There is some empirical evidence that campaign professionalism in Europe differs not only between political parties and countries, but also between first-order and second-order elections. Most parties campaign “half-hearted” at second-order elections such as the European parliamentary elections. Their campaigns are less professionalized compared to national parliamentary elections. Although this belongs to common wisdom, it may be a methodological artefact since empirical studies have turned to identical indicators to measure professionalism at first-order and second-order campaigns. However, we assume that levelling bars of professionalism differ between these two types of campaigns. To test this assumption, we asked 68 party secretaries and campaign managers in twelve European countries to evaluate the importance of a set of components that are supposed to reflect professionalism both in national and European election campaigns. Their answers indicate some similarities in campaign professionalism, but also some differences that should be taken into account in future analyses.
