Electoral externalities are a common feature of multilevel systems of government. National politics have, with different degrees of intensity, an impact on the results of regional elections. Regional governments can contribute to increase electoral externalities between the national and regional levels when incumbent parties use strategies of exoneration for bad economic outcomes (i.e. attributing the responsibility to the national government) while assuming responsibilities for good economic results. In this paper we analyze electoral externalities in Spain using data from the content analysis of state parties’ regional manifestos. We will compare the manifestos of incumbent state parties at the 2007 regional elections, when the economic situation in Spain was very good, with the 2011 regional
elections, which took place in a context of deep economic crisis, to see whether they present a different attitude towards economic policies and economic proposals in each of the two extreme economic contexts.
