What are you looking for?

Maier, Jürgen

Maier, Jürgen

Jürgen Maier, born in Jugenheim, Germany, in 1968. Ph.D. from the University of Bamberg. Professor of Political Communication, University of Koblenz-Landau.

Fellow (1 February 2013 – 30 June 2013)

Strategic Behaviour of Political Actors in the 2009 European Election Campaign

In elections, political actors try to maximize public support. To achieve this goal they use campaign strategies. There are two rational choice models explaining the strategic behaviour of political actors: the proximity model and the directional model. Although both models make very different assumptions of how political actors behave (proximity model: political actors adopt moderate issue positions; directional model: political actors take pronounced issue position) a test of these models in the context of European elections is still missing. Therefore, the project analyses the campaign strategy of candidates in the run-up to the 2009 European Elections in all EU-member states. Because the choice of strategy can have major consequences for the style of campaigning and electoral competition as well as for the coverage through mass media we try to explain the candidates’ electoral success and the attention the candidates received from the mass media.

Selected Publications

Maier, J. (2011). The Impact of Political Scandals on Political Support. An Experimental Test of Two Theories. International Political Science Review 32, 283-302.

Maier, J. & Rittberger, B. (2008). Shifting Europe’s Boundaries. Mass Media, Public Opinion, and the Enlargement of the EU. European Union Politics 9, 243-267.

Maier, J., Maurer, M., Reinemann, C. & Faas, T. (2007). Reliability and Validity of Real-Time Response Measurement: A Comparison of Two Studies of a Televised Debate in Germany. International Journal of Public Opinion Research 19, 53-73.

Personal Webpage