Estimating Voter Migration in Canada
Using Generalized Maximum Entropy |
WERNER ANTWEILER
University of British Columbia |
| |
|
|
| |
Non-Technical Summary
Do the non-voters decide elections? Voters don't so much
swing as bounce on a long elastic tether. They may abstain from voting
when they're unhappy, but they don't necessarily switch
parties. Studying patterns of voter migration in the three most recent
federal elections in Canada and the three most recent provincial
elections in B.C. provides significant evidence that voters maintain
long-term political preferences, a kind of "tethered partisanship",
and are less prone to float and drift between political preferences
than often thought. Political strategists haven't yet taken this
lesson to heart, as much political campaigning is still directed at
the elusive "swing voter", and much less at getting the
"affinity voter" sufficiently motivated and into the
voting booth.
Research Paper
• Electoral Studies 26(4), December 2007, pages 756-771. (also access the journal via ScienceDirect or Ingenta if you or your university are subscribed; direct link to full text of article via ScienceDirect)
• The first version of the paper is available as SSRN Research Paper 930232, August 13, 2006.
News Coverage
• Re-engaging non-voters key to election victory: UBC Study by Lorraine Chan, appeared in UBC Reports 54(10), 2 October 2008
Charts and Figures
Voter Migration Estimates
British Columbia Provincial Elections 1996-2001 |
|---|
| B.C. Liberal Party |
New Democratic Party |
B.C. Green Party |
 |
 |
 |
| click on each chart to retrieve the full scale PDF file |
Voter Migration Estimates
British Columbia Provincial Elections 2001-2005 |
|---|
| B.C. Liberal Party |
New Democratic Party |
B.C. Green Party |
 |
 |
 |
| click on each chart to retrieve the full scale PDF file |
Voter Migration Estimates
Canadian Federal Elections 2000-2004 |
|---|
| Liberal Party |
New Democratic Party |
Bloc Quebecois |
 |
 |
 |
| Progressive Conservatives |
Canadian Alliance |
Conservative Party |
 |
 |
 |
| click on each chart to retrieve the full scale PDF file |
Voter Migration Estimates
Canadian Federal Elections 2004-2006 |
|---|
| Liberal Party |
New Democratic Party |
Bloc Quebecois |
Conservative Party |
 |
 |
 |
 |
| click on each chart to retrieve the full scale PDF file |
Data Sources
| Election |
CSV Data File | Adj. |
|---|
| Canadian Federal Election 2000 |
download | 301::308 |
| Canadian Federal Election 2004 |
download | 308 |
| Canadian Federal Election 2006 |
download | 308 |
| British Columbia Provincial Election 1996 |
download | 75::79 |
| British Columbia Provincial Election 2001 |
download | 79 |
| British Columbia Provincial Election 2005 |
download | 79 |
The column "Adj." indicates the number of constituencies used
in the table. Where two numbers are provided, separated by a ::,
the original number of electoral districts of this election
was transposed to match the number of electoral districts
in the subsequent election.
Useful Links
• The GME estimator is implemented through
PROC ENTROPY in the SAS Language;
also see pp. 731-782 in the SAS/ETS 9.1 User's Guide
for further information on methodology.
• Maximum Entropy estimators are discussed extensively in the book
Maximum Entropy Econometrics: Robust Estimation with Limited Data by Amos Golan, George G. Judge, and Douglas Miller, Wiley: 1996.
• Elections Canada, Information on Past Elections
• Elections B.C., Provincial Election Results
|
|
| |
|
|
| |
 |
THE UNIVERSITY OF
BRITISH COLUMBIA
|  |
|
© 2025 Sauder School of Business, University of British Columbia.
This web site is maintained by
Werner Antweiler.
|
| |