Description
Goals: This seminar has two goals: The first is to make you familiar with the concepts, debates and earlier studies on personalisation. The second is to train and improve your empirical skills and your writing on research findings.
Content: A widely held belief, in particular among politicians and journalists, in many countries is that at elections many voters decide on the basis of the evaluations of the personalities and character traits of politicians and political leaders. According to this perspective on elections and electoral behavior, a variety of personality factors is important for the individual party choice and ultimately the outcome of democratic elections. According to some observers, contemporary elections are beauty contests and at elections voters choose their political idol on the basis of their looks and almost literally on the face of them, not on the basis of political content, policy proposals and ideology as major parts of democratic theory would hold. This view on the personalization of elections and electoral behavior appears to be gaining support in many countries, including the Netherlands.
In this seminar we will address various questions as regards the personalization of contemporary politics in general and the role politicians and political personalities play at election time in the Netherlands in particular. Do politicians impact on electoral behavior and party choice? If so, how does this work and how important is this influence relative to other factors that play a role? What specific individual characteristics and personality traits are assumed to play a role, and how can we find out about their potential or actual effects? Are all politicians evaluated on the basis of the same traits? Do all voters evaluate in the same way and with respect to the same traits and characteristics? These are the kind of questions that will be addressed, primarily on the basis of the literature and if possible also on the basis of new research in the seminar. The research for the final paper may draw on original data, to be collected during the seminar, but can of course also be based on the literature and on a secondary analysis of existing data.
Methods of Instruction
Short lectures, class discussion of assigned readings and student presentations.
Study Material
Kees Aarts, André Blais, Hermann Schmitt (eds.), Political Leaders and Democratic Elections (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2011);
Lauri Karvonen, The Personalisation of Politics: A Study of Parliamentary Democracies (Colchester: ECPR Press, 2010);
Selection of scientific journal articles and/or book chapters.
Examination
You will be evaluated on participation, the assignments, and final paper.
Schedule:
Wednesday 31 October till 19 December, 13.00-15.00 hrs in 1A37 (except 14 Nov. 5A42 and 12 Dec. 1A11) and
Friday 2 November till 21 December, 13.00-15.00 hrs in 5A37