Overcoming the Regional Cleavage? Political Party Nationalization in Ecuador since the Return to Democracy

Abstract

This work analyses the evolution of Ecuadorian political parties’ territorial coverage since the return to democracy. It uses district-level electoral returns from between 1979 and 2013 for three different types of elections (presidential, national deputy, provincial deputy) to evaluate the territorial homogeneity of the parties in each period («static» nationalization) as well as the homogeneity of temporal change («dynamic» nationalization). Through use of electoral cartography, as well as mixed model statistical analysis, the results show a high level of volatility along both dimensions of nationalization for all parties, including the government’s ALianza pais. The analysis also reveals that widespread voter support for legislators from a single party is driven by presidential coattails rather than through developing deep roots in districts. The geographical analysis indicates that regionalism has persisted in Ecuadorian political parties since 1979 despite the success of Rafael Correa’s party at the polls.

Keywords

• nacionalización de los partidos políticos
• ecuador
• alianza pais
• cartografía electoral