Regional Elections in Slovakia: Beyond the Second Order Election Hypothesis

This paper considers the territoriality of vote in national and regional elections in Slovakia. It examines several institutional and sociological variables that are commonly thought to explain the differences between results political parties achieve in national and regional elections. As the difference in timing between regional and national elections has been smaller than seven months (national elections follow the regional ones), and governing parties receive dissimilar results (defeats in 2001 and 2005, but victory in 2009), the second-order hypothesis receives only a mixed support in the Slovak case. This finding, however, should be considered against three important country-specific observations. Firstly, there are crucial differences in executive-legislative relations at local and national level. The separation of powers at the regional level decreases competitiveness between parties and makes cooperation across government-opposition divide more likely. Secondly, fluidity of party system, organizational instability and low durability of parties make a systematic comparison of party results very difficult. Short life-span and overall decline of support for some governing parties reflects their weak electoral performance at BOTH regional and national level. Finally, openness of election at regional level (but not at the national one) to independent and unaffiliated candidates, and the significant electoral support they receive, indicate low levels of “partyness” in the regional competition. Hence, the paper also contributes to discussion on the place of party in a new European democracy.