Motivations for partisan attachment in the developing world

Abstract

In developing countries, partisanship is pervasive, but its motivations remain largely unexplored. Whereas non-programmatic party–voter linkages dominate the political discourse in these contexts, we posit that such linkages are probably not the sole motivating factor behind partisanship. Drawing on interviews and an original survey from India – a context rife with non-programmatic exchanges – we find that partisans generally attribute their loyalty to parties’ ideological positions and policy platforms. This finding is reinforced by a priming experiment in which respondents made to reflect on parties’ ideologies and policies were more likely to self-report as partisans. Priming non-programmatic party–voter linkages in the form of community-based favoritism produces no discernible effect. Exploring differences between those attributing their own partisan loyalty to more programmatic or more non-programmatic motivations, we find the former group to be more consistent in their voting patterns and more likely to report negative partisanship, though both groups express similar levels of affective partisan attachment. Our findings underscore the need for more nuanced theorizing of partisanship and its effects in the developing world.