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This article aims to explain attitudes towards the European Union in Central and East European countries. I propose a model that combines economic and political variables at two levels of explanation: the individual and the national. Using a cross-sectional time series data set compiled from Central and Eastern Eurobarometer surveys, I demonstrate that individual attitudes towards domestic economic and political reforms are good predictors of citizens' attitudes towards the European Union in Central and East European countries. Macro dimensions, such as economic and political performance, have an impact on attitudes towards the EU, particularly in candidate countries. Finally, a multiplicative model with interaction effects between the individual level and the macro level suggests that attitudes have a stronger impact if the domestic conditions are good. If the country is in bad shape, the attitudes are less relevant.

In the literature on civil conflicts, federalism is often touted as a useful institution to address regional demands. However, diversity in the groups present in a country is also associated with a higher tendency for conflicts. In this article we examine how the geographic distribution of groups across a country affects the ways in which federalism contributes to conflict resolution. Of tantamount importance in assessing these effects of federalism is whether particular types of distributions of groups across a territory make the adoption of federal institutions more likely. We find federal countries with strong ethno-federal arrangements to be particularly conflict-prone.

Over the last decade, Switzerland has been characterized by both a radicalization of its political system and the relative success of the SP and SVP parties, which tend to adopt a strategy of permanent campaigning. Because of this, it is often argued that politicians are held accountable for their behaviour and that their electoral successes depend on their voting behaviour in parliament. We thus explore whether the voting behaviour of representatives, or citizens' evaluations of parties' ideological positions had an impact on their electoral success in the 1995, 1999, and 2003 national elections. More precisely, we assess how far the proximity and directional models explain the electoral success of incumbents and parties using roll call data for the National Council as well as the Selects surveys at the individual level. The results at both levels suggest that voters' choice is largely consistent with what is predicted by the spatial models of electoral behaviour. Swiss voters form their party preference on both proximity and direction, which supports a mixed model of electoral behaviour. Adapted from the source document.

"Die Schweiz hat während der letzten Dekade eine Radikalisierung des politischen Systems erlebt welche zu einem relativen Erfolg der SP und der SVP führte, wobei beide Parteien zum 'permanenten Wahlkampf' tendieren. Basierend auf dieser Erfahrung wird oft argumentiert, dass die Politiker vermehrt für ihr Verhalten im Nationalrat zur Rechenschaft gezogen werden. Die Verfasser untersuchen deshalb, ob das Wahlverhalten der Repräsentanten oder die Einschätzung ihrer ideologischen Positionen durch die Wähler einen Einfluss hatte auf den Wahlerfolg der wichtigsten Parteien bei den Wahlen 1995, 1999 und 2003. Genauer betrachten die Verfasser, wie gut 'Proximity-' und 'Directional-Voting' Modelle die Wiederwahl von Repräsentanten und den Wahlerfolg von Parteien zu erklären vermögen, basierend auf Namensabstimmungen im Nationalrat und den Umfragedaten der Selects-Wahlstudie. Die Resultate deuten auf beiden Ebenen darauf hin dass die Wahlentscheidung im Großen und Ganzen konsistent ist mit dem was diese räumlichen Modelle vorhersagen. Die Schweizer Wähler stützen ihre Parteipräferenz sowohl auf das 'Proximity-' als auch auf das 'Directional'-Modell was auf ein gemischtes Modell der Wahlentscheidung schließen lässt." (Autorenreferat)

A simple game-theoretic model suggests that voter preferences should find stronger reflection in policy outcomes if referendums are possible than if such popular influence is excluded. Relying on the large-scale quasiexperiment of European integration, we test whether referendums lead to more supportive voters with data covering more than 20 years. We find suggestive evidence for our theoretical implication that constitutional provisions for referendums lead to citizens more supportive of European integration. Similarly, the results suggest that voters more strongly support European integration immediately after a referendum vote.