Replication data for: Strategic Voting in the 1994 Taipei City Mayoral Election

In most multi-candidate, plurality rule elections, voters often have to consider whether or not to vote strategically; defecting from a most preferred, but non-viable candidate in order to reduce the chances that an even less-preferred candidate would be elected. What makes the 1994 Taipei election interesting is that the non-viable candidates could not be easily identified, which created an opportunity for party elites to manipulate voters' decisions by sending signals to influence their perceptions of the candidates' viability. Our analysis has two important results. First, voters discounted strategic considerations in their vote calculations early in the campaign, especially when there was considerable doubt, among both voters and party elites, over which candidate was unlikely to win the election. Second, once the election became more proximate and information about candidate viability was more likely to accurately reflect the outcome of the election, voters used signals from party elites and placed greater weight on strategic considerations.在绝大多数多候选人相对多数投票制（plurality rule）选举中，选民往往需要权衡是否采取策略性投票：即背离自身最偏好但无胜算候选人（non-viable candidate），以降低次劣偏好候选人当选的概率。令1994年台北选举颇具研究价值的一点在于，彼时无胜算候选人难以被明确辨识，这为政党精英提供了操纵选民决策的空间——他们可通过传递信号，影响选民对候选人胜算的认知。本研究的分析得出两项重要结论。其一，竞选初期选民在进行投票决策时，并未过多考量策略性投票因素，尤其是当选民与政党精英均对哪位候选人无胜选可能存在显著不确定性时。其二，一旦选举临近，且关于候选人胜算的信息能够更准确地反映选举结果，选民便会参考政党精英传递的信号，并更为重视策略性投票因素。