Geographical Representation Under a Single Nationwide District: The Case of the Netherlands

• Published date: 01 August 2023
• Author: Marijn Nagtzaam,Tom Louwerse
• Date: 01 August 2023
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1111/lsq.12408

591

LEGISLATIVE STUDIES QUARTERLY, 48, 3, August 2023

DOI: 10.1111/lsq.12408

MARIJN NAGTZAAM

Leiden University

TOM LOUWERSE

Leiden University

Geographical Representation Under a

Single Nationwide District: The Case

of the Netherlands

Previous studies have demonstrated the common occurrence of con-

stituency focus in parliamentary questions, which is most often attributed to

electoral incentives. If an electoral system makes use of a single nationwide

district, however, these district- oriented electoral incentives do not apply.

MPs may still substantively represent a geographical region, because they are

motivated to stand up for a specific region for other reasons. This article

explores the extent to which Dutch MPs pay attention in parliamentary ques-

tions and debates to specific regions. We find that those with stronger ties to

a region, and especially MPs who reside in a region, are more likely to men-

tion it in parliamentary questions and speeches. In addition, we find that this

effect is stronger for provinces where regional attachment among residents is

relatively stronger.

Geographical representation is almost always studied in

the context of local constituencies (e.g., Fernandes, Won, and

Martins 2020; Martin 2011; Russo2021). MPs pay attention to

their local area because they rely on local constituents for their

reelection (Carey and Shugart1995; Kellermann 2016), but pre-

vious research also suggests that geographical representation is

not purely driven by these local electoral incentives (Martin2011;

Zittel, Nyhuis, and Baumann2019). This article contributes to the

literature on geographical representation by focusing on a case

© 2022 The Authors. Legislative Studies Quarterly published by Wiley

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592 Marjin Nagtzaam and Tom Louwerse

where there are no local constituencies because elections are or-

ganized in a single nationwide electoral district. This helps us to

look beyond local electoral incentives to look at what drives geo-

graphical representation in the absence of geographically defined

constituencies.

In general, one would expect an MP in a single nationwide

district to primarily act as party member representing a socially

defined group of voters, rather than acting as a local or regional

representative. We argue that even in the absence of strong elec-

toral incentives for local representation, voters will desire some

degree of geographical representation. We explore the extent to

which MPs pay attention to regional representation in a system

without subnational electoral districts: the Netherlands. Given the

fact that the entire country is a single district, the electoral system

does not tie an MP to a specific region. This makes it an interest-

ing case from an international- comparative perspective to explore

the extent and explanations of geographical representation when

district electoral incentives are absent.

The absence of local constituencies does not imply that vot-

ers see no need for geographical representation. In the 2017 Dutch

Parliamentary Election Study, almost 40% of the voters said they

either fully agree or agree with the statement that every region

or province should have MPs (Van der Meer, Van der Kolk, and

Rekker2017). Not only voters think that regional representation is

important: in the Dutch Parliamentary Study of 2017, 74% of the

participating MPs indicated they found it relatively or very impor-

tant to represent their own region (Andeweg and Van Vonno2018,

13– 14).

Given that both MPs and voters think geographical rep-

resentation is important, the question which comes to mind is

whether there actually is a form of geographical representation in

the Netherlands, and if so what the mechanism behind this form

of representation is. After all, none of the MPs have an electoral

link to a specific region, since they are both selected and elected in

a nationwide district. If there is geographical representation, this

must be affected by other factors.

Our research question is: to what extent and why are Dutch

MPs more likely to represent a specific region? We will explore

three possible explanations for regional representation by MPs.

The first one originates from the MP themself. We argue that it is

more likely that an MP mentions a region in parliamentary speech

and questions if they are born in that region, received education