Party Positions on Issue Dimension

Variable description

A commonly surveyed item, and therefore used in early measures of ideological polarization such as the CSES polarization index, this item captures parties’ positions on different issues. Most commonly, this means a placement on a left-right scale, but other issue dimensions such as a socioeconomic, cultural or even environmental one are possible as well.

Party position scores can come from a variety of sources. Survey data such as the CSES asks respondents about their perceptions of party positions, expert surveys such as the CHES queries the evaluations of experts and MARPOR uses codings of party manifestos as the basis for its scores.

Datasets & Variants

CSES

LEFT-RIGHT - PARTY A

E3019_A

Scale: 0 (Left) - 10 (Right)

Wording: In politics people sometimes talk of left and right. Where would you place [PARTY A] on a scale from 0 to 10 where 0 means the left and 10 means the right?"

CHES

Overall ideological stance

LRGEN

Scale: 0 (Extreme left) - 5 (Center) - 10 (Extreme right)

Wording: Position of the party in YEAR in terms of its overall ideological stance."

Ideological stance on economic issues

LRECON

Scale: 0 (Extreme left) - 5 (Center) - 10 (Extreme right)

Wording: Position of the party in YEAR in terms of its ideological stance on economic issues. Parties can be classified in terms of their stance on economic issues such as privatization, taxes, regulation, government spending, and the welfare state. Parties on the economic left want government to play an active role in the economy. Parties on the economic right want a reduced role for government."

Position on social and cultural issues

GALTAN

Scale: 0 (Libertarian/Postmaterialist) - 5 (Center) - 10 (Traditional/Authoritarian)

Wording: Position of the party in YEAR in terms of their views on social and cultural values. “Libertarian” or “postmaterialist” parties favor expanded personal freedoms, for example, abortion rights, divorce, and same-sex marriage. “Traditional” or “authoritarian” parties reject these ideas in favor of order, tradition, and stability, believing that the government should be a firm moral authority on social and cultural issues.

EES

Party Left-Right

Scale: 0 (Left) - 10 (Right)

Wording: And about where would you place the following political parties on this scale? Which number from 0 to 10, where ‘0’ means “left” and ‘10’ means “right” best describes these parties?

Marpor

Party left right

RILE

Scale: ?

Wording: Right-left position of party as given in Michael Laver/Ian Budge (eds.)"

Measures

Measures that rely on these items: