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Wednesday, September 6

How Intra-Party Disagreement Determines Issue Salience and Diversity in Parties' Election Manifestos
Time:
12:30 pm to 2:00 pm
Presenter:
Zachary Greene, Department of Politics, University of Strathclyde
Location:
4130 Wesley W. Posvar Hall
Sponsored by:
European Studies Center along with Department of Political Science

Despite incentives to present a unified front during elections, political parties are often rife with disagreements and differences in priorities. Yet, little is known about how parties negotiate between conflicting factions and intra-party groups. In this project, Dr. Greene considers competing perspectives that explain parties’ decision-making process. Do divided parties use campaign materials such as election platforms to detail carefully negotiated compromises or instead minimize policy disagreements by excluding discussion of these issues? Using evidence from Germany, Dr. Greene considers these perspectives by examining the content of speeches and election platforms from parties’ most important decision-making forum: the party national congress. The results suggest that different logics hold depending on the importance of the issue at hand.