Nobody seems to be fully representing me: Differential inter-attitudinal cohesion systems and their effects on satisfaction with the political system

Abstract

A shared inter-attitudinal structure of political preferences is a key precondition for political parties' abilities to represent citizens' views and, consequently, for the system's capacity to fulfil its purpose satisfactorily. Nonetheless, the structure of attitudes' cohesion is not usually included in studies exploring the elements that affect citizens' satisfaction with the functioning of the system. This paper aims to explore this gap. It distinguishes between two ways in which voters' structure of attitudes might be different from that of elites: insufficient thinking around issues, and the use of different schemes of thinking around political objects. Results from the European Election Study show that the two logics co-exist in European Union societies. They also demonstrate that the latter is associated with voters' lower levels of satisfaction with the functioning of democracy, even after controlling for political engagement, distance to closest party and need to engage in trade-offs.