Blurring to Survive? The effect of intraparty democracy on elite blurring strategies

Across Western democracies, intraparty conflict is increasingly salient, with the split in Die Linke and the sustained conflict and repeated leadership elections in the UK’s Conservative Party as just two of many recent examples. In this light, it is all the more important to deepen our understanding of how intraparty democracy limits and conditions party leaders’ strategies. This manuscript builds on previous research that positions party leaders as servants of two masters with conflicting preferences: their party members and the median voter. In this paper, we argue that positional blurring is a potential strategy to satisfy both principals, but that underlying incentives to use this strategy vary depending on the dimension on which party members can influence the party, namely on their ability to affect leadership selections, policy platforms and candidate selection. To test this argument, we leverage data on internal party processes and party leader positioning and clarity. The results contribute to our understanding of how intraparty democracy delimits leaders’ strategic flexibility with important implications for political representation and democratic responsiveness.