The Cycle of Coalition

David Fortunato is Associate Professor in the School of Global Policy and Strategy, University of California, San Diego. His research has been published in the American Political Science Review, American Journal of Political Science, and Journal of Politics, among others.

• 1. A lesson learned too late; 2. Motivation and promise; 3. Parties and voters under coalition governance; 4. Perceptions of coalition compromise; 5. Costs of coalition compromise; 6. Collective responsibility and differentiation; 7. What could go wrong?; 8. Does it ever go right?; 9. Pushing forward.

'For far too long, research on elite-level coalition politics and research on voter behavior have largely proceeded along separate lines. This book represents a brilliant and long-overdue correction. With great theoretical sophistication, and drawing on an impressive array of observational and experimental data, Fortunato demonstrates the complex interactions between elite level coalition politics and the perceptions and behavior of voters. These are issues that cannot be studied in isolation. This book not only advances our understanding of the dynamics of coalition governance and voter behavior in multiparty systems, but should reshape how scholars approach these questions.' Georg Vanberg, Duke University