The Czech Pirate Party in the 2010 and 2013 Parliamentary Elections and the 2014 European Parliament Elections: Spatial Analysis of Voter Support

Abstract

The paper presents a spatial analysis of the Czech Pirate Party (Pirates) voter support in the 2010 and 2013 parliamentary elections and the 2014 European Parliament elections. The main method applied for classifying electoral results was the spatial autocorrelation and spatial regression. The result of the analysis has shown that territorial support for the Pirates copies to a great extent the areas of high support for right-wing parties and simultaneously the areas exemplified by a high development potential. In the case of spatial characteristics, little support for the Pirates was shown in Moravia and higher in the Sudetenland in terms of determinants of support. Additionally to spatial regimes, inter-regional support for the Pirates was also influenced by other non-spatial characteristics, although the strength of their influence was relatively weak. The units which embodied a successful environment for voting for the Pirates were particularly characterized by greater urbanization and a greater number of entrepreneurs, while a lack of jobs and the older age structure, i.e. the signs that in the socio-economic, or socio-ecological sense define peripheral areas, negatively impacted the gains of the Pirates. Ambiguous influence was exercised by college-educated inhabitants, who in the parliamentary elections in 2010 and 2013 decreased the gains of the Pirates, however, in the elections to the European Parliament in 2014 a direction of relationship was modified and turned positive.