Teaching research project: State election 2023

For the state election on 8 October 2023 in Bavaria, we conducted a teaching research project at the University of Regensburg, just as we had done five years previously. The main topic was the mobilisation and analysis of non-voters in the city of Regensburg. Once again, many students from the University of Regensburg were involved in the project, which took place four weeks before the 2023 Bavarian elections on 8 October 2023 and four weeks afterwards. The focus was on a field experiment with written surveys, in-depth interviews, door-to-door visits and focus group discussions in selected monitoring areas of the Regensburg Social Index and a total of 12,000 households. The social index has been compiled by the city of Regensburg since 2022. We are interested in whether non-voters in well-off neighbourhoods differ from non-voters in precarious neighbourhoods and, if so, how. In addition, the cross-party mobilisation effect of a reminder of the 2023 state election was tested. The city of Regensburg was very cooperative in this regard and provided us with the social and demographic monitoring data for the 71 residential areas in Regensburg for the sampling. The city is also very interested in our results, as it would like to observe political behaviour in the monitoring areas in addition to many other indicators such as population structure or employment.

The state of research on the topic of "unequal voter turnout" shows that "massive differences in the probability of voting can also be observed in Germany depending on the level of education, social class or income" (Roßteutscher & Schäfer 2016, p. 455). As social status "is not randomly distributed across society, but people of higher status generally live in different neighbourhoods than people of lower status, there is an increasing concentration of high and low voting districts" (Roßteutscher & Schäfer 2016, p. 455). This phenomenon can also be observed in Regensburg. Participation in the 2021 Bundestag Elections in Regensburg was satisfactory overall at 77.2% (Bavaria: 79.9%) and in the 2023 state elections at 71.6% (Bavaria: 73.1%). However, the Office for Urban Development and the Statistical Office for the 71 areas of Regensburg's social and demographic monitoring showed that voter turnout in the 2021 general election varied between 57.3% (Friedrich-Viehbacher Allee) and 89.3% (Oberer and Unterer Wöhrd) (Stadt Regensburg 2022, p. 67).

For a long time, non-voters in Germany were an "unknown entity" (Falter & Schumann 1994) and not a relevant subject of research. The growing abstention from voting since the heyday of over 90 % participation in the 1970s was seen as unproblematic and rather as an adaptation to normal conditions in Western democracies (normalisation thesis) (Roth 1992). Empirical studies at the time showed that non-voters and voters did not differ greatly in terms of origin and attitudes and that non-voters could therefore be categorised as socially "inconspicuous" (Roth & Wüst 2007, p. 400). However, this changed in 2009, when voter turnout in the Bundestag Elections fell to a historic low of just 70.8 % (West: 72.3 %/East: 64.8 %) (Westle et al. 2013, p. 475) and the proportion of non-voters reached alarming proportions. Merkel and Petring (2012, p. 100) also warned of the distortions of a "two-thirds democracy" in which the socially disadvantaged no longer participate in political life. The normalisation thesis increasingly gave way to the crisis thesis, which states that the increasing abstention of certain population groups from voting is linked to growing dissatisfaction with the political system and its actors.

Since then, political science has devoted increased attention to analysing non-voters, albeit primarily at the federal level in Germany. Recently, however, there has been a significant decline in participation, particularly in local and state elections (Faas & Hohmann 2015; Faus & Alin 2023). For example, only 55.5% of eligible voters took part in the state elections in North Rhine-Westphalia in 2022. Faus and Alin (2023) published a study in which they increasingly used the qualitative method of focus group interviews to find out more about the motives of non-voters. Field experiments are increasingly being used to mobilise voters, particularly in the USA (Gerber & Green 2000, 2017). The question of whether and, if so, under what circumstances non-voters are willing to participate again is investigated. In German non-voter research, this method tends to be the exception. For this reason, we conducted an exploratory mixed-method study using a combination of quantitative and qualitative methods in the city of Regensburg based on the social index to conduct a field experiment on the 2023 Bavarian elections. Door-to-door visits in particular have proven to be effective as a party and non-party mobilisation factor for voter turnout (Hohmann 2021). But also methods such as standardised surveys, in-depth interviews and focus group discussions. The collection of this diverse information enables us to examine and answer current questions in non-voter research together with our students. A publication by Springer VS is planned in 2027 for the research results of the teaching research project, in which very good Bachelor's and Master's theses will also be considered:

Walter-Rogg, Melanie and Raphael Richter. 2027. The 2023 state election in Bavaria - Analyses of voting behaviour and political culture in the Free State of Bavaria (Freistaat Bayern), Wiesbaden: Springer VS.