This article addresses a critical gap in the literature on winner–loser effects that consists of the lack of attention for highly contentious constitutional referenda. It uses unique multi-wave panel data of over 13,000 people that is unrivalled in size and richness. We estimate causal effects of the referendum on rarely studied but crucial public perceptions of the fairness of the way a referendum is conducted. These perceptions pertain to the highly contentious 2016 European Union (Brexit) referendum in the United Kingdom, which is an ideal-type example of a wider class of referenda for which similar outcomes can be expected. We use difference-in-differences methods and find winner–loser effects of a magnitude far greater than ever observed for general elections. Moreover, we find that these effects not only persist, but even grow over time. The findings have profound implications for the use of such referenda.
AndersonCJBlaisABowlerS, et al. (2005) Losers’ Consent: Elections and Democratic Legitimacy. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
2.
AndersonCJGuilloryCA (1997) Political institutions and satisfaction with democracy: A cross-national analysis of consensus and majoritarian systems. American Political Science Review91(1): 66–81.
3.
AndersonCJLoTempioA (2002) Winning, losing and political trust in America. British Journal of Political Science32(2): 335–351.
4.
AngristJDPischkeJ-S (2009) Mostly Harmless Econometrics. New York: Princeton University Press.
5.
BeaudonnetLBlaisABolD, et al. (2014) The impact of election outcomes on satisfaction with democracy under a two-round system. French Politics12(1): 22–35.
6.
BirchS (2010) Perceptions of electoral fairness and voter turnout. Comparative Political Studies43(12): 1601–1622.
7.
BlaisAGélineauF (2007) Winning, losing and satisfaction with democracy. Political Studies55(2): 425–441.
8.
BuchananA (2002) Political legitimacy and democracy. Ethics112(4): 689–719.
9.
Centre for Research into Elections and Social Trends (CREST) (1999) 1997 British General Election Study: Cross-Section Study, Scottish Election Study, Ethnic Minority Study – Codebook. London: CREST.
10.
De ChaisemartinCD’HaultfeuilleX (2018) Fuzzy differences-in-differences. Review of Economic Studies85: 999–1028.
11.
DekavallaM (2018) Issue and game frames in the news: Frame-building factors in television coverage of the 2014 Scottish independence referendum. Journalism19(11): 1588–1607.
12.
DelgadoI (2016) How governing experience conditions winner-loser effects: An empirical analysis of the satisfaction with democracy in Spain after 2011 elections. Electoral Studies44: 76–84.
13.
EastonD (1965) A Systems Analysis of Political Life. New York: Wiley.
14.
EsaiassonP (2011) Electoral losers revisited – How citizens react to defeat at the ballot box. Electoral Studies30(1): 102–113.
15.
EsaiassonPPerssonMGilljamM, et al. (2019) Reconsidering the role of procedures for decision acceptance. British Journal of Political Science49(1): 291–314.
FranckTM (1992) The emerging right to democratic governance. The American Journal of International Law86(1): 46–91.
20.
FrickeH (2017) Identification based on difference-in-differences approaches with multiple treatments. Oxford Bulletin of Economics and Statistics79(3): 426–433.
21.
FurmanITunçA (2019) The end of the Habermassian ideal? Political communication on Twitter during the 2017 Turkish constitutional referendum. Policy and Internet. Epub ahead of print 29 July. DOI: 10.1002/poi3.218.
22.
GerringJ (2008) Case selection for case-study analysis: Qualitative and quantitative techniques. In: Box-SteffensmeierJMBradyHECollierD (eds) Oxford Handbook of Political Methodology. Oxford: Oxford University Press, pp.645–684.
23.
HackmanJRPearceJLWolfeJC (1978) Effects of changes in job characteristics on work attitudes and behaviors: A naturally occurring quasi-experiment. Organizational Behavior and Human Performance21: 289–304.
24.
HanSMChangEC (2016) Economic inequality, winner-loser gap, and satisfaction with democracy. Electoral Studies44: 85–97.
25.
HellevikO (2009) Linear versus logistic regression when the dependent variable is a dichotomy. Quality and Quantity43: 59–74.
26.
HowellPJustwanF (2013) Nail-biters and no-contests: The effect of electoral margins on satisfaction with democracy in winners and losers. Electoral Studies32(2): 334–343.
27.
ImbensGWRubinDB (2015) Causal Inference in Statistics, Social and Biomedical Sciences. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
28.
ImbensGWWooldridgeJM (2009) Recent developments in the econometrics of program evaluation. Journal of Economic Literature47: 5–86.
LechnerM (2011) The estimation of causal effects by difference-in-difference methods. Foundations and Trends in Econometrics4: 165–224.
31.
LeiterDClarkAKClarkM (2019) Winners and losers reconsidered: Party support, character valence, and satisfaction with democracy. European Political Science Review11(3): 285–300.
32.
LindeJEkmanJ (2003) Satisfaction with democracy: A note on a frequently used indicator in comparative politics. European Journal of Political Research42(3): 391–408.
33.
LockeJ (1821 [1689]) Two Treatises of Government: A New Edition Corrected. London: Whitmore and Fenn.
34.
MarienSKernA (2018) The winner takes it all: Revisiting the effect of direct democracy on citizens’ political support. Political Behavior40(4): 857–882.
35.
MartinAMikołajczakGOrrR (2020) Does process matter? Experimental evidence on the effect of procedural fairness on citizens’ evaluations of policy outcomes. International Political Science Review. Epub ahead of print 4 March. DOI: 10.1177/0192512120908874.
36.
MartiniSQuarantaM (2019) Political support among winners and losers: Within- and between-country effects of structure, process and performance in Europe. European Journal of Political Research58(1): 341–361.
37.
MillerAH (1974) Political issues and trust in government: 1964–1970. American Political Science Review68(3): 951–972.
38.
NaginDSTelepCW (2017) Procedural justice and legal compliance. Annual Review of Law and Social Science13: 5–28.
39.
NiesiobędzkaMKołodziejS (2017) The fair process effect in taxation: The roles of procedural fairness, outcome favorability and outcome fairness in the acceptance of tax authority decisions. Current Psychology39: 246–253.
40.
RoseJ (2014) The Public Understanding of Political Integrity: The Case for Probity Perceptions. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan.
41.
ScholzJTLubellM (1998) Trust and taxpaying: Testing the heuristic approach to collective action. American Journal of Political Science42(2): 398–417.
42.
ShadishWRCookTDCampbellDT (2002) Experimental and Quasi-Experimental Designs for Generalized Causal Inference. Boston: Houghton Mifflin.
43.
SinghSKarakoçEBlaisA (2012) Differentiating winners: How elections affect satisfaction with democracy. Electoral Studies31(1): 201–211.
44.
SinghSLagoIBlaisA (2011) Winning and competitiveness as determinants of political support. Social Science Quarterly92(3): 695–709.
45.
SklarA (1999) Contested collectives: The struggle to define the ‘we’ in the 1995 Québec referendum. Southern Communication Journal642: 106–122.
46.
SunshineJTylerTR (2003) The role of procedural justice and legitimacy in shaping public support for policing. Law & Society Review37(3): 513–548.
47.
TylerTR (1988) What is procedural justice-criteria used by citizens to assess the fairness of legal procedures. Law & Society Review22: 103–135.
48.
TylerTR (2003) Procedural justice, legitimacy, and the effective rule of law. Crime and Justice30: 283–357.
49.
TylerTRRasinskiK (1991) Procedural justice, institutional legitimacy, and the acceptance of unpopular US Supreme Court decisions: A reply to Gibson. Law and Society Review25(3): 621–630.
50.
Van den WijngaertM (2001) De volksraadpleging van 12 maart 1950. In: FleerackersF (ed.) De Re Ferenda: Een meta-juridische conflictanalyse van het referendum. Brussels: Larcier, pp.131–144.
51.
Van der EijkCFranklinM (2009) Elections and Voters. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan.
52.
Van der MeerTWSteenvoordenEH (2018) Going back to the well: A panel study into the election boost of political support among electoral winners and losers. Electoral Studies55: 40–53.
VillaJM (2016.) Diff: Simplifying the estimation of difference-in-differences treatment effects. The Stata Journal16: 52–71.
55.
WingCSimonKBello-GomezRA (2018) Designing difference in difference studies: Best practices for public health policy research. Annual Review of Public Health39: 453–469.
Supplementary Material
Please find the following supplemental material available below.
For Open Access articles published under a Creative Commons License, all supplemental material carries the same license as the article it is associated with.
For non-Open Access articles published, all supplemental material carries a non-exclusive license, and permission requests for re-use of supplemental material or any part of supplemental material shall be sent directly to the copyright owner as specified in the copyright notice associated with the article.
