Some Things don’t ever change: How Portugal’s political party outcome influences voter turnout

This study tests the hypothesis that in the Portuguese legislative elections from 2011 to 2022, municipalities where the political party with the majority of the votes is the same as the one in the prior election, have a higher abstention rate compared to municipalities where the majority of the votes shifts to a different political party. No significant differences in voter turnout were found among municipalities that re-elected a party from those that did not. However, when examining how many times the party has been re-elected two effects were observed: the "Newly Elected" Effect (NEE), where municipalities that re-elected a party for the first and second time saw an increase in abstention, and an opposite effect, designated as "Longevity" Effect (LE), where municipalities that re-elected a party for the fifth to eighth time observed a decrease in abstention. Finally, when trying to understand the impact that re-electing a party had in each election year on the voter turnout, there was no significant change in abstention throughout the years, suggesting that the absence of re-election impact on abstention is a systemic issue.