A Review of Public Issue Salience: Concepts, Determinants and Effects on Voting

Abstract

In this article, I offer a review of the uses and findings regarding public issue salience in the political science literature, with a focus on electoral behaviour. I argue that in spite of the increased use of issue salience in recent years, with impressive explanatory results, the concept of issue salience remains underspecified and, at times, contradictory and that its antecedents remain relatively unknown. This is likely to have led to serious shortcomings when attempting to explain recent changes to party systems and electoral results in advanced democracies.