Electoral Institutions and the Cross-national Variation of Attitudes Toward Sensitive Issues.

The article presents an analysis of the argument that electoral institutions affect the ideological diversity of the political discourse of polity. The author argues that electoral institutions should facilitate the discussion of more sensitive political issues. The author examines, using 1999 World Values survey data, whether such intuition helps explain cross-national variations in attitudes toward 3 issue areas, such as the economic sacrifices for the sake of gains in environmental protection, the justifiability of homosexuality, and the justifiability of euthanasia.