Authors
Andreas Ladner, Joëlle Pianzola
Publication date
2010
Conference
Electronic Participation: Second IFIP WG 8.5 International Conference, ePart 2010, Lausanne, Switzerland, August 29–September 2, 2010. Proceedings 2
Pages
211-224
Publisher
Springer Berlin Heidelberg
Description
Voting Advice Applications (VAAs) render a valuable platform for tackling one of democracy’s central challenges: low voter turnout. Studies indicate that lack of information and cost-benefit considerations cause voters to abstain from voting. VAAs are online voting assistance tools which match own political preferences with those of candidates and parties in elections. By assisting voters in their decision-making process prior to casting their votes, VAAs not only rebut rational choice reasoning against voting but also narrow existing information gaps. In this paper we examine the impact of VAAs on participation and voter turnout. Specifically, we present results on how the Swiss VAA smartvote affected voter turnout in the 2007 federal elections. Our analyses suggest that smartvote does have a mobilizing capacity, especially among young voters who are usually underrepresented at polls. Moreover, the study …
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