To what extent do European MPs hold progressive ambitions and how do these ambitions affect the choice of individual strategies? We argue that progressively ambitious MPs have incentives to create individual visibility and seek the support of party leaders at a higher level who decide on promotion to sought-after offices. Relying on novel data from the comparative MP survey PartiRep we show that progressive ambition is widespread among MPs in 72 national and subnational parliaments across Europe. Using a three-level hierarchical model we find that progressively ambitious MPs are significantly more likely to favor personal rather than party-centered campaigns and to address the national or regional party leadership instead of their local party. We also find support for other hypotheses on the effects of electoral system variables and party ideology. Overall, the paper shows that ambition theory offers a promising approach for studying parliamentary politics in Europe from an individualistic rational choice perspective.
