CAMPAIGN EFFECTS ON VOTER CHOICE IN THE GERMAN ELECTION OF 1990

Using national survey panel data collected in Germany during the 1990 Bundestag election campaign, we develop a model to assess the effect o f the campaign on individual votes and the election outcome. We find t hat the dominant effects of the campaign on German voters, as in the L azarsfeld er al. studies from the 1940s and in more recent US research , were the 'reinforcement' of earlier preferences and the 'activation' of latent vote dispositions based on fundamental individual attitudes such as party affiliation and left-right ideology. At the same time, the analysis shows that the number of campaign 'converts' (those who v ote against their dispositions and prior preferences) was approximatel y 14 per cent of the electorate. The vote division among these individ uals was overwhelmingly pro-government, suggesting that the 1990 Germa n campaign altered a sufficient number of votes to turn what was an ev en contest, based on the electorate's initial political dispositions, into a solid government coalition victory.