Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-t7fkt Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-20T07:26:00.676Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Who Has School Spirit? Explaining Voter Participation in School Board Elections

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  09 August 2019

R. Michael McGregor  and
Jack Lucas
R. Michael McGregor*
Affiliation:
Department of Politics and Public Administration, Ryerson University, 350 Victoria Street JOR700, Toronto, ON, M5B 2K3
Jack Lucas
Affiliation:
Department of Political Science, University of Calgary, 2500 University Drive NW, Calgary, AB, T2N 1N4
*
*Corresponding author. Email: [email protected]
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

This research note examines the correlates of turnout in Canadian school board elections. Using individual-level data from the Canadian Municipal Election Study, we find that gender, education, left-wing ideology, Conservative partisanship and parental status were associated with participation in Calgary's 2017 public school board elections. Some of these patterns relate to the specific details of Calgary's 2017 election; others, we suggest, may be characteristic of school board elections more generally. We relate our findings to the literature on ballot roll-off and low-turnout elections.

Résumé

Cette note de recherche examine les corrélats de la participation aux élections des conseils scolaires au Canada. Selon les données individuelles tirées de l'Étude sur les élections municipales canadiennes, nous constatons que le sexe, le niveau de scolarité, l'idéologie de gauche, la partisanerie conservatrice et la qualité parentale étaient associés à la participation aux élections des conseils scolaires publics de 2017 à Calgary. Certaines de ces tendances sont liées aux détails particuliers de l'élection de 2017 à Calgary ; d'autres, à notre avis, pourraient être caractéristiques des élections des conseils scolaires en général. Nous faisons le lien entre nos constatations et la bibliographie sur les élections à faible taux de participation et l'annulation des bulletins de vote.

Keywords

turnoutschool board electionslocal elections
Type
Research Note/Notes de recherche
Information
Canadian Journal of Political Science/Revue canadienne de science politique , Volume 52 , Issue 4 , December 2019 , pp. 923 - 936
Copyright
Copyright © Canadian Political Science Association (l'Association canadienne de science politique) and/et la Société québécoise de science politique 2019 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Footnotes

Acknowledgments: The authors wish to thank Dr. Mary McGregor, our anonymous reviewers, and the journal editor for their helpful feedback on earlier versions of this piece.

†

The second author is a member of the English-language editorial team. To maintain objectivity, an outside editor oversaw the review process and was fully responsible for editorial decisions related to this submission.

References

Alphonso, Caroline. 2018. “Nova Scotia Introduces Bill to Dissolve School Boards in education Overhaul.” Globe and Mail, March 10.Google Scholar
Andersen, Jørgen Juel, Fiva, Jon H. and Natvik, Gisle James. 2014. “Voting When the Stakes Are High.” Journal of Public Economics 110: 157–66.Google Scholar
Anzia, Sarah F. 2011 “Election Timing and the Electoral Influence of Interest Groups.” Journal of Politics 73 (2): 412–27.Google Scholar
Blais, André. 2006. “What Affects Voter Turnout?” Annual Review of Political Science 9: 111–25.Google Scholar
Blais, André. 2007. “Turnout in Elections.” In The Oxford Handbook of Political Behavior, ed. Dalton, Russell J. and Klingemann, Hans-Dieter. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Braid, Don. 2017. “Smith's Contention Taxes Up by 51% Is Wrong; Meanwhile, Trolls Are Trying to Discredit Sensible Policies Touted by Students Count.” Calgary Herald, October 14.Google Scholar
Breux, Sandra, Couture, Jerome and Koop, Royce. 2017. “Turnout in Local Elections: Evidence from Canadian Cities, 2004–2014.” Canadian Journal of Political Science 50 (3): 699–722.Google Scholar
Bullock, Charles S., and Dunn, Richard E.. 1996. “Election Roll-Off: A Test of Three Explanations.” Urban Affairs Review 32 (1): 71–86.Google Scholar
Cancela, João and Geys, Benny. 2016. “Explaining Voter Turnout: A Meta-Analysis of National and Subnational Elections.” Electoral Studies 42: 264–75.Google Scholar
City of Calgary. 2013. “Official Results.” 2013 Election. http://www.calgary.ca/CA/city-clerks/Scripts/Elections2013/2013-General-Election-Results.htm (November 2017) accessed May 15, 2019.Google Scholar
City of Calgary. 2017. “Official Results.” 2017 Election. http://www.calgary.ca/election/Pages/results/Official-Results.aspx (November 2017).Google Scholar
City of Edmonton. 2017. “Official Results.” 2017 Election. https://www.edmonton.ca/city_government/municipal_elections/2017-election-results.aspx (November 2017).Google Scholar
City of Toronto. 2014. “General Election Results.” https://www.toronto.ca/city-government/elections/general-information/election-results/general-election-results/ (November 2017).Google Scholar
DiPasquale, Denise and Glaeser, Edward L.. 1999. “Incentives and Social Capital: Are Homeowners Better Citizens?” Journal of Urban Economics 45 (2): 354–84.Google Scholar
Ervik, Bjorn. 2012. “Second-Order Arguments for Second-Order Elections? Measuring ‘Election States’ in a Multilevel Context: The Case of Norway.” Journal of Elections, Public Opinion, and Parties 22 (1): 27–50.Google Scholar
Feddersen, Timothy J. and Pesendorfer, Wolfgang. 1999. “Abstention in Elections with Asymmetric Information and Diverse Preferences.” American Political Science Review 93 (2): 381–98.Google Scholar
Ferguson, Eva. 2017. “Hotly Contested CBE Election to Change Face of Public Board.” Calgary-Herald, October 17.Google Scholar
Geys, Benny. 2006. “Explaining Voter turnout: A Review of Aggregate-Level Research.” Electoral Studies 25 (4): 637–63.Google Scholar
Golder, Sona N., Lago, Ignacio, Blais, André, Gidengil, Elisabeth and Gschwend, Thomas. 2017. Multi-level Electoral Politics: Beyond the Second-Order Election Model. Oxford: Oxford University Press.10.1093/oso/9780198791539.001.0001Google Scholar
Hall, Melinda and Bonneau, Chris. 2008. “Mobilizing Interest: The Effects of Money on Citizen Participation in State Supreme Court Elections.” American Journal of Political Science 52 (3): 457–70.Google Scholar
Hall, William. 2007. “Voting in State Supreme Court Elections; Competition and Context as Democratic Incentives.” Journal of Politics 69 (4): 1147–59.Google Scholar
Hamilton, Howard D. 1971. “The Municipal Voter: Voting and Non-Voting in City Elections.” American Political Science Review 65: 1135–40.Google Scholar
Junker, Anna. 2017. “Province Puts CBE Spending under Review.” Calgary Herald, June 10.Google Scholar
Kogan, Vladimir, Lavertu, Stéphane and Peskowitz, Zachary. 2018. “Election Timing, Electorate Composition, and Policy Outcomes: Evidence from School Districts.” American Journal of Political Science 62 (3): 637–51.Google Scholar
Lassen, David Dryer. 2005. “The Effect of Information on Voter Turnout: Evidence from a Natural Experiment.” American Journal of Political Science 49 (1): 103–18.Google Scholar
McGregor, R. Michael, 2018. “Voters Who Abstain: Explaining Abstention and Ballot Roll-Off in the 2014 Toronto Municipal Election.” Urban Affairs Review 54 (6): 1081–106.Google Scholar
McGregor, R. Michael and Spicer, Zachary. 2016. “The Canadian Homevoter: Property Values and Municipal Politics in Canada.” Journal of Urban Affairs 38 (1): 123–39.10.1111/juaf.12178Google Scholar
Mackie, Richard. 2002. “Witmer Orders School-Board Takeover.” Globe and Mail, August 28.Google Scholar
Marsh, Michael. 1998. “Testing the Second-Order Election Model after Four European Elections.” British Journal of Political Science 28 (4): 591–607.Google Scholar
Matsusaka, John G. 1995. “Explaining Voter Turnout Patterns: An Information Theory.” Public Choice 84 (1–2): 91–117.Google Scholar
Ministère de l’Éducation et de l'Enseignement supérieur. 2014. “Résultats préliminaires des élections scolaires de 2014.” http://www.education.gouv.qc.ca/commissions-scolaires/gouvernance/elections-scolaires-2014/resultats-2014/ (November 2017) accessed May 15, 2019.Google Scholar
Moe, Terry. 2005. “Teacher Unions and School Board Elections.” In Besieged: School Boards and the Future of Education Politics, ed. Howell, William G.. Washington, DC: Brookings Institution Press.Google Scholar
Nichols, Stephen M. 1998. “State Referendum Voting, Ballot Roll-Off, and the Effect of New Electoral Technology.” State & Local Government Review 30 (2): 106–17.Google Scholar
Reif, Karlheinz and Schmitt, Hermann. 1980. “Nine Second-Order National Elections: A Conceptual Framework for the Analysis of European Election Results.” European Journal of Political Research 8 (1): 3–44.Google Scholar
Schaffner, Brian F, and Streb, Matthew J.. 2002. “The Partisan Heuristic in Low-Information Elections.” Public Opinion Quarterly 66 (4): 559–81.10.1086/343755Google Scholar
Schaffner, Brian F, Streb, Matthew J. and Wright, Gerald C.. 2001. “Teams without Uniforms: The Nonpartisan Ballot in State and Local Elections.” Political Research Quarterly 54 (1): 7–30.Google Scholar
Schmitt, Hermann. 2005. “The European Parliament Elections of June 2004: Still Second-Order?” West European Politics 28 (3): 650–79.Google Scholar
Sheppard, Bruce, Galway, Gerald and Brown, Jean. 2013. School Boards Matter: Report of the Pan-Canadian Study of School District Governance. Montreal: Canadian School Boards Association.Google Scholar
Sherlock, Tracy. 2016. “Vancouver School Board in Chaos.” The Province, October 5.Google Scholar
Smets, Kaat and van Ham, Carolien. 2013. “The Embarrassment of Riches? A Meta-Analysis of Individual-Level Research on Voter Turnout.” Electoral Studies 32 (2): 344–59.Google Scholar
Stockemer, Daniel. 2017. “What Affects Voter Turnout? A Review Article / Meta-Analysis of Aggregate Research.” Government and Opposition 52 (4): 698–722.Google Scholar
Streb, Matthew J. and Frederick, Brian. 2011. “When Money Cannot Encourage Participation: Campaign Spending and Rolloff in Low Visibility Judicial Elections.” Political Behaviour 33 (4): 665–84.Google Scholar
Tausanovitch, Chris and Warshaw, Christopher. 2014. “Representation in Municipal Government.” American Political Science Review 108 (3): 605–41.Google Scholar
Tolley, Erin. 2011. “Do Women ‘Do Better’ in Municipal Politics? Electoral Representation across Three Levels of Government.” Canadian Journal of Political Science 44 (3): 573–94.Google Scholar
Walker, Jack. 1966. “Ballot Forms and Voter Fatigue: An Analysis of the Office Block and Party Column Ballots.” Midwest Journal of Political Science 10 (4): 448–63.Google Scholar
Supplementary material: File

McGregor and Lucas supplementary material

McGregor and Lucas supplementary material
Download McGregor and Lucas supplementary material(File)
File 52.4 KB