Representation and austerity politics : attitudes of Greek voters and elites compared

Karyotis, Georgios and Rudig, Wolfgang and Judge, David; Freire, André and Lisi, Marco and Andreadis, Ioannis and Leite Viegas, José Manuel, eds. (2015) Representation and austerity politics : attitudes of Greek voters and elites compared. In: Political Representation in Times of Bailout. Routledge, London. ISBN 978-1138939028

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Abstract

Drawing on surveys of voters and MPs in Greece, this chapter analyses elite–mass interaction on key policy (austerity, European integration, immigration) and ideological issues after the 2012 elections. We find that while for the government parties, New Democracy and PASOK, the level of congruence is quite high, MPs from opposition parties (SYRIZA, Golden Dawn) place themselves in more exposed positions in comparison with their voters. The observed substantial variation in the intensity and direction of congruence, across parties and issue preferences in Greece, reinforces the view that the dimensionality of political contestation is not reducible to a single ideological dimension.