The Mandate vs Independence Controversy
(2025) Elgar Encyclopedia of Political Representation — accepted/in-press
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- Abstract
- Political representation, often described in political studies as a complex and multidimensional concept, initially identifies a relationship connecting citizens (i.e., the ‘principals’ of the electoral process) and political elites, the agents entrusted with addressing the former’s concerns and preferences as part of the parliamentary decision-making process. The extent to which this relationship should be binding – meaning the extent to which individual politicians should be constrained by their constituents’ priorities or afforded a margin of autonomy – constitutes an ongoing normative debate (i.e., the mandate vs. independence controversy) in both democratic theory and empirical political studies. This entry aims to offer a general overview of this debate, based on various elite surveys performed over the last few decades. The picture that emerges suggests that politicians’ positions on the representation dilemma are influenced by a multiplicity of factors at the individual, party and country levels.
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Camatarri, S. (2025). The Mandate vs Independence Controversy. In Andrea Pedrazzani, André Freire, Eva Önnudóttir & Hermann Schmitt (ed.), Elgar Encyclopedia of Political Representation. Edward Elgar Publishing. https://hdl.handle.net/2078.5/237179