Spatial diffusion and geographical patterns in the Turkish vote for pro-Islamist parties

Abstract

Electoral geography is mostly concerned with the geographic distribution of voters and their attributes. We add a new argument to the discussion about electoral geography: that parties pursue geographically oriented stronghold strategies. Parties win electoral provinces, transform them into strongholds, and then use the stronghold´s resources to systematically target nearby provinces. We illustrate our argument with a quantitative analysis of the rise of the Turkish Adalet ve Kalkınma Partisi (AKP), utilizing a spatial diffusion perspective. Our analysis shows that the AKP has electoral gains in a given ‘receiver’ province if they have performed well in other ‘sender’ provinces in previous elections. This relation is moderated by geographical distance: only past electoral success in nearby ‘sender’ provinces has an impact on the electoral fortune of the AKP in the ‘receiver’ province. Thus, our argument is that geography matters and it channels party strategies.