Factors Influencing Declining Voter Turnout - A Case Study in Neu-Ulm

Abstract

This paper is a continuation of a contribution published [1] by the same authors analysing possible reasons for low voter turnout in the City of Neu-Ulm. This paper operated under the limitation that only summary voter participation data from past elections was available which could be matched with demographic data from the city constituencies. Data that could be used to derive individual motivation was not available. To remedy this limitation, a questionnaire was sent to 3,000 inhabitants of Neu-Ulm to relate their voter participation to several possible factors influencing the propensity to vote and to derive recommendations for the City Council how to improve on voter participation in future elections. This contribution presents some preliminary results from the study.