Evidence from Sweden shows the importance of parties signalling potential coalition partners for strategic voting

From Podemos to the Front National and the Five Star Movement, mainstream parties in Europe are increasingly being challenged by ‘outsider’ parties on the radical-left and far-right in several European countries. But with the proliferation of new parties how is electoral support affected by strategic voting? Annika Fredén writes on the differing fortunes of small parties in Sweden and Germany in recent elections. She argues that the extent to which smaller parties benefit from strategic voting is highly dependent on signalling prior to polling day, and that parties in tight contests such as the 2015 general election in the UK could therefore benefit from pre-election agreements.