Institutions versus party practices. The role of candidate selection in campaign personalization in Hungary

This paper aims at capturing the effect of candidate selection on campaign personalization in the context of Hungary at two general elections. Based on the literature, our main hypothesis is that candidates that think their selection was mostly influenced by the national party leadership (i.e. it was centralized and at the same time exclusive) pursue less personalized campaigns than those who think that other actors played a major role in candidate selection. By utilizing the data from two consecutive waves (2010 and 2014) of the Comparative Candidate Survey, we show that centralized and exclusive selection practices affect campaign personalization in Hungary’s mixed-member electoral system. We conclude that the perception of the power of the party centre over their nominations forms individual campaign strategies quite substantially. Respondents, who thought that the party centre has an established role in saying the final word regarding their selection as candidates, pursued more party-centred campaigns. The main finding of this paper is that candidate selection affects the campaign personalization of the different groups of candidates (single member district candidates, local politicians and national party leaders) in different ways. The result confirms that centralization and exclusiveness in candidate selection is definitely important in shaping how the different groups of candidates approach campaign personalization. Keywords Candidate selection; Campaign; Personalization; Hungary; Candidates; Comparative Candidate Survey