Ballot Access for Independent Candidates (lower/only house)

QoG code: jw_indy

Equals 1 wherever independent candidates are legally allowed (even where the legal requirements are strict), and 0 otherwise. This complements the cases where the ballot variables above equal 1 or 2, since they are adjusted to capture de facto practice. jw_indy instead captures the de jure rules. A user could adjust the ballot variables above to be de jure if (s)he replaced values of 2 with values of 1 when jw_indy = 0. Refers to lower house elections. The ballot variables focus on the amount of party control over candidates' access to a competitive position on the ballot. The variables equal (in order of increasing personal vote incentives): (0) where parties control access to ballots as well as the order in which individuals will fill the seats that the party wins (closed list multi-member districts, open list multi-member districts with little or no de facto change in list order); (1) where parties control access to the ballot, but not the order in which candidates will receive seats (open lists where intra-party preference votes seem to have a significant influence on which candidates are selected, and single-member districts where parties control access to the list); (2) where there are few or no impediments to individual candidates' ability to appear on the ballot (single-member districts where parties do not control access, e.g. allowing independent candidates and/or use primaries to select candidates).

Type of variable
Binary
Downloaded by QoG on
2025-12-19
Last updated by source
2012-03-24
Details of this variable in our compilation datasets
Dataset No. Countries
Standard time-series 105
OECD time-series 30
Dataset Available for years
Standard time-series 1978-2005
OECD time-series 1978-2005

Country coverage

Click here to see the full list of countries
  • Afghanistan
  • Albania
  • Algeria
  • Andorra
  • Argentina
  • Armenia
  • Australia
  • Austria
  • Azerbaijan
  • Bahamas
  • Bangladesh
  • Barbados
  • Belarus
  • Belgium
  • Benin
  • Bolivia
  • Bosnia and Herzegovina
  • Brazil
  • Bulgaria
  • Burundi
  • Cambodia
  • Canada
  • Cape Verde
  • Chile
  • Colombia
  • Costa Rica
  • Cuba
  • Czech Republic
  • Denmark
  • Djibouti
  • Dominican Republic
  • Ecuador
  • Egypt
  • El Salvador
  • Estonia
  • Finland
  • France (1963-)
  • Georgia
  • Germany
  • Ghana
  • Greece
  • Grenada
  • Guatemala
  • Guyana
  • Honduras
  • Hungary
  • India
  • Indonesia
  • Ireland
  • Israel
  • Italy
  • Japan
  • Korea, South
  • Kuwait
  • Latvia
  • Lesotho
  • Lithuania
  • Luxembourg
  • Malaysia (1966-)
  • Mali
  • Malta
  • Mexico
  • Monaco
  • Mongolia
  • Morocco
  • Mozambique
  • Netherlands
  • New Zealand
  • Nicaragua
  • Niger
  • Norway
  • Pakistan (1971-)
  • Panama
  • Papua New Guinea
  • Paraguay
  • Peru
  • Philippines
  • Poland
  • Portugal
  • Romania
  • Russia
  • San Marino
  • Sao Tome and Principe
  • Slovakia
  • Slovenia
  • South Africa
  • Spain
  • Sri Lanka
  • St Kitts and Nevis
  • St Lucia
  • St Vincent and the Grenadines
  • Switzerland
  • Taiwan
  • Tanzania
  • Thailand
  • Trinidad and Tobago
  • Turkey
  • Ukraine
  • United Kingdom
  • United States
  • Uruguay
  • Venezuela
  • Vietnam
  • Zambia
  • Zimbabwe

Year coverage

This variable has information from 1978 to 2005.