Journal of Electoral Studies

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Party Image in Taiwan - An Application of Focus Group

Su-Feng Cheng
2004 / 11
Volume 11, No.2

pp.185-206
10.6612/tjes.2004.11.02.185-206
Paper

Abstract

The concept and measurement of party identification have been an played an important role on explaining voting behavior in Taiwan's election studies, and it also helped to accumulate numerous research. However, it is arguable to apply this concept to explain the one-party dominant system before the 1980s and multiple party system after the 1980s in Taiwan, because whether voters can formulate "stable" identification toward a party as this concept was define in the United States needs ti be explored. therefore, we can find different variants, i. e. , party identification, partisan preference, party support, partisan orientation, partisanship, and party membership, when schlars tried to apply this construct to explain people's voting behavior, but which one is better to fit in Taiwan's electoral politics remained to be sorted out. In this study, we wmploy focus group research to explore voter' parties in people's mind. We demonstrate what people think about political parties and we believe this might be a better way to clarify the concept of party identification and improve its application in the electorral studies in Taiwan.

Keywords

party identification

partisan preference

party image

focus group