1932
0
  1. Home
  2. A-Z Publications
  3. Annual Review of Political Science
  4. Volume 17, 2014
  5. Article

Annual Review of Political Science

Volume 17, 2014

Measuring Policy Positions in Political Space

Abstract

Spatial models are ubiquitous within political science. Whenever we confront spatial models with data, we need valid and reliable ways to measure policy positions in political space. I first review a range of general issues that must be resolved before thinking about how to measure policy positions, including cognitive metrics, a priori and a posteriori scale interpretation, dimensionality, common spaces, and comparability across settings. I then briefly review different types of data we can use to do this and measurement techniques associated with each type, focusing on headline issues with each type of data and pointing to comprehensive surveys of relevant literatures—including expert, elite, and mass surveys; text analysis; and legislative voting behavior.

Keyword(s): dimensionality, metrics, roll-call voting, scaling, surveys, text
Loading

Article metrics loading...

/content/journals/10.1146/annurev-polisci-061413-041905
2014-05-11
2024-04-26
Loading full text...

Full text loading...

/deliver/fulltext/polisci/17/1/annurev-polisci-061413-041905.html?itemId=/content/journals/10.1146/annurev-polisci-061413-041905&mimeType=html&fmt=ahah

Literature Cited

  1. Aisbett J, Gibbon G. 2001. A general formulation of conceptual spaces as a meso level representation. Artif. Intell. 133:189–232 [Google Scholar]
  2. Alvarez RM, Nagler J, Bowler S. 2000. Issues, economics, and the dynamics of multiparty elections: the British 1987 general election. Am. Polit. Sci. Rev. 94:131–49 [Google Scholar]
  3. Attneave F. 1950. Dimensions of similarity. Am. J. Psychol. 63:546–54 [Google Scholar]
  4. Bakker R, de Vries C, Edwards E, Hooghe L, Jolly S. et al. 2012. Measuring party positions in Europe: the Chapel Hill expert survey trend file, 1999–2010. Party Polit. doi: 10.1177/1354068812462931
  5. Barbera P. 2013. Birds of the same feather tweet together: Bayesian ideal point estimation using Twitter data Presented at Annu. Meet. Midw. Polit. Sci. Assoc., Chicago
  6. Bardi L. 1989. Il Parlamento della Comunità europea: legittimità e riforma 259 Bologna: Il Mulino
  7. Baumgartner FR, Green-Pedersen C, Jones BD. 2007. Comparative Studies of Policy Agendas London: Routledge
  8. Benoit K. 2005. Policy positions in Britain 2005: results from an expert survey Work. pap., Lond. School Econ.
  9. Benoit K. 2008. Party positions in Italy 2008: results from an expert survey Work. pap., Lond. School Econ.
  10. Benoit K. 2010. Party policy positions in Britain, 2010: results from an expert survey Work. pap., Lond. School Econ.
  11. Benoit K, Conway D, Laver M, Mikhaylov S. 2012. Crowd-sourced data coding for the social sciences: massive non-expert coding of political texts Presented at New Directions in Analyzing Text as Data, Harvard Univ., Oct. 5–6, Cambridge, MA
  12. Benoit K, Laver M. 2006. Party Policy in Modern Democracies London: Routledge
  13. Benoit K, Laver M. 2012. The dimensionality of political space: epistemological and methodological considerations. Eur. Union Polit. 13:2194–218 [Google Scholar]
  14. Benoit K, Laver M, Mikhaylov S. 2009. Treating words as data with error: uncertainty in text statements of policy positions. Am. J. Polit. Sci. 53:2495–513 [Google Scholar]
  15. Black D. 1948. On the rationale of group decision-making. J. Polit. Econ. 56:123–34 [Google Scholar]
  16. Bonica A. 2013. Ideology and interests in the political marketplace. Am. J. Polit. Sci. 57:2294–311 [Google Scholar]
  17. Bowler S, Farrell DM. 2008. Legislator shirking and voter monitoring: impacts of European Parliament electoral systems upon legislator-voter relationships. J. Common Market Stud. 31:145–70 [Google Scholar]
  18. Budge I. 2003. Expert judgements of party policy positions: uses and limitations in political research. Eur. J. Polit. Res. 37:1103–13 [Google Scholar]
  19. Budge I. 2013. The ‘paradox of the manifestos’—satisfied users, critical methodologists Work. pap., Univ. Essex
  20. Budge I, Klingemann H-D, Volkens A, Bara J, Tannenbaum E. et al. 2001. Mapping Policy Preferences: Parties, Electors and Governments: 1945–1998: Estimates for Parties, Electors and Governments 1945–1998 Oxford, UK: Oxford Univ. Press
  21. Budge I, Robertson D, Hearl D. 1987. Ideology, Strategy and Party Change: Spatial Analyses of Post-War Election Programmes in 19 Democracies Cambridge, UK: Cambridge Univ. Press
  22. Carroll R, Lewis JB, Lo J, Poole KT, Rosenthal H. 2009. Comparing NOMINATE and IDEAL: points of difference and Monte Carlo tests. Legis. Stud. Q. 34:4555–91 [Google Scholar]
  23. Carrubba C, Gabel M, Hug S. 2008. Legislative voting behavior, seen and unseen: a theory of roll-call vote selection. Legis. Stud. Q. 33:4543–72 [Google Scholar]
  24. Carrubba CJ, Gabel M, Murrah L, Clough R, Montgomery E, Schambach R. 2006. Off the record: unrecorded legislative votes, selection bias and roll-call vote analysis. Br. J. Polit. Sci. 36:04691–704 [Google Scholar]
  25. Castles FG, Mair P. 1984. Left–right political scales: some ‘expert’ judgments. Eur. J. Polit. Res. 12:173–88 [Google Scholar]
  26. Clinton JD, Jackman S. 2009. To simulate or NOMINATE?. Legis. Stud. Q. 34:4593–621 [Google Scholar]
  27. Clinton J, Jackman S, Rivers D. 2004. The statistical analysis of roll call data. Am. Polit. Sci. Rev. 98:2355–70 [Google Scholar]
  28. Converse PE. 1964. The nature of belief systems in mass publics. Ideology and Discontent DE Apter 206–61 London: Free Press of Glencoe [Google Scholar]
  29. Däubler T, Benoit K, Mikhaylov S, Laver M. 2012. Natural sentences as valid units for coded political text. Br. J. Polit. Sci. 42:4937–51 [Google Scholar]
  30. Dolezal M, Ennser-Jedenastik L, Müller WC, Winkler AK. 2014. How parties compete for votes: a test of saliency theory. Eur. J. Polit. Res. 5357–76
  31. Downs A. 1957. An Economic Theory of Democracy New York: Harper
  32. Eguia JX. 2013. Challenges to the standard Euclidean spatial model. Advances in Political Economy G Caballero, DM Kselman, N Schofield, pp. 169–80 Heidelberg: Springer-Berlin [Google Scholar]
  33. Enelow JM, Mendell NR, Ramesh S. 1988. A comparison of two distance metrics through regression diagnostics of a model of relative candidate evaluation. J. Polit. 50:1057–71 [Google Scholar]
  34. Farrell D, Hix S, Scully R. 2011. EPRG MEP survey dataset: 2011 release EPR Group. Lond. School Econ.
  35. Fisher SH, Herrick R. 2013. Old versus new: the comparative efficiency of mail and internet surveys of state legislators. State Polit. Policy Q. 13:2147–63 [Google Scholar]
  36. Gabel M, Huber J. 2000. Putting parties in their place: inferring party left-right ideological positions from party manifesto data. Am. J. Polit. Sci. 44:94–103 [Google Scholar]
  37. Gärdenfors P. 2000. Conceptual Spaces: the Geometry of Thought Cambridge, MA: MIT Press
  38. Gärdenfors P. 2004. Conceptual spaces as a framework for knowledge representation. Mind Matter 2:29–27 [Google Scholar]
  39. Giannetti D, De Giorgi E. 2006. The 2006 Italian general elections: issues, dimensions and policy positions of political parties. J. Mod. Ital. Stud. 11:4494–515 [Google Scholar]
  40. Grimmer J, Stewart BM. 2013. Text as data: the promise and pitfalls of automatic content analysis methods for political texts. Polit. Anal. 21:3267–97 [Google Scholar]
  41. Grynaviski JD, Corrigan BE. 2006. Specification issues in proximity models of candidate evaluation (with issue importance). Polit. Anal. 14:393–420 [Google Scholar]
  42. Hix S, Noury A, Roland G. 2006. Dimensions of politics in the European Parliament. Am. J. Polit. Sci. 50:2494–520 [Google Scholar]
  43. Hix S, Noury AG, Roland G. 2007. Democratic Politics in the European Parliament Cambridge, UK: Cambridge Univ. Press
  44. Hooghe L, Bakker R, Brigevich A, de Vries C, Edwards E. et al. 2010. Reliability and validity of the 2002 and 2006 Chapel Hill expert surveys on party positioning. Eur. J. Polit. Res. 49:5687–703 [Google Scholar]
  45. Hotelling H. 1929. Stability in competition. Econ. J. 39:15341–57 [Google Scholar]
  46. Hrbek R, Schweitzer C-C. 1989. Die deutschen Europa-Parlamentarier: Ergebnisse einer Befragung der deutschen Mitglieder des Europäischen Parliaments. Aus. Polit. Zeitgeschichte B 3:893–18 [Google Scholar]
  47. Huber J, Inglehart R. 1995. Expert interpretations of party space and party locations in 42 societies. Party Polit. 1:173–111 [Google Scholar]
  48. Humphreys M, de la Sierra RS, van der Windt P. 2013. Fishing, commitment, and communication: a proposal for comprehensive nonbinding research registration. Polit. Anal. 21:11–20 [Google Scholar]
  49. Humphreys M, Laver M. 2010. Spatial models, cognitive metrics, and majority voting equilibria. Br. J. Polit. Sci. 40:11–30 [Google Scholar]
  50. Inglehart R. 1997. Modernization and Postmodernization: Cultural, Economic, and Political Change in 43 Societies 19 New York: Cambridge Univ. Press
  51. Inglehart R. 2008. Changing values among western publics from 1970 to 2006. West Eur. Polit. 31:1–2130–46 [Google Scholar]
  52. Inglehart R, Flanagan SC. 1987. Value change in industrial societies. Am. Polit. Sci. Rev. 81:1289–319 [Google Scholar]
  53. Inglehart R, Klingemann H-D. 1976. Party identification, ideological preference and the left-right dimension among western mass publics. Party Identification and Beyond I Budge, I Crewe, D Farlie 243–73 London: Wiley [Google Scholar]
  54. Inglehart R, Welzel C. 2005. Modernization, Cultural Change, and Democracy: the Human Development Sequence New York: Cambridge Univ. Press
  55. Kadane JB. 1972. On division of the question. Public Choice 13:47–54 [Google Scholar]
  56. Kato J, Laver M. 1998. Party policy and cabinet portfolios in Japan, 1996. Party Polit. 4:2253–60 [Google Scholar]
  57. Kato J, Laver M. 2003. Policy and party competition in Japan after the election of 2000. Jpn. J. Polit. Sci. 4:1121–33 [Google Scholar]
  58. Kats A, Nitzan S. 1977. More on decision rules and policy outcomes. Br. J. Polit. Sci. 7:3419–22 [Google Scholar]
  59. Katz RS, Wessels B. 1999. The European Parliament, the National Parliaments, and European Integration Oxford, UK: Oxford Univ. Press
  60. Kim H, Fording RC. 1998. Voter ideology in Western democracies, 1946–1989. Eur. J. Polit. Res. 33:173–97 [Google Scholar]
  61. King A, Orlando F, Sparks D. 2011. Ideological extremity and primary success: a social network approach Presented at Annu. Meet. Midw. Polit. Sci. Assoc., Chicago
  62. Klingemann H-D, Hofferbert RI, Budge I. 1994. Parties, Policies, and Democracy Boulder, CO: Westview
  63. Klingemann H-D, Volkens A, Bara J, Budge I, McDonald M. 2006. Mapping Policy Preferences II: Estimates for Parties, Electors, and Governments in Eastern Europe, European Union and OECD 1990–2003 Oxford, UK: Oxford Univ. Press
  64. Laver M. 1994. Party policy and cabinet portfolios in Ireland 1992: results from an expert survey. Irish Polit. Stud. 9:1157–64 [Google Scholar]
  65. Laver M. 1995. Party policy and cabinet portfolios in the Netherlands, 1994. Acta Polit. 30:13–28 [Google Scholar]
  66. Laver M. 1998a. Party policy in Britain 1997: results from an expert survey. Polit. Stud. 46:2336–47 [Google Scholar]
  67. Laver M. 1998b. Party policy in Ireland 1997: results from an expert survey. Irish Polit. Stud. 13:1159–71 [Google Scholar]
  68. Laver M, Benoit K. 2006. Party Policy in Modern Democracies London: Routledge
  69. Laver M, Benoit K, Garry J. 2003. Estimating the policy positions of political actors using words as data. Am. Polit. Sci. Rev. 97:2311–31 [Google Scholar]
  70. Laver M, Budge I. 1992. Party Policy and Government Coalitions New York: St. Martin's
  71. Laver M, Hunt WB. 1992. Policy and Party Competition New York: Routledge
  72. Laver M, Mair P. 1999. Party policy and cabinet portfolios in the Netherlands, 1998: results from an expert survey. Acta Polit. 34:49–66 [Google Scholar]
  73. Lowe W, Benoit K, Mikhaylov S, Laver M. 2011. Scaling policy positions from hand-coded political texts. Legis. Stud. Q. 36:1123–55 [Google Scholar]
  74. Maestas C, Neeley GW, Richardson LE Jr. 2003. The state of surveying legislators: dilemmas and suggestions. State Polit. Policy Q. 3:190–108 [Google Scholar]
  75. Mair P. 1991. Searching for the positions of political actors: a review of approaches and a critical evaluation of expert surveys. Estimating the Policy Positions of Political Actors M Laver 33–49 London/New York: Routledge [Google Scholar]
  76. McCarty NM, Poole KT. 1998. An empirical spatial model of congressional campaigns. Polit. Anal. 7:11–30 [Google Scholar]
  77. McElroy G, Benoit K. 2007. Party groups and policy positions in the European Parliament. Party Polit. 13:15–28 [Google Scholar]
  78. McElroy G, Benoit K. 2012. Policy positioning in the European Parliament. Eur. Union Polit. 13:1150–67 [Google Scholar]
  79. McKelvey RD, Wendell RE. 1976. Voting equilibria in multidimensional choice spaces. Math. Oper. Res. 1:144–58 [Google Scholar]
  80. Mikhaylov S, Laver M, Benoit KR. 2012. Coder reliability and misclassification in the human coding of party manifestos. Polit. Anal. 20:178–91 [Google Scholar]
  81. Morgan M-J. 1976. The modeling of government coalition formation: a policy-based approach with interval measurement PhD thesis, Dep. Polit. Sci., Univ. Mich.
  82. Poole KT. 2005. Spatial Models of Parliamentary Voting New York: Cambridge Univ. Press
  83. Poole KT, Rosenthal H. 1997. Congress: a Political-Economic History of Roll Call Voting New York: Oxford Univ. Press
  84. Poole KT, Rosenthal H. 1984. US presidential elections 1968–80: a spatial analysis. Am. J. Polit. Sci. 28:2282–312 [Google Scholar]
  85. Rae DW, Taylor M. 1971. Decision rules and policy outcomes. Br. J. Polit. Sci. 1:171–90 [Google Scholar]
  86. Ray L, Narud HM. 2000. Mapping the Norwegian political space: some findings from an expert survey. Party Polit. 6:2225–39 [Google Scholar]
  87. Saiegh SM. 2009. Recovering a basic space from elite surveys: evidence from Latin America. Legis. Stud. Q. 34:1117–45 [Google Scholar]
  88. Schofield N, Sened I. 2005. Multiparty competition in Israel, 1988–96. Br. J. Pol. Sci. 35:4635 [Google Scholar]
  89. Scully R, Hix S, Farrell DM. 2012. National or European parliamentarians? Evidence from a new survey of the Members of the European Parliament. J. Common Market Stud. 50:4670–83 [Google Scholar]
  90. Shepard RN. 1987. Toward a universal law of generalization for psychological science. Science 237:1317–23 [Google Scholar]
  91. Shepard RN. 1991. Integrality versus separability of stimulus dimensions: from an early convergence of evidence to a proposed theoretical basis. The Perception of Structure: Essays in Honor of Wendell R. Garner JR Pomerantz, GL Lockhead 53–71 Washington, DC: Am. Psychol. Assoc. [Google Scholar]
  92. Slapin JB, Proksch S-O. 2008. A scaling model for estimating time series policy positions from texts. Am. J. Polit. Sci. 52:3705–22 [Google Scholar]
  93. Spirling A, McLean I. 2006. The rights and wrongs of roll calls. Gov. Opposition 41:4581–88 [Google Scholar]
  94. Spirling A, McLean I. 2007. UK OC OK? Interpreting optimal classification scores for the UK House of Commons. Polit. Anal. 15:185–96 [Google Scholar]
  95. Spirling A, Quinn K. 2010. Identifying intraparty voting blocs in the UK House of Commons. J. Am. Stat. Assoc. 105:490447–57 [Google Scholar]
  96. Steenbergen MR, Marks G. 2007. Evaluating expert judgments. Eur. J. Polit. Res. 46:3347–66 [Google Scholar]
  97. Volkens A. 2001. Quantifying the election programmes: coding procedures and controls. Mapping Policy Preferences: Estimates for Parties, Electors and Governments 1945–1998 I Budge, H-D Klingemann, A Volkens, J Bara, E Tannenbaum , et al., pp. 93–107 Oxford/New York: Oxford Univ. Press [Google Scholar]
  98. Volkens A. 2007. Strengths and weaknesses of approaches to measuring policy positions of parties. Electoral Stud. 26:1108–20 [Google Scholar]
  99. Wendell RE, Thorson SJ. 1974. Some generalizations of social decisions under majority rule. Econometrica 42:5893–912 [Google Scholar]
  100. Westholm A. 1997. Distance versus direction: the illusory defeat of the proximity theory of electoral choice. Am. Polit. Sci. Rev. 91:865–83 [Google Scholar]
  101. Zechmeister EJ, Corral M. 2012. Individual and contextual constraints on ideological labels in Latin America. Comp. Polit. Stud. 46:6675–701 [Google Scholar]
/content/journals/10.1146/annurev-polisci-061413-041905
Loading
Measuring Policy Positions in Political Space
Annual Review of Political Science 17, 207 (2014); https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev-polisci-061413-041905
/content/journals/10.1146/annurev-polisci-061413-041905
/content/journals/10.1146/annurev-polisci-061413-041905
Loading

Data & Media loading...

  • Article Type: Review Article

Most Cited Most Cited RSS feed

This is a required field
Please enter a valid email address
Approval was a Success
Invalid data
An Error Occurred
Approval was partially successful, following selected items could not be processed due to error