involvement in non-partisan forms of political action, such as direct contact
with politicians, unconventional participation, citizen interest groups, and
other forms of direct action (Dalton 2004: ch. 8).
If the sceptical citizen does turn out to vote, this affects their voting
choices. Across Western democracies, distrust in parties appears to
Public Images of Political Parties 947generally increase support for two types of parties: established parties
who are in opposition and far-right parties. These two options represent
different paths for remedying the ills of political parties. The first helps to
make established parties more responsive to the citizens, since dissatisfied
voters are willing to support the opposition. The second is a more radical
rejection of traditional party politics and it represents a desire to change
from without the fundamental nature of modern, representative
democracy. Another important finding is that despite the criticism farleft parties have levelled at the political establishment, their supporters
are generally no more likely than other citizens to express disenchantment
of political parties.
Even more important, our findings have implications beyond these
immediate effects on citizen political behaviour. Spreading distrust of
political parties will probably increase pressures for institutional changes
that alter or diminish the role that parties play within the democratic process
(Cain et al. 2003). One set of reforms has aimed at improving the system of
elections and representative democracy to improve the system of party
government. For instance, dissatisfaction with parties has fuelled demands
for reform of electoral systems in Italy, New Zealand, Japan and several
nations.
A second set of reforms has