Suchergebnisse

Both academics who study presidential powers and political practitioners acknowledge that Lithuanian president enjoys the power to appoint high-ranking officials. This article investigates the determinants of success (or failure) of presidential decrees by which nominations of high-ranking public officials are submitted to Seimas. Presented theory and results are also discussed in a wider context of literature on semi-presidentialism: what does this power say about the role of presidents and the functioning of such regimes? Analysis employs an original data set, which consists of 337 decrees by presidents of Lithuania from 1993 to 2023 that were submitted to Seimas for consent regarding the appointment of respective public officials. The statistical analysis is complemented by information from semi-structured interviews with several high-ranking politicians. The study reveals several key points. First, high success rate of decrees (about 92.7 percent) is explained by the incentives of the constitutional algorithm and the informal practice of coordinating nominations between the president and the ruling majority before submitting them to Seimas. Second, quantitative analysis and qualitative interviews reveal that the success of decrees increases with the judicial appointments that are advised by a body of experts (Council of Judges) and decreases with appointments to heads of institutions. Third, some cases can also be explained by personal characteristics of nominees: age (result of quantitative analysis) or their self-presentation to Seimas (semi-structured interviews). Fourth, cohabitation – when the president and the parliamentary majority are of different political camps – only partially explains the success of decrees. Some unsuccessful decrees occur because of a short-term drop in the "temperature" of intra-executive relationship. However, this drop usually bounces back to cooperation phase – thus, the power to appoint high-ranking officials contradicts popular paradigm of literature on semi-presidentialism, namely that sees the relationship between president and government as competitive. The president himself together with the system of checks and balances around this power almost ideally embody the moderating power: important condition is that the moderator himself is also constitutionally "moderated".

Under semi-presidential regimes, directly elected presidents often play a central role in foreign policy, but their responsibility for the economy is limited. I propose an office-centred explanation of voter behaviour in semi-presidential elections based on the foreign policy preferences of the electorate. In order to explore the empirical applicability of this addition to the theory, I explore the Lithuanian case: a semi-presidential country where the president has substantial powers in foreign and defence policy and the presidents are usually non-partisan. I employ a dataset from the Lithuanian 2019 post-election survey that offers a battery of items measuring the positions of voters on foreign policy issues. When controlling for alternative explanations, I find that foreign policy preferences (measured as an index of voter attitudes towards Russia and defence) are a strong and stable determinant of vote choice, in both the first and second rounds of presidential elections.

This article explores the roots of electoral hyper-accountability in Central and Eastern Europe. I focus on Lithuania: a country that is a stable liberal democracy, but has re-elected none of its governments (in the same party composition) since the restoration of independence. Survey data from the Lithuanian National Election Study reveal that Lithuanian voters are constantly dissatisfied with the economy and retrospectively evaluate it worse than the objective indicators would suggest. This partially explains why the Lithuanian voters constantly turn away from the government parties at parliamentary elections. However, their subsequent choice between parliamentary and new (previously marginal) parties is another puzzle. Using the 2016 Lithuanian post-election survey, I test how retrospective voting (economic and corruption issues) and political factors (trust and satisfaction with democracy) explain vote choice between the three types of parties (governmental, oppositional, and successful new party). It appears that new parties in Lithuania capitalize on double dissatisfaction, as the logic of the punisher comprises two steps. First, due to economic discontent, she turns away from the incumbent. Second, due to political mistrust, she often turns not to the parliamentary opposition, but to new parties. An analysis of retrospective economic evaluations hints at the political roots of hyper-accountability: these two steps are connected, as dissatisfaction with democracy is a strong predictor of negative retrospective evaluations of economy. Additional analysis of the 2019 post-election survey corroborates the results and reveals that a similar logic also applies in direct presidential elections.

This article investigates voter behavior in the 2019 Lithuanian presidential elections. Even though they appear as first-order (citizens elect an executive that enjoys considerable powers), Lithuanian academic literature has rather neglected this topic in the recent decades. In this article, I employ data from a post-electoral survey conducted after the most recent presidential elections and investigate what kinds of voters and motives were hiding beneath the results of the first and second round in the 2019 presidential elections. Results show that the cleavages that are relevant in the Seimas elections (ethnic and evaluations of Soviet times) also influence the vote choice in the presidential elections. Analysis shows that a ideological cleavage related to social liberalism may becoming important in Lithuania. Lastly, there are signs of retrospective voting, as the voters that evaluate the economy better were more inclined to vote for the presidential candidate of the governing coalition. However, the overall effect is not strong.

AbstractThis article analyses the political effects of the mixed parallel electoral system in Lithuania. According to the 'best of both worlds' logic, mixed systems could combine advantages from both the majoritarian and proportional formulas. However, counterarguments were also presented in the literature, pointing to the possibility of the 'worst of both worlds'. According to presented analysis of Lithuanian parliamentary elections between 1992 and 2016, the pessimistic scenario is expected when a mixed parallel electoral system is used in a new democracy with a weakly institutionalised party system and high volatility. Lithuania's mixed parallel system produces relatively disproportional election results. However, it also facilitates the fragmentation of party system. Moreover, the effects in a concrete election are hardly predictable, especially the seat bonus of election winner. Evidence in the article points to a conclusion that mixed parallel electoral systems could contribute to the 'worst of all worlds' and new democracies should avoid them.

Šiuo straipsniu pradedama akademinė diskusija dėl to, ką Lietuvos partinei sistemai reiškė 2016 m. Seimo rinkimai. Atnaujinant rinkimų kaitu­mo rodiklius ir partijų konkurencinės erdvės žemėlapį (pagal rinkėjų verti­nimus) teigiama: stabilizacija, nurodoma kalbant apie 2012 m. Seimo rinki­mus, buvo labai santykinė (Vakarų politologai tikriausiai jos neįžvelgtų) ir, įvertinant visą 1992–2016 m. laikotarpį, panašesnė į išimtį. Taigi, 2016 m. rinkimai tiesiog grąžino nestabilią Lietuvos partinę sistemą į savas vėžes – nepaisant gana apgaulingos mažos naujų partijų sėkmės, matyti, kad padidė­jo tiek bendras, tiek išorinis (parodantis partinės sistemos silpnumą) nestabi­lumas. Konkurencinėje erdvėje išryškėjusios dvi dimensijos vėl meta iššūkį Lietuvos tradicinių partijų gebėjimui integruoti naujokus. Akivaizdu, kad yra niša ir kartu poreikis toliau tirti rinkėjų elgesį, tad antroje straipsnio dalyje aptariami esminiai klausimai, kuriuos rinkimų politologijai (politinei socio­logijai) pateikia 2016 m. Seimo rinkimai: rinkėjų kaitumo individo lygmeniu logika, (besikeičiantis?) rinkimų sistemos vaidmuo, partijų ir visuomenės (ne)susikalbėjimas, rinkimų kampanijos įtaka rinkimų rezultatui. Esant tiek nežinomųjų, siūloma kritiškai žiūrėti į galimybes prognozuoti rinkimų rezul­tatus ir vedama paralelė tarp politologų ir seismologų: smarkūs žemės dre­bėjimai, kaip ir tokie rinkimai, sunkiai numatomi iš anksto. Kaip sprendžiant trijų kūnų problemą, nestabilios sąveikos tarp pasiūlos, paklausos ir rinkimų sistemos veda į neprognozuojamą rinkimų rezultatą. Tačiau būtent dėl to ir reikia toliau tęsti tyrimus.

This article strives to begin an academic discussion about the impact of the 2016 parliamentary elections on the Lithuanian party system. It was previously argued by political scientists that stabilization could be observed around the 2012 parliamentary elections. On the basis of renewed measures of electoral volatility (total volatility, party replacement and external volatility), the following is argued: the observed party system stabilization was more an exception than a trend. In 2016, the party system returned to the usual track: despite the deceptively small success of new parties, an increase in total and especially external volatility (signifying a weak institutionalization of the party system) was observed. If compared to the Western countries, such levels of electoral volatility point to an inchoate party system at best: 2016 was not that special, since earthquakes in Lithuanian elections are very common. Moreover, an updated map of party competition (based on the voters' evaluations of the parties) space raises another challenge for previous research. It was previously accepted that traditional parties in Lithuania are quite successful in the integration of newcomers: hence, the party system sustains its patterns of competition from election to election, despite the high levels of volatility. However, the 2016 elections bring back the second dimension of competition, which now divides not only the newcomers and the surviving parties, but also the older populist parties vs. the election winner, the Lithuanian Farmers and Greens Union. Resting on these preliminary findings, the need to further investigate electoral behavior in Lithuania is obvious. The second part of the article discusses what questions are (again) raised for the electoral research after the 2016 elections. It is not an exhaustive list, but there is a clear need to advance knowledge in these aspects: the logic of electoral volatility at the voter's level, the (changing?) role of the electoral system, the impact of the electoral campaign, the divide between voters and politicians. In the context of these unknowns, the current possibilities of both the party system stabilization and electoral forecasting (political scientists in Lithuania are sometimes criticized for their inability to do this successfully) are viewed critically. There is a parallel between seismologists and Lithuanian political scientists, as both an earthquake and earthquake elections are hard to predict. There is a three-body problem in Lithuanian elections: unstable interactions between the supply, demand and the electoral system lead to unpredictable election results. But precisely because of this there is a need for continuing research. ; Šiuo straipsniu pradedama akademinė diskusija dėl to, ką Lietuvos partinei sistemai reiškė 2016 m. Seimo rinkimai. Atnaujinant rinkimų kaitu­mo rodiklius ir partijų konkurencinės erdvės žemėlapį (pagal rinkėjų verti­nimus) teigiama: stabilizacija, nurodoma kalbant apie 2012 m. Seimo rinki­mus, buvo labai santykinė (Vakarų politologai tikriausiai jos neįžvelgtų) ir, įvertinant visą 1992–2016 m. laikotarpį, panašesnė į išimtį. Taigi, 2016 m. rinkimai tiesiog grąžino nestabilią Lietuvos partinę sistemą į savas vėžes – nepaisant gana apgaulingos mažos naujų partijų sėkmės, matyti, kad padidė­jo tiek bendras, tiek išorinis (parodantis partinės sistemos silpnumą) nestabi­lumas. Konkurencinėje erdvėje išryškėjusios dvi dimensijos vėl meta iššūkį Lietuvos tradicinių partijų gebėjimui integruoti naujokus. Akivaizdu, kad yra niša ir kartu poreikis toliau tirti rinkėjų elgesį, tad antroje straipsnio dalyje aptariami esminiai klausimai, kuriuos rinkimų politologijai (politinei socio­logijai) pateikia 2016 m. Seimo rinkimai: rinkėjų kaitumo individo lygmeniu logika, (besikeičiantis?) rinkimų sistemos vaidmuo, partijų ir visuomenės (ne)susikalbėjimas, rinkimų kampanijos įtaka rinkimų rezultatui. Esant tiek nežinomųjų, siūloma kritiškai žiūrėti į galimybes prognozuoti rinkimų rezul­tatus ir vedama paralelė tarp politologų ir seismologų: smarkūs žemės dre­bėjimai, kaip ir tokie rinkimai, sunkiai numatomi iš anksto. Kaip sprendžiant trijų kūnų problemą, nestabilios sąveikos tarp pasiūlos, paklausos ir rinkimų sistemos veda į neprognozuojamą rinkimų rezultatą. Tačiau būtent dėl to ir reikia toliau tęsti tyrimus.

This paper argues that economic voting is not limited to first-order elections and also can be observed in local elections (usually considered as second-order). Though local governments do not have the power to shape the macro-economic policy of the state, they may have some instruments to influence the well-being of their regions. Moreover, voters may perceive them as accountable for the state of the economy in the region and punish or reward them in local elections on basis of the economic trends. Lithuania appears to be a quite interesting case in which to test these theoretical arguments. Party identification and cleavages are quite weak here: therefore economic voting can be expected to provide at least some explanation of voting (it should not be shadowed by other social factors). Six local municipal council elections were held in Lithuania since the transition to democracy: the first were held in 1995 and the last in 2011. While controlling for important political-contextual factors, this paper strives to compare the impact of economic voting at Lithuania's municipal elections across time five separate time periods. Results of the empirical analysis reveal that Lithuanians are learning the economic vote with unemployment being more significant as a factor in explaining changes in votes for dominant parties in the municipal councils in the more recent period than in the first several elections. A referendum effect is also observed: parties that belong to the national government parties are punished more during economic downturns.

Collective violence has been a concern for the social sciences since the Antiquity. However, precisely in the last decades academic interest in this phenomenon is incre­asing. It could be related both to the violent character of the 20th century (in terms of absolute and relative numbers of casualties) and changing nature of violent conflict: rising death toll of civilians, spread of inner-state ethnic and civil violence, decline of traditional warfare, etc. This article is focused on the aspect of political institutional conditions (regime properties): how they are related to the collective violence. Relying on works of Charles Tilly, two most important properties of regimes (political institutional conditions) that could affect the occurrence and intensity of collective violence are discerned: regime (governmental) capacity and democracy level. Three hypotheses are discerned for the empirical testing. First hypothesis pre­supposes inverse relation between the democracy level and degree of collective vio­lence (except inter-state warfare). Second hypothesis similarly enunciates the inverse relation between the regime capacity and degree of collective violence (initiated by the non-governmental subjects). According to the third hypothesis, highest levels of collective violence should be expected in the low capacity-undemocratic regimes, moderate levels – in low capacity-democratic and high capacity-undemocratic, lo­west levels – in high capacity-democratic regimes. Testing of hypotheses is based on quantitative-graphical analysis, using the data on democracy and political collective violence provided by the Center for Systemic Peace. First hypothesis is falsified – in accordance with other similar works (f.e., Gupta, 2008), no relation between democracy level and degree/occurrence of col­lective violence is found. However, empirical analysis strongly supports the second hypothesis: there is a statistically significant relationship between the regime capacity (measured as polity fragmentation index) and degree of collective violence. The pro­bability that regime will experience higher levels of collective violence (if it occurs) is raised greatly when the regime capacity is lower. As it is expected from these fin­dings, third hypothesis is only partially supported: higher levels of collective violence are indeed observed in the low capacity-undemocratic regimes, but the most succes­sful in terms of containment of collective violence are high-capacity undemocratic regimes (not high capacity-democratic, as formulated in the hypothesis). ; Straipsnyje nagrinėjamas politinių institucinių sąlygų ir kolektyvinio smurto santykis, ieškant atsakymo į klausimą, kokie režimo bruožai yra palankūs (nepalankūs) kolektyviniam smurtui pasireikšti didesniu mastu. Remiantis Charleso Tilly teorija, išskiriami du problemos kontekste svarbiausi režimo bruožai (politinės institucinės sąlygos): demokratijos lygis ir režimo pajėgumai; iškeliamos trys empirinėje dalyje testuojamos hipotezės. Taikant kiekybinės grafinės analizės metodą atskleidžiama, kad demokratijos lygio ir kolektyvinio smurto pasireiškimo / laipsnio ryšio nėra. Tačiau galima rasti kolektyvinio smurto ir režimo pajėgumų sąsajų: mažėjant režimo pajėgumams, išauga tikimybė didesniam kolektyvinio smurto laipsniui. Empirinė analizė taip pat parodo, kad geriausiai kolektyvinio smurto pasireiškimą slopina (neleidžia pakilti į aukštą lygį) didelių pajėgumų nedemokratiniai, o didžiausiu jo laipsniu pasižymi mažų pajėgumų nedemokratiniai režimai.

Lietuvos viešojoje erdvėje dažnai diskutuojama apie rinkėjų elgesį, tačiau konkrečių partijų ar tuo labiau politikų elektoratams skirtų akademinių straipsnių, kuriuose būtų taikoma kiekybinė analizė, trūksta. 2015 m. kovo mėn. vykusių pirmųjų tiesioginių mero rinkimų ir buvusio ilgamečio Vilniaus mero Artūro Zuoko pralaimėjimo kontekstas suteikia puikią progą išanalizuoti šio politiko socialinę paramos bazę. Pagal tris skirtingus (potencialaus) elektorato analizės lygmenis (objektyvų individo, subjektyvų individo, balsavimo rezultatų teritorinėse rinkimų apylinkėse), analizuojant reprezentatyvius duomenis ir pritaikant statistinius metodus, straipsnyje siekiama nustatyti politiko A. Zuoko vietą nacionalinės politinės konkurencijos lauke. Analizė leidžia daryti išvadą, kad buvusio Vilniaus mero sociologinis profilis yra centro dešinysis, artimas liberalams ir konservatoriams.

Straipsnyje nagrinėjamas politinių institucinių sąlygų ir kolektyvinio smurto santykis, ieškant atsakymo į klausimą, kokie režimo bruožai yra palankūs (nepalankūs) kolektyviniam smurtui pasireikšti didesniu mastu. Remiantis Charleso Tilly teorija, išskiriami du problemos kontekste svarbiausi režimo bruožai (politinės institucinės sąlygos): demokratijos lygis ir režimo pajėgumai; iškeliamos trys empirinėje dalyje testuojamos hipotezės. Taikant kiekybinės grafinės analizės metodą atskleidžiama, kad demokratijos lygio ir kolektyvinio smurto pasireiškimo / laipsnio ryšio nėra. Tačiau galima rasti kolektyvinio smurto ir režimo pajėgumų sąsajų: mažėjant režimo pajėgumams, išauga tikimybė didesniam kolektyvinio smurto laipsniui. Empirinė analizė taip pat parodo, kad geriausiai kolektyvinio smurto pasireiškimą slopina (neleidžia pakilti į aukštą lygį) didelių pajėgumų nedemokratiniai, o didžiausiu jo laipsniu pasižymi mažų pajėgumų nedemokratiniai režimai.

Why in particular election some parties win and others lose votes (if compared to the last election)? One of the dominant theoretical explanations for the dynamics of electoral support is economic voting. Considering weak party identification and cleavage-based voting, it may appear easily applicable for the post-communist democracies: if not economy, then what can explain the dynamics of voting for the incumbent and non-incumbent parties? However, macro-level analysis of national elections in these countries faces the problem of very small samples (considering the quite small quantity of democratic elections). Therefore, research of (economic) voting in the post-communist democracies usually takes a path of regional voting analysis. However, this type of research was largely ignored by the Lithuanian researchers: there is still a lack of systematic study of regional voting, where it would be explained by the economic (and other, supplementary) factors.This article strives to at least partly fill this gap and to make contribution into research on regional economic voting, resting on strategy quite rarely applied: analysis of local elections (into municipal councils of Lithuania). Hence first part of the article presents relevant (for the presented investigation) aspects of the economic voting theory and also discusses the possibilities of finding this phenomenon at the level of local elections. Potential impact for the vote change of other relevant political-institutional factors is also discussed. Resting on presented theory and existing empirical findings, two groups of hypotheses are discerned: the ones in first group aim for the search of economic voting, and others enunciate link between the vote and politicalinstitutional factors. Two kinds of responsibility objects are selected: first – dominant parties in national government coalition, second – dominant parties in municipal council (hypotheses aim to explain particularly change of their vote share).Second part of the article presents statistical analysis of vote change in two periods between municipal elections in Lithuania: year 1997–2000 and 2002–2007. The main reason behind this particular selection is quite different nature of both periods, which enables to test the impact of economic voting (and other factors) under different conditions. To be more specific, first period is characterized by the dominance of Homeland Union-Lithuanian Christian Democrats (HU-LCD) in the national government and deteriorating state of economy (aspect of rising unemployment). In second period, Social Democratic Party of Lithuania (SDPL) was in power (dominant party in national government coalitions) and state of economy was improving.The main findings of empirical analysis (methods of regression analysis and independent samples t-test were applied) are in line with the logic of conditional economic voting: economy matters, but sometimes it matters more and sometimes it doesn't. Firstly, unemployment change is interestingly important in the explanation of the vote change of dominant party in the municipal council, when economy is improving: more the unemployment falls, the bigger is possibility of reward (or lesser punishment). However, when state of economy is deteriorating, different levels of unemployment rise doesn't have an effect on the vote change: mere participation in the national government is enough for the punishment (but it is interestingly not important for the reward, if economy is rising). Moreover, in case of rising unemployment, dominant parties in the municipalities that are also dominant in the NATIONAL coalition are clearly punished if compared to other parties: but in case of improving economy, there are no differences between two samples.Research also confirms that turnout change is an important explanation factor of local election results: it was statistically significant in three of four regression model. It is important for the vote change of both analyzed dominant-in-the-national-government parties, HU-LCD and SDPL: these parties tend to lose votes if turnout is rising (and vice versa). Fragmentation variable has impact in two models: this confirms that party system format is important for the electoral change not just at the national level, but also at the local elections. ; Straipsnyje pateikiamas balsavimo Lietuvos savivaldybių tarybų rinkimuose tyrimas, kuriame makrolygiu gilinamasi į rinkimų rezultatus ir jų priežastis. Remiantis statistine dviejų laikotarpių (1997–2000 m. ir 2002–2007 m.) duomenų analize, siekiama paaiškinti balsavimo už savivaldoje ir nacionalinėje vyriausybėje dominuojančias partijas (du atskiri analizės atvejai) pokyčius, lyginant su prieš tai buvusiais rinkimais. Pagrindinės straipsnio hipotezės remiasi ekonominio balsavimo teorija: tikrinama, ar blogėjanti /gerėjanti ekonomikos būklė turi įtakos šių partijų gautiems balsams savivaldos tarybų rinkimuose. Papildomai tikrinamos su politiniais ir instituciniais veiksniais susijusios hipotezės: siekiama nustatyti, ar priklausomybė nacionalinei vyriausybei (tik savivaldoje dominuojančių partijų atveju), rinkiminio aktyvumo ir fragmentacijos kaita turi reikšmės partijų gautų balsų pokyčiams. Aptinkama, kad nedarbo lygio kaitos veiksnys padeda paaiškinti savivaldoje dominuojančių partijų gautų balsų pokyčius ekonominės būklės gerėjimo laikotarpiu, tačiau nėra reikšmingas jai blogėjant. Nacionalinėje valdžioje dominuojanti partija savivaldos rinkimuose yra vienareikšmiškai baudžiama blogėjant ekonominei situacijai, tačiau ekonomikai gerėjant tos partijos gautų balsų vidutinis pokytis neišsiskiria. TS-LKD 1997–2000 m. ir LSDP 2002–2007 m. gautų balsų pokyčių dispersiją politiniai instituciniai veiksniai (visų pirma, rinkiminio aktyvumo kaita) padeda paaiškinti geriau nei ekonominiai.