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On digital front-runners and late-comers: Analyzing issue competition over digitization in German subnational elections

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  30 May 2019

Markus B. Siewert  and
Pascal D. König
Markus B. Siewert
Affiliation:
Goethe University Frankfurt, Department of Social Sciences, Institute for Political Science, Germany
Pascal D. König*
Affiliation:
Goethe University Frankfurt, Department of Social Sciences, Institute for Political Science, Germany
*
*E-mail: p.koenig@soz.uni-frankfurt.de
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Abstract

Despite the sweeping societal and economic transformation brought about by digitization, it has remained a relatively marginal topic in elections, with parties having few incentives to signal commitment to digitization. Why then would parties start to do so? We address this question by examining party manifestos from German subnational elections in the period between 2010 and 2018. Our analysis contributes to the research on issue competition by looking at why parties engage with the topic of the digitization even though it has neither become politicized nor salient, at present. We find, first, that parties emphasize digitization more in regions belonging to the mid-tier in terms of their degree of digital modernization. Second, parties with more resources and greater ideological compatibility signal more commitment to digitization. Finally, electoral success of the Pirate Party as a credible challenger has been followed by greater emphasis on digitization, especially among the ideologically closest competitors.

Keywords

party competitionissue ownershipdigitizationinformation and communication technologysubnational electionsGermany
Type
Research Article
Information
European Political Science Review , Volume 11 , Issue 2 , May 2019 , pp. 247 - 265
Copyright
© European Consortium for Political Research 2019 

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