Dinamica participării la vot în România (1992-2009). Cazul Constanţei
The Dynamics of Electoral Participation in Romania (1992-2009). The Case of Constanţa

Summary/Abstract: When trying to analyse the practical details of electoral participation, attempting to find reasons for a certain electoral behavior, one of the most significant approaches is the study of the dynamics of electoral participation. In Romania, the electoral participation has dropped dramatically in the last twenty years. In our opinion, the population’s refusal to express their vote, as well as the loss of support and trust for the politicians, constitute a serious threat to the quality of the Romanian democracy. One of the main hypotheses of our paper is that the electoral preferences of the people who usually don’t vote are either totally different from those of the people who vote constantly (the first declaring that they cannot identify themselves with any of the parties or the candidates), or they oscillate frequently (therefore, we would be entitled to place them in the category of the so-called ‘volatile electorate’). Our paper aims to analyse, within the wider framework of the study of the electoral participation at a national level, the specific case of Constantza, where important differences can be noticed regarding the voter participation rate, compared to the figures at the national level. Our approach is based on official data, gathered from all the general and presidential elections held between 1992 and 2009 (calculated both at the national and at the regional level). Based on the analysis of this data, we could draw the conclusion that, as far as Constantza is concerned, the population takes a great interest in the political matters, which contributed to maintaining the constant high rate of the electoral participation, not only in the local elections, but also in the general and presidential ones.

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