I’m a Federal Sovereigntist but a Provincial Nationalist: Party Identification in a Multi-Level Westminster Democracy

How do citizens handle overlapping partisan identities? In multilevel democracies, voters might hold partisan identities that either match or differ across levels of government. These identities potentially interact with citizens aligning one partisan identity to match their identity at another level. Using evidence from Canada where subnational and national party systems sometimes overlap but frequently differ, we investigate how individuals handle these overlapping identities. We find that overlapping identities apparently strengthen national partisan identification. We further find that provincial party identification has difficult travelling up to explain national vote intent in Canada outside Quebec. In Quebec, however, provincial party identification does, in fact, structure federal vote choice. Voters, then, are capable of seeing through organizational differences and sorting themselves into like-minded parties either through preferences relating to ideology, territorial independence, or both. Our results suggest the importance of accounting for multiple levels of identity when considering political behaviour.