All the prime minister’s glory? Leader effects and accountability of prime ministers in parliamentary elections
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In: Politics, Vol. 40, No. 4, 01.11.2020, p. 444-459.
Research output: Journal contributions › Journal articles › Research › peer-review
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TY - JOUR
T1 - All the prime minister’s glory? Leader effects and accountability of prime ministers in parliamentary elections
AU - Berz, Jan
PY - 2020/11/1
Y1 - 2020/11/1
N2 - Are prime ministers held accountable for their government’s performance? The personalisation of parliamentary elections and subsequent voting behaviour based on the personality of party leaders questions the accountability of elected governments. In this article, I analyse the confounding of prime ministers’ leader effects by voters’ evaluation of government performance to examine whether prime ministers are held accountable for the performance of their government. I use individual-level data from British, Danish, and German elections and a natural experiment at the German state level to show that voters hold prime ministers personally accountable. The findings constitute an important extension of electoral accountability and have implications for the study of personalisation and presidentialisation in parliamentary democracies.
AB - Are prime ministers held accountable for their government’s performance? The personalisation of parliamentary elections and subsequent voting behaviour based on the personality of party leaders questions the accountability of elected governments. In this article, I analyse the confounding of prime ministers’ leader effects by voters’ evaluation of government performance to examine whether prime ministers are held accountable for the performance of their government. I use individual-level data from British, Danish, and German elections and a natural experiment at the German state level to show that voters hold prime ministers personally accountable. The findings constitute an important extension of electoral accountability and have implications for the study of personalisation and presidentialisation in parliamentary democracies.
KW - leader effect
KW - party leader
KW - personalisation
KW - presidentialisation
KW - prime minister
KW - voting behaviour
KW - Politics
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85081606200&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1177/0263395720907054
DO - 10.1177/0263395720907054
M3 - Journal articles
AN - SCOPUS:85081606200
VL - 40
SP - 444
EP - 459
JO - Politics
JF - Politics
SN - 0263-3957
IS - 4
ER -