Cathy Gormley-Heenan and Roger Macginty — Ethnic Outbidding and Party Modernization: Understanding the Democratic Unionist Party’s Electoral Success in the Post-Agreement Environment

31 published claims from this book.

• A betrayal discourse is a low-cost outbidding strategy leveraging shared communal narratives
• Centralized party structures enable disciplined and nuanced outbidding strategies
• Credibility disputes over rivals’ bids shape outbidding outcomes.
• Ethnic outbidding can be modulated and coexist with party modernization
• Ethnic outbidding intensity fluctuates over a peace process’s timeline, not continuously
• Ethnic outbidding is intra-bloc competition that blocks inter-group compromise.
• Ethnic parties shift toward moderation only after securing dominance over in-group rivals
• Ethnonational parties can simultaneously outbid rivals and modernize
• Hardline ethnic parties can modernize and thrive in peace processes.
• In divided societies, voter turnout may matter more than ideological conviction.
• In-group unity rhetoric lets parties signal anti-deal activism when attention is elsewhere.
• Nineties-era mass-party models are being displaced by electorally focused, disciplined catch-all machines.
• Outbidders may damage a peace process only as a byproduct of attacking intragroup rivals.
• Outbidders weaponize fear narratives while discounting deferred peace benefits.
• Outbidding aims range from accord collapse to full acceptance
• Outbidding and party modernization mutually reinforce each other rather than conflict
• Outbidding can backfire by strengthening moderates or branding challengers as spoilers
• Outbidding impacts on peace accords form a graded spectrum from collapse to symbolic modification.
• Outbidding is context dependent and can phase-shift toward moderation after in-group victory
• Outbidding parties poach defectors from moderate rivals to consolidate in-group unity.
• Outbidding’s impact on peace accords depends on pro-accord blocs’ capacity to withstand internal pressure.
• Parties can wield elections as outbidding instruments against peace processes
• Peaceful political actors can legitimize violence by their co-ethnics without direct causal linkage.
• Physical proximity makes intra-group conflicts more vitriolic than inter-group ones
• Sectarian outbidding parties can still adopt modern party organization
• The DUP achieved electoral discipline through hierarchical control and leader deference.
• The DUP disciplined internal message unity for effective outbidding campaigns.
• The DUP shifted from unionist vote-sharing pacts to outbidding rival unionist parties.
• The DUP’s post-Agreement gains came from mobilizing apathetic unionists, not attracting new voters.
• The DUP’s post-Agreement success drew on party professionalization
• Zero-sum conflict contexts make groups treat any concession as weakness on all issues