From the voter’s perspective two aspects of political competition are crucial. Firstly, there must be more than one party coming into consideration. ISecondly, competition itself finds its expression in the selection process – from possible options to the final choice. This is how competition is perceived individually: a number of parties come into question but which one should I vote for? This reduction process can be measured using PTVs and therefore, a comparative study of electoral competition may profit considerably from focussing on those. This paper asks whether the reduction processes in several countries covary with certain party system characteristics, e.g. the (effective) number of parties, party system polarization, or the electoral system?
I will use, amongst others, EES data to model the so-called two-stage process of party choice. Following this, cross-national variations in the competition structure, i.e. the process from consideration to party choice, are analysed. Thereby, systematic variation regarding patterns of competition can be detected and explained. This can help to describe voter’s decision-making process in a more realistic, context specific way.
