INCREASED PERSONALISATION IN AN UNSTABLE PARTY SYSTEM: THE 2013 ELECTIONS IN ISRAEL

Abstract

More than one third of the Israeli voters changed their vote from the 2009 elections to the 2013 elections, yet most stayed within ‘their’ camp (either the right-religious or the centre-left). But it was the few who changed their vote that made the difference. Likud kept its control of the pivotal position and leads the new government, but an unprecedented alliance between the centrist-secular Yesh Atid and the right-religious Jewish Home—based on socio-economic issues, not the predominant security factor in Israeli politics, and personal relations between the party leaders—forced Likud to establish a coalition that excluded the ultra-religious parties it had sat in government with since the 2009 elections.

Additional information

Gideon Rahat is an associate professor in the Department of Political Science at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. His research interests are Israeli politics and comparative politics, especially political parties, electoral reform and candidate selection methods. His recent book, with Reuven Hazan, Democracy within Parties: Candidate Selection and their Political Consequences, was published by Oxford University Press (2010). Email: [email protected]

Reuven Y. Hazan is a professor in the Department of Political Science at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and currently the Chair of the department. His research and publications focus on political parties and party systems, elections and electoral systems, and legislative studies. His most recent publication is a co-edited book, Understanding Electoral Reform (Routledge, 2012), which also appeared as a special issue of the journal West European Politics (34 (3)). Email: [email protected]