Correcting campaign misinformation: experimental evidence from a two-wave panel study

In this study, we used a two-wave panel and a real-world intervention during the 2017 UK general election to investigate whether fact-checking can reduce beliefs in an incorrect campaign claim, source effects, the duration of source effects, and how predispositions including political orientations and prior exposure condition them. We find correction effects in the short term only, but across different political divisions and various prior exposure levels. We discuss the significance of independent fact-checking sources and the UK partisan press in facilitating effects

British Election Longitudinal News Study 2015–2019: Print news coverage with validated topics and candidate sentiment

The British Election Longitudinal News Study 2015–2019 (BELNS) covers campaign coverage relating to three general elections: 2015, 2017, 2019. The print newspaper component in this release tracks topic and general election candidate coverage across 46 national and local sources, including actor-level sentiment. For a full description, see Documentation.Corrected file version uploaded on 17-05-2021.The British Election Longitudinal News Study 2015–2019 (BELNS) covers campaign coverage relating to three general elections: 2015, 2017, 2019. The print newspaper component in this release tracks topic and general election candidate coverage across 46 national and local sources, including actor-level sentiment.Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC)Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC)Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC

Intra-Campaign Changes in Voting Preferences: The Impact of Media and Party Communication

An increasing number of citizens change and adapt their party preferences during the electoral campaign. We analyze which short-term factors explain intra-campaign changes in voting preferences, focusing on the visibility and tone of news media reporting and party canvassing. Our analyses rely on an integrative data approach, linking data from media content analysis to public opinion data. This enables us to investigate the relative impact of news media reporting as well as party communication. Inherently, we overcome previously identified methodological problems in the study of communication effects on voting behavior. Our findings reveal that campaigns matter: Especially interpersonal party canvassing increases voters’ likelihood to change their voting preferences in favor of the respective party, whereas media effects are limited to quality news outlets and depend on individual voters’ party ambivalence

Financing Direct Democracy: Revisiting the Research on Campaign Spending and Citizen Initiatives

The conventional view in the direct democracy literature is that spending against a measure is more effective than spending in favor of a measure, but the empirical results underlying this conclusion have been questioned by recent research. We argue that the conventional finding is driven by the endogenous nature of campaign spending: initiative proponents spend more when their ballot measure is likely to fail. We address this endogeneity by using an instrumental variables approach to analyze a comprehensive dataset of ballot propositions in California from 1976 to 2004. We find that both support and opposition spending on citizen initiatives have strong, statistically significant, and countervailing effects. We confirm this finding by looking at time series data from early polling on a subset of these measures. Both analyses show that spending in favor of citizen initiatives substantially increases their chances of passage, just as opposition spending decreases this likelihood

Political Entrepreneurship in the Field of Māori Sovereignty in Aotearoa New Zealand

Individual actors have the potential to shape political outcomes through creative use of opportunities. Political entrepreneurship identifies how such actors recognise and exploit opportunities, for personal or collective gain. The existing literature focuses on individuals operating within institutional settings, with less attention paid to other types of actors. In this article, I argue for an expansion of the political entrepreneurship framework, by considering individuals in the electoral and protest arenas. An examination of the field of Māori sovereignty, or tino rangatiratanga, in Aotearoa New Zealand allows exploration of prominent actors’ innovative strategies and practices. The findings highlight the actors’ reliance on identity in mobilising support within the community, to press claims. Broadening the application of political entrepreneurship demonstrates the roles of social, cultural and political capital in influencing outcomes, by identifying opportunities available to individuals embedded in the community and according to the context of the arena