%0 Journal Article
%T If you can beat them, confront them: Party
%A Or Tuttnauer
%J European Union Politics
%@ 1741-2757
%D 2018
%R 10.1177/1465116517752870
%X This article explains the variation in opposition behavior by investigating parliamentary voting of opposition parties across 16 European national parliaments. It finds that features of an opposition party that increase its likelihood of winning office in future elections¡ªits size and experience in government¡ªincrease the party¡¯s tendency toward confrontation with the government, as do features that increase the party¡¯s need to differentiate itself from the government. At the systemic level, features that increase the attractiveness of cooperation¡ªsuch as an open structure of competition and considerable influence of the opposition on parliamentary decision-making¡ªdecrease tendencies toward confrontation. Together, party-specific and systemic features explain two-thirds of the observed variation in the behavior of opposition parties, even without controlling for vote-specific factors
%K Comparative politics
%K legislative studies
%K parliamentary opposition
%K political parties
%K voting
%U https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/1465116517752870