A comparative spatial analysis of majoritarian and proportional elections

This study estimates spatial representations of recent elections in Canada, France, The Netherlands and Israel. Its purpose is to test whether there exist systematic differences in the extent of spatial dispersion among parties and candidates in the majoritarian and proportional electoral systems. Canada and France are majoritarian systems, while The Netherlands and Israel are highly proportional. The study uses a measure of central tendency developed by Kollman et al. (1992, 1993, 1998) [Kollman, K., Miller, J.H., Page, S.E., 1992. Adaptive parties in spatial elections. American Political Science Review, 86, 929–937; 1993. Adaptive parties and spatial voting theory. In: Grofman, B. (Ed.), Information, Participation & Choice. University of Michigan Press, Ann Arbor, pp. 161–173; 1998. Political parties and electoral landscapes. British Journal of Political Science, 28, 139–158] and non-parametric statistical tests to compare the relative dispersion of parties and candidates across the maps. The analysis reveals that parties and candidates in the majoritarian systems are located significantly closer to the center of the distribution of voters than those in proportional systems. The estimated spatial maps also provide information useful for interpreting the bases of electoral politics in each country.  2000 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.