Information costs and voting in Thailand: Explaining party- and candidate-centered patterns.

摘要

Voting allows the preferences of citizens to be translated into mandates to govern. Voting behavior thus deserves our attention. In recent years, the question of voting patterns in Thailand has gained attention among students of Thai party politics and elections. Participants in the literature have generally focused on describing and accounting for the prevalence of personal or candidate-centered voting in Thailand. While candidate-centered voting is the norm, scholars have noted that voting behavior has varied across both space and time in Thailand. However, little systematic work exists that seeks to account for such variations in voting behavior. This dissertation contributes to this literature by adopting and modifying an American model to explain voting behavior in the Thai context. The main research question is whether information costs play a key role in affecting voting decisions among Thai voters. The dissertation hypothesizes that information costs regarding candidates are an important determinant of voting patterns (party-centered vs. candidate-centered voting). As such, the study analyzes electoral data from Thailand's 1992 (September), 1995, and 1996 general elections. The findings clearly show that information costs are essential to voting decisions and that voting patterns (party-centered vs. candidate-centered) are strongly influenced by the information costs incurred by voters. These findings are consistent over time.