Banerjee2019 - Voting Intention

Asian Journal of Political Science
ISSN: 0218-5377 (Print) 1750-7812 (Online) Journal homepage: https://www.tandfonline.com/loi/rasi20
Electoral alliance with sworn opponent political

party: factors impacting voting intention
Saikat Banerjee & Paroma Mitra Mukherjee
To cite this article: Saikat Banerjee & Paroma Mitra Mukherjee (2019): Electoral alliance with
sworn opponent political party: factors impacting voting intention, Asian Journal of Political Science,
DOI: 10.1080/02185377.2019.1579105
To link to this article: https://doi.org/10.1080/02185377.2019.1579105
Published online: 11 Feb 2019.
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ASIAN JOURNAL OF POLITICAL SCIENCE
https://doi.org/10.1080/02185377.2019.1579105
Electoral alliance with sworn opponent political party: factors

impacting voting intention
a
Saikat Banerjee and Paroma Mitra Mukherjeeb
a
Indian Institute of Foreign Trade (IIFT-Deemed University under Ministry of Commerce), Kolkata, India;
b
Management Development Institute (MDI), Murshidabad, India
ABSTRACT KEYWORDS
Alliance with sworn political opponents is becoming a growing Opponent alliance; political
phenomenon within the realm of political alliances. Here, two or involvement; trust;
more competitive political parties join hands to defeat a particular preference; voting intention;
common opponent. During election, alliance partners face SEM; India
election together and distribute electoral seats mutually to avoid
vote share. However, ensuring vote in favour of opponent alliance
candidate is only possible when voters prefer to cast vote for the
alliance candidate. Thus, this is crucial to know influencing factors
that shape voters’ voting intention in favour of opponent alliance
candidate. This study is an attempt to empirically investigate
factors that have significant influence to shape voters’ voting
intention for opponent alliance. The result shows that opponent
alliance perceived fit impacts opponent alliance voting intention
positively. Opponent alliance brand trust has a positive impact on
opponent alliance voting intention. In addition, opponent alliance
preference impacts opponent alliance voting intention positively.
Introduction
Alliance with rivals, though sounds misnomer, is getting momentum in recent past where
fiercely competitive rival firms are joining hands for mutual benefits (Hagedoorn, Albert,
& Nicholas, 2000). Motivations behind such competitor alliances range from cooperative
research and development, distribution of new and existing products (Bucklin & Sengupta,
1993; Rindfleisch & Christine, 2001), access to resources (Van de Vrande, Vanhaverbeke,
& Duysters, 2011), etc. Such alliances redefine the age-old rivalry view where competition
is viewed as ‘win-lose’ game among rivals and replace it with ‘win-win’ one for both (Lado,
Nancy, & Susan, 1997). However, caution is that participating competitors may become
exposed to opportunistic exploitation (Heide, Wathne, & Rokkan, 2007; Ju, Murray,
Kotabe, & Gao, 2011), as cooperation may groom more capable rivals and lead to careless
transfer of firm’s expertise (Alvarez & Barney, 2001; Das, Sen, & Sengupta, 1998).
In the political market, strategic alliance is a mutual agreement for cooperation among
different political parties on common political agendas. Intention of electoral alliance for-
mation is to contest the election mutually to gain winning vote margin. In the recent past,
alliance with well-known sworn political opponents (henceforth ‘opponent alliance’),
CONTACT Saikat Banerjee saikat@iift.edu

© 2019 Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group
2 S. BANERJEE AND P. MITRA MUKHERJEE
where political ideologies and agendas are remarkably different, is becoming a growing
phenomenon within the realm of political alliances. In this type of alliances, two or
more competitive political parties join hands to defeat a particular common opponent.
During the election, opponent turned alliance parties face election together and distribute
electoral seats mutually between themselves to avoid vote share. The parties go for joint
campaigning and in case a favourable election outcome, together form cabinet or legisla-
ture. As per mutual understanding, alliance partners, though once opponent, do not run
candidates against one another but appeal their supporters to vote for alliance candidate.
Expectation is that voters will consider alliance candidate as representative of parties who
form the electoral alliance. Objective of such alliances is to increase likelihood of winning
the election. In reality, it may happen that a voter is not a supporter of the party which is
contesting election from his/her constituency as alliance representative. Due to such alli-
ance with opponent, voters are forced to be in a situation where they are expected to cast
vote to a party which they dislike most considering the said party candidate as a befitting
representative of their preferred party. Thus, ensuring vote is only possible when voters
prefer alliance with opponents. Otherwise, the voters have to choose from other contest-
ants or may have to refrain from voting. In both the cases, the prime incentive behind for-
mation of alliance with opponents is defeated.
In the political market, as voters cannot affect policies (Besley, 2006; Merlo, 2006), the
only means at their disposal is to elect the party most likely to satisfy them (Padovano,
2013). For opponent alliance formation, though decision is taken at party level by
leaders, the alliance needs to be accepted by voters to ensure positive outcomes. In case,
it is perceived as unconvincing, alliance partners lose voters’ support. Because of the
absence of any reliable tools or methods in predicting alliance success (Dussauge and
Garrette, 1995), political parties may be interested to understand influencing factors
that shape voters’ voting intention for opponent alliance. Knowledge about the same is
crucial for political marketers for selection of right opponent alliance partner in a more
objective manner. However, no empirical investigation has been done till date to
explore those factors.
This study is an attempt to empirically investigate factors that have significant influence
to shape voters’ voting intention for opponent alliance. Based on extensive literature
survey, we have proposed eight key sources of associations namely voter’s perception
about opponent alliance, political product involvement, expectancy, perceived fit, affect,
attitude about opponent alliance, opponent alliance trust and preference. The combined
effect of those key associations may, directly and indirectly, influence voting intention.
Thus, objective is to investigate the type of causal direct and indirect relationships exist
among those sources. We have taken a regional electoral competition in the state of
West Bengal, India as our focal point of study as all marketing actions in politics are deter-
mined by particular country’s political system and its components like geographic, psy-
chographic and behavioural set-up (Baines, Worcester, Jarrett, & Mortimore, 2003;
Cwalina, Falkowski, & Newman, 2011). In India, literacy rate is reasonably high in
West Bengal state. As per the 2011 Census report, West Bengal state ranks 20th
amongst the thirty-six states and union territories in India in terms of literacy rate
(Census, 2011). West Bengal is among the states with higher voter turnout and it had
82.16% turnout in last Lok Sabha (Parliament) election held in 2014 (Election Commis-
sion of India Report, 2014). Voters in West Bengal are extremely well-conversant about
ASIAN JOURNAL OF POLITICAL SCIENCE 3
political trends. People of Bengal take lot of interest in politics and their awareness level is
much more than the rest of India. Their view points are contemporary in nature. More-
over, political alliance with sworn opponent was originated in West Bengal and it was con-
sidered as incubation centre for testing of such attempt. Those are the motivation behind
selection of West Bengal as context of this study.
Being largest democracy of the world, Indian political market follows multiple-party
system from the very beginning. It has witnessed sizeable number of cooperative alliances
among like-minded political parties in the past. Lately, alliances with one or more
opponents to defeat another strong opponent have become popular among political
parties in India. Recent examples are like opponent alliance among Janata Dal
(United), Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD) and Indian National Congress (Congress) in
Bihar state assembly election, Congress and Samajwadi Party (SP) alliance in Uttar
Pradesh state assembly election; Congress and Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-
M) alliance in West Bengal state assembly election etc. Because of increasing competitive
intensity in the political market, opponent alliances are considered as a panacea for
winning the election. However, election results are not always in favour of opponent alli-
ances. Historically, Indian political market has witnessed mixed outcome of those
opponent alliances. For example, 2015 assembly election results in Bihar (a state in
India) made a history in Indian politics where different ideologies based fiercely competi-
tive three political parties namely JD (U), RJD and Congress, formed grand alliance to
defeat another strong opponent Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). The alliance gained in
terms of seats, and defeated BJP and allied. However, in West Bengal state assembly elec-
tion in 2016, the alliance between CPI (M) with Congress (the greatest rival party of CPI
(M) since inception) was failed miserably against rival All India Trinomool Congress
(TMC). Thus, the success formula is still unknown and no systematic framework has
been evolved. Outcome of this study may provide insights about factors which play deter-
mining role behind opponent alliance voting intention. Those insights can be applied
during exploring such opponent options in other regions of India.
Literature review, hypotheses development and conceptual framework

Opponent alliance
In the literature, alliance is defined as the short- or long-term association of two or more
individual firms (Simonin & Ruth, 1998). It is an ultimate form of cooperation between
two firms in the sense that they make the relation highly visible (Park, Jun, & Shocker,
1996). Alliance can dramatically improve an organization’s operations and competitive-
ness (Brucellaria, 1997). Rationale of alliance is to leverage propositions of alliance part-
ners in a mutually beneficial way. Alliance can provide partners with the greater prospect
to spread out their skills. Alliance partners are motivated by synergies and the more related
the partners are in strategic alliances, the more opportunities are present for strategic com-
patibility (Thompson, Peteraf, Gamble, & Strickland, 2012).
Among different types of alliances, alliances with rival firms are defined as collaborative
agendas realized by competing firms operating in same industry by maintaining their stra-
tegic autonomy (Bleeke & Ernst, 1993; Dussauge and Garrette, 1995). This kind of alli-
ances provides scope for partners to combine their organizational capabilities by
pooling of partners’ resources and capabilities (Bucklin & Sengupta, 1993). As they operate
in the similar type of market, it enables them to create synergy for joint value creation
(Madhok & Tallman, 1998). Potential benefits of such alliances include facilitated entry
in new markets (Rindfleisch & Christine, 2001), increased market power, acquisition
and exchange of skills (Dacin, Oliver, & Roy, 2007), promote higher levels of both
tactic and explicit knowledge acquisition (Calabrese & Baum, 2000) and enhancing
market performance (Hamel, Yves, & Prahalad, 1989).
However, in such alliances, the partner firms inevitably have conflicting agendas and
interests and such alliances are viewed as unstable and temporary form of economic
organization (Lichtenberger & Naulleau, 1993). Those are viewed as a means for one of
the allies to learn skills and capabilities from the other partner firm, thus strengthening
its own position and weakening the other’s (Bleeke & Ernst, 1993; Hamel et al., 1989).
Many of the times alliances between rival firms can have a strong anticompetitive
impact (Jorde & Teece, 1990).
From political market perspectives, opponent political parties are often seen as compe-
titors. Alliances with opponent political parties are initiated to fulfil common agendas irre-
spective of ideological differences between partners. However, linking one competing
political party with another one involves risk of voters’ confusion and brand equity
dilution of participating parties (Simonin & Ruth, 1998). Unfavourable voters’ perceptions
about opponent alliance increase chance to failure of such endeavour and existing associ-
ation of respective partners may suffer.
Direct effects
Opponent alliance perception and voting intention
Firms can maximize their financial performance by blending competition with cooperation
(Amaldoss, Meyer, Raju, & Rapoport, 2000; Luo, Rebecca, & Xing, 2006). In the political
market, performance is judged by number of seats a political party wins in an election.
As opponent alliance can facilitate resource sharing, direct conflict in a functional
manner, and promote mutual learning (Lado et al., 1997), that may enhance winning possi-
bility of alliance partners by synergizing the benefits of both competition and cooperation.
Still, unbounded inter-organizational cooperation and trust may make a partner vulnerable
to the risks of opportunistic exploitation by alliance partners (Zeng & Xiao-Ping, 2003).
Based on the findings from earlier researches in different industry contexts, we may
suggest that opponent alliances have a positive influence on party’s political gain.
In the literature, voting intention is defined as a voter’s willingness to vote for a particu-
lar candidate representing a political party (Rachmat, 2010). In the political market,
opponent alliance success largely depends on the way voters perceive the said alliance
and frame their voting intention. Voters’ perceptions about opponent alliance are likely
to influence their voting intentions. Opponent alliance holding favourable voters’ percep-
tion may enjoy strong voters’ support and resultant favourable voting intentions. To
examine whether voters’ perceptions about opponent alliance influence their voting inten-
tions, we propose the following hypothesis:
H1: Voter’s perception about opponent alliance has a significant positive impact on his/her
voting intention.
Political product involvement and voting intention

Product involvement is consumer’s enduring perception of the importance of the product
category based on consumer’s inherent needs, values and interests (DeWulf, Odekerken-
Schroder, & Iacobucci, 2001; Mittal, 1995). Product involvement determines the depth,
complexity and extensiveness of cognitive and behavioural process (Chakravarti & Janis-
zewski, 2003) which consumers travel through during decision making. In consumer
behaviour literature, product involvement has been extensively used as an explanatory
variable to explain behavioural pattern (Dholakia, 1998). Based on their levels of
product involvement different people perceive the same product differently (Zaichkowsky,
1994). For high product involvement context, consumers focus more on highly diagnostic
cues such as attributes and benefits to develop attitude about products (Bian & Moutinho,
2011). Propensity of involvement varies under a typical market condition based on how a
consumer is stimulated by personal recognition and/or interest in the product (Engle,
Blackwell, & Miniard, 1995).
Political product involvement is viewed as voters’ general interest in politics and explicit
interest in any political event like election (Lazarsfeld, Berelson, & Gaudet, 1948).
Researchers further proposed involvement as voters’ psychological traits reflected in
their concern about particular election outcome (Kanihan & Chaffee, 1996). Voters’ pol-
itical product involvements have great importance in their voting decisions (Yoon, Pink-
leton, & Ko, 2005). High involved voters take greater interest to understand political
propositions of opponent alliance wherein low involved voters may feel little excitement
to explore political agendas of opponent alliance. High involved voters feel motivation
to pay attention to political communication of alliance parties and therefore may be
more likely to be influenced by those communications. Thus, intensity of involvement
may influence voters’ opponent alliance voting intentions. Hence, we propose:
H2: Political product involvement of voter has a significant positive impact on alliance voting
intention.
Opponent alliance expectancy and voting intention

Expectancy is the degree to which an item falls into some predetermined pattern or struc-
ture (Heckler & Childers, 1992). Expectancies originate from either personal experience or
information from formal or informal sources. In their study, Heckler and Childers (1992)
empirically confirmed the expectancy effect on consumer decision making. Fleck and
Quester (2007) propagated a positive effect of expectancy congruence on behaviour.
Expectancies derive from beliefs, which come from peoples’ direct experiences and infor-
mation from others or are logically deduced from others’ beliefs (Hao, Hu, Bruning, & Liu,
2013). In the context of alliance, expectancy is the degree to which the partners are
expected to form an alliance. Alliance expectancy depends on the degree to which partner-
ing firms are positively related to consumers’ knowledge structure. A high level of expect-
ancy refers to the context when alliance partners have the potential to meet consumers’
expectations.
For opponent alliance in the political market, expectancy is linked with the context
when voters evaluate the alliance of two or more competing political parties. Proposed
common agendas by alliance partners are more easily accepted and referred if they are
expected in the stimulus context. Expectancy is conditioned with the existing knowledge
or preconceptions about alliance partners. Opponent alliance may be seen by voters as
unexpected or surprising association between two fiercely competitive parties and that
may influence their alliance evaluation. Opponent alliance with high expectancy refers
to those alliances that are approved by voters because of their existing knowledge structure
about partner political parties. The approval is possible when proposed alliance is able to
provide voters with a convincing context. In case of non-approval, voters become skeptical
about alliance objectives and that may influence their voting intentions. Thus, the higher
the expectancy of opponent alliance is, the greater is the effect on voters’ responses to the
opponent alliance. Accordingly, we may propose:
H3: Voter’s expectancy about opponent alliance has a significant positive impact on his/her
voting intention.
Opponent alliance perceived fit and voting intention

Conceptually the assumption of fit is that two objects share some commonalities (Aaker &
Keller, 1990) and each object is represented with an associative schema in memory
(Anderson, 1996). Perceived fit is linked with consumer perception and it refers to the
intensity to which consumers perceive that the relationship between two entities (e.g.
two opponent political parties in this context) is right and reasonable. Perceived fit is
characterized by the number of shared associations between partners (Sandor, 2002). It
is the degree to which the images of partners are consistent (Simomin and Ruth, 1998).
Higher levels of fit are associated with the more favourable evaluations of the concerned
entities (Baumgarth, 2004; Becker-Olson & Hill, 2006; Ruth & Simonin, 2003). In reality,
consumers prefer a high perceived fit between partners as consumers prefer consistency in
their thoughts and react negatively to a violation or inconsistency (Becker-Olson & Hill,
2006). Accordingly, high perceived fit leads to positive brand alliance evaluation (Simonin
& Ruth, 1998). Simultaneously, in the absence of a perceived fit, the image of each partner
can be negatively perceived by consumers.
Similarly, for the success of the opponent alliance, the fit may be considered important.
For a perceived fit, each of the two partner political parties is assumed to contribute its
own expertise and creates synergetic promises to voters. Perceived fit assesses the resem-
blance of image and political proposition between alliance partners. Voters use this per-
ception of fit during formation of voting intentions toward the political alliance.
Evaluation of opponent alliance depends on how well each partner party is linked with
each other and the degree of perceived fit between partners. Usually, voters react on the
basis of their initial perceptions about political alliance partners. For voters, justification
of fit is essential, i.e how convinced voters are with the idea of opponents joining
hands. The same is affected positively or negatively, depending on the outcome of per-
ceived fit between partner political parties. Voters see perceived fit between partners
parties based on their perception of political image cohesiveness and associative consist-
ency (Simonin & Ruth, 1998). The same may be evaluated by voters on the basis of part-
ners’ political ideologies and agendas. In case of low perceived fit, voters find it more
difficult to relate one partner’s association with the other one. Thus, we may conclude
that voters’ perceptions of an opponent alliance fit can influence their voting intentions.
Accordingly, our propose hypothesis is:
H4: Voter’s view about perceived fit of opponent alliance has a significant positive impact on
his/her voting intention.
Opponent alliance affect and voting intention

Psychologists defined affect as an appraisal of an object, person, or event as good or bad,
favourable or unfavourable, desirable or undesirable (Petty & Cacioppo, 1981). Schim-
mack and Crites Jr (2005) viewed affect as the identification of something as momentarily
pleasant or unpleasant. Brand affect is defined as a brand’s potential to stimulate a positive
emotional response in the average consumer as a result of its use (Chaudhuri & Holbrook,
2001). Consumers are emotion driven during consumption decision (Kemp & Kopp,
2011). Their affective responses towards an object may impact their choice and purchase
intention (Luce, 1998). Affect plays an essential role to influence and shape meaning of
object in the mind of the consumer. Elements of consumer affect include basic emotions
in the hierarchy of consumption emotions such as pleased, happy, irritated, or discontent
(Laros & Steenkamp, 2005). In a particular decision-making context, consumer with a
positive affect has more favourable evaluation of the situation and the opposite is true
for consumer with negative affect.
In reality, the affect associated with partnering firms is evoked when consumers
encounter an alliance (Boush & Loken, 1987). As consumers seek positive affective
responses from product or service consumption (Mick & Demoss, 1990), the same may
be witnessed during their selection of political party. Affect experienced in the context
of opponent alliance is expected to influence voters positively if they are satisfied with
the alliance partners and intend to see those elected. However, opponent alliance is an
unknown entity to voters and voters have no prior knowledge structure about its prop-
ositions. Thus, role of affect may be more significant in this particular context as
Homer (2006) propagates that affect plays a more dominant role in shaping views
towards an unknown object. As consumer’s affect is a critical driver of consumer’s
value perception (Shaw, 2007), the right political alliance may stimulate positive emotional
responses and voters may feel secure about alliance for safeguarding their interests. Levin
and Levin (2000) advocate that positive associations (e.g. affect) are transferred between
the partners in successful alliances. Accordingly, positive affect toward political alliance
may increase voters’ probability of casting vote in favour of alliance candidate. The
same is observed in the research done by Morris, Woo, Geason, and Kim (2002) in
which they have seen that affect can influence consumer behaviour and behavioural
changes. Accordingly, to examine whether affect has any impact on the alliance voting
intention during election, we propose the following hypothesis:
H5: Voter’s affect experienced towards opponent alliance has a significant positive impact on
his/her voting intention.
Opponent alliance attitude and voting intention

Attitude is defined as a person’s internal evaluation of an object, and may be favourable or
unfavourable (Mitchell & Olson, 1981). Consumers’ buying decisions are based largely on
their attitudes towards the options available to them (Petty, Unnava, & Strathman, 1991).
Attitude towards an object can form the basis for purchase intention (Jiang, Chan, Tan, &
Chua, 2010; Suh & Lee, 2005) as attitudes are relatively stable psychological constructs.
Accordingly, consumers’ attitudes can impact their subsequent evaluations of partnering
firms (Baumgarth, 2004; Voss & Gammoh, 2004). Rodrigue and Biswas (2004) propagate
that attitudes towards alliances are related positively to purchase intention. More favour-
able original attitudes are towards independent partner firms, the more likely the alliance
partnership will ensure a favourable attitude (Dickinson & Barker, 2007). However, posi-
tive evaluations of individual firm can be adjusted downwards as a result of alliance par-
ticipation (James, 2005).
Komiak and Benbasat (2006) propagate that intentions are determined by attitude and
the same applies to voting intention. Voters’ positive attitudes about opponent alliance
partners may lead to favourable impact on their voting intentions. Positive attitude may
be formed on voter’s perception that opponent alliance is built on principles of moral,
ethics, ideology and common agenda. Accordingly, a typical voter holds favourable or
unfavourable attitude about alliance partners. In addition, the voter may develop a positive
attitude about alliance if the alliance candidate is from the party he prefers. However,
because of seat sharing, if alliance candidate in his constituency is from competing
party which the voter dislikes, the same may have a negative impact on his overall attitude
about opponent alliance. Accordingly, there might be a negative impact on voting inten-
tion if the voter does not consider the alliance candidate from opponent party as represen-
tative of his favoured party. Thus, in both the cases, attitude about opponent alliance may
impact voting intention significantly. Hence, it is critical to understand whether the atti-
tude toward opponent alliance can eventually influence voting intention. Accordingly, we
propose:
H6: Voter’s attitude about opponent alliance has a significant positive impact on his/her
voting intention.
Opponent alliance trust and voting intention

Trust relates to beliefs about the action in the future (Suh & Houston, 2010). Past research-
ers propagate significant role of trust in shaping buyer–supplier relationships (McEvily &
Zaheer, 2006) as it has been seen as the main aspect in a variety of interactions with others
(Gefen, 2000). In relationship marketing, trust is seen as a key to successful long-term
relationship (Morgan and Hunt, 1994) as trust has played a predominant role in maintain-
ing confidence and developing relationship during purchase decision making (Elliot &
Yannopoulou, 2007). From consumers’ perspectives, trust is seen as the confident expec-
tations of object’s reliability and intentions in a decision-making context (Delgado-Balles-
ter, 2004). Brand trust is defined as the willingness of the average consumer to rely on the
ability of the brand to perform its stated function (Chaudhuri & Holbrook, 2001). Those
are purchased more frequently by consumers (Sichtmann, 2007) and consumers are ready
to pay higher prices (Netemeyer et al., 2004). For strategic alliance, trust between partners
has been seen as key factor for positive alliance outcomes (Krishnan, Martin, & Noorder-
haven, 2006).
Ahmed, Lodhi, and Shahzad (2011) opined trust as the main binding force in cement-
ing the relationship between political party and the voters. Past researches advocate signifi-
cant relation between trust and voting intentions (Jones & Kim, 2010; Komiak & Benbasat,
2006). Political product is a unique product in which, for a repeat purchase, voters have to
wait till next election which has a sizeable time lag. To avoid risk of wrong selection, voters
build up their intentions to vote in favour of the candidate whom they trust. Thus, success
of a political party depends on mutual trust between the party and the voters (Bauer,
Huber, & Herrmann, 1996; Patti, Luck, & Chapman, 2003). Similarly, role of trust may
be important to ensure positive responses from voters in favour of alliance. If voters
have trust on the alliance to perform its newly offered propositions, they are more
intended to vote the same. Voters’ trust on opponent alliance would lead to their inten-
tions to vote the alliance candidate. Accordingly, trust on opponent alliance can be a
strong predictor of voting intention. Thus, we may propose:
H7: Voter’s trust on opponent alliance has a significant positive impact on his/her voting
intention.
Opponent alliance preference and voting intention

Preference is the bias a customer holds towards a particular object (Chang & Liu, 2009).
Hellier, Geursen, Carr, and Rickard (2003) defined preference as the extent to which the
customer favours the chosen offer provided by a company in comparison to the similar
types of offers provided by other companies in his or her consideration set. Brand prefer-
ence is the affinity a customer holds towards a particular brand. Voters develop meaning
and preference for a particular party in comparison to others (Banerjee & Chaudhuri,
2016). The process of developing preference for a political party is a complex decision
making. Political party revolves around its ideology (Jost, 2006) and influences voters’ pre-
ferences. Political party meaning formed in voter’s mind is an important factor determin-
ing voter preference (Cwalina, 2011) and same is applicable for opponent alliance context.
Based on their evaluation of opponent alliance, voters intend to vote for the alliance can-
didate. Komiak and Benbasat (2006) opined that the higher the preference in favour of a
political party, the more would be voters’ voting intentions. Thus, our next hypothesis is:
H8: Voter’s preference for a political alliance has a significant positive impact on his/her
voting intention.
Indirect effects
Indirect effects of sources of associations on opponent alliance trust
This study argues that if the voter perceives in a positive manner about opponent alliance,
then the trust would be higher and the perception of risk would be low. Opponent alliance
perception becomes instrumental to ensure voters’ trust on alliance. In the alliance, two
political parties are linked in a manner that seems to be meaningful to voters. A higher
degree of expectancy would encourage voters to develop trust on the opponent alliance,
while lower degree of expectancy would decrease the voters’ trust on the alliance candi-
date. Higher level of expectancy leads to higher alliance trust. Similarly, voters use percep-
tions of fit during development of trust about alliance. Without presence of perceived fit
about opponent alliance, trust cannot be built on behaviour. Higher perceived fit has a
positive impact on trust (Musante, 2007) as users view the alliance as an effective one.
Voters’ trust regarding the alliance candidate is based on the attitude the voter has
about the alliance partners and alliance as a whole. Positive attitude signals credibility
of opponent alliance to voters which leads to higher level of trust. Based on the above
explanations, the following hypotheses are constructed to examine indirect effects of
opponent alliance, expectancy, perceived fit and alliance attitude on opponent alliance
trust.
H9a: Voter’s perception about opponent alliance has a significant positive indirect impact on
alliance trust.
H9b: Voter’s expectancy about political alliance has a significant positive indirect impact on
alliance trust.
H9c: Voter’s view about perceived fit of political alliance has a significant positive indirect
impact on alliance trust.
H9d: Voter’s attitude about political alliance has a significant positive indirect impact on alli-
ance trust.
Indirect effects of sources of association on opponent alliance preference

As argued in the previous section, voters’ perception about opponent alliance works as a sig-
nificant input in formulating their preference about alliance. Favourable perception exists
when voters view the alliance as a joint proposition to satisfy some of their particular expec-
tations. This encourages them to view alliance candidate as most preferred one to cast vote.
In the previous section, we have already argued that voters’ political product involvements
determine their interest level to gather knowledge about alliance partners. A higher level of
political product involvement encourages voters to gather more information about
opponent alliance and that would shape their alliance preference and subsequent voting
intentions. The expectancy outcome of opponent alliance may have noticeable consequences
on alliance preference. The expectancies that voters hold about opponent alliance influence
their preferences about alliance as an available alternative. Voters may use expectancy as a
cue to evaluate alliance and the same may build up their preferences and voting intentions.
Under a high expectancy scenario, preference for an opponent alliance will be highest and
accordingly the same will be low in case of low expectancy scenario.
Similarly, overall perceived fit between partner political parties has a positive effect in
relation to voters’ subsequent preferences of the opponent alliance. Voters use this percep-
tion of fit during formation of preferences and voting intentions toward the political alli-
ance. Any possibility of absence of perceived fit may impact inversely alliance’s ability to
influence voters’ preferences. Higher perceived fit should increase voters’ preferences to
the opponent alliance propositions. As consumer’s affective states lead to judgments of
offers (Schwarz & Clore, 1988), feeling strong, positive affect toward opponent alliance
may increase alliance preference and the probability of casting vote in favour of alliance
candidate. Likewise, voters’ positive attitudes about opponent alliance enhance their pre-
ferences for alliance candidates. To develop preference about alliance, the voter uses per-
ceived attributes, benefits and images more to evaluate the alliance if his attitude about
alliance is high. Similarly, we may argue that there exists a positive association between
opponent alliance trust and alliance preference which may ensure favourable voting inten-
tion as it is viewed that brand trust is inevitable to ensure brand preference (Bauer et al.,
1996). The higher the trust, the more would be the increase in intensity of preference
(Komiak & Benbasat, 2006). Accordingly, we hypothesize following indirect effects:
H10a: Voter’s perception about opponent alliance has a significant positive indirect impact
on his/her preference for alliance.
H10b: Political product involvement of voter has a significant positive indirect impact on his/
her preference for alliance.
H10c: Voter’s expectancy about political alliance has a significant positive indirect impact on
his/her preference for alliance.
H10d: Voter’s view about perceived fit of political alliance has a significant positive indirect
impact on his/her preference for alliance.
H10e: Voter’s experienced affect towards political alliance has a significant positive indirect
impact on his/her preference for alliance.
H10f: Voter’s attitude about political alliance has a significant positive indirect impact on his/
her preference for alliance.
H10g: Voter’s trust on political alliance has a significant positive indirect impact on his/her
preference for alliance.
Based on the above discussion, we propose following conceptual model to test empirically
(Figure 1).
Method
Opponent alliance and political participation in the context of West Bengal
In this research, we have considered the political event of opponent alliance formed in the
state of West Bengal, India in 2016 between two-decade old fiercely competitive political
parties Congress and CPI (M) as our focal point of study. After heavy defeats consecutively
Figure 1. Conceptual model showing direct and indirect relationships among constructs.
in 2011 assembly election and in 2014 parliament election against major opponent party
TMC, both Congress and CPI (M) welcomed ideas of alliance to face assembly election
2016 together as both the party had a common objective to defeat TMC. Intention
behind alliance was to pose stiff challenge to the TMC in the election though ideologically
both the partner parties were pole apart. Accordingly, Congress and CPI-M formed an
alliance and went for seat sharing and joint campaigning to contest against ruling TMC
party and failed miserably to assume power in the state.
In terms of political participation, the primary motive of the opponent alliance was to
consolidate the opposition vote to defeat TMC. We may view it as survival instinct for the
parties. Both the parties were facing rapidly declining supporter base. For the people that
gave an alternative to ruling party TMC. So it was a kind of polarization of non-TMC vote.
However, the same alliance might send confusing signals. Congress and CPI (M) had com-
pletely different ideologies. So people deciding their vote on the basis of ideologies might
be confused and it might go against the alliance especially in constituencies where the
opposite ideology candidate was representing the alliance. But for people looking just at
another alternative to TMC might vote for the alliance. From alliance partners point of
view, the two parties [CPI(M) & Congress] were hoping to consolidate anti-TMC votes.
But that might make the core voters of the respective parties indecisive. If they vote for
the alliance it would not be for ideological reasons more of anti-TMC reasons. Thus,
while it is possible that the two parties might succeed to some extent in consolidating
anti-TMC votes, this alliance might make the core voters of the respective parties indeci-
sive, leading to decrease in voting turnout. Additionally, as there was ideological mismatch
in such alliances, the alliance might be a short-term experiment by the political parties to
face a particular election scenario. For long-term continuity, alliance strategies should be
based on factors impacting motivation of voters to support such initiatives. This particular
study may explore those insights further by indicating the rationale behind electoral alli-
ances with sworn political opponents in a key constituency.
Sampling and data collection

This study is based on primary data collected from voters in the age bracket of 18–60 in the
city of Kolkata, state of West Bengal, in India. To avoid any post-election result bias, data
was collected just before assembly election 2016 wherein both Congress and CPI (M) par-
ticipated as alliance partner and shared assembly seats to contest. The field interview pro-
ceeded over two months period that included weekends and weekdays in order to avoid
respondent bias. A total of 480 respondents were approached through a direct interview
to conduct the survey with the help of a structured questionnaire. Out of them only
390 (approximately 81 percent response rate) were ready to participate in the survey.
Out of the total 390 filled up questionnaires, 373 questionnaires were useable (approxi-
mately, 95 percent useable rate) and the analysis had been conducted with the help of
373 complete responses.
Out of 373 respondents, a total of 69.7 percent respondents were male and 30.3 percent
were female. Respondents ranged in age from 18 and above years as eighteen is minimum
voting age for Indian citizen. Some 29.2 percent of respondents represented the age group
18–25, 25.5 percent belonged to 26–35 age brackets, 24.7 percent were from 36–50 and
20.7 percent was under 50 and above age brackets. Regarding educational attainment,
Table 1. Sample characteristics.

Variables Categories Percentage (%)
Sex Male 69.7
Female 30.3
Age 18–25 years 29.2
26–35 years 25.5
36–50 years 24.7
Above 50 years 20.7
Education Secondary and Below 17.2
Graduate 51.2
Post-graduate/Professional 31.6
Occupation Unemployed 29.8
Service 27.1
Private/self-employed 43.2
Annual Family Income (INR) Less than 0.30 million 44.5
0.30 million–1 million 35.9
1 million–2 million 15.3
Above 2 million 4.3
there was a variety of qualifications ranging from secondary and below (17.2 percent),
graduate (51.2 percent) and post-graduate/professional (31.6 percent). Occupation
ranged from unemployed (29.8 percent), service (27.1 percent) and private/self-employed
(43.2 percent). Some 44.5 percent of the participants were under annual household income
category less than INR 0.3million, with 35.9 percent stayed within annual household
income bracket INR 0.3 million-1 million, 15.3 percent earned below INR 2 million
annually and for 4.3 percent of respondents, annual household incomes were above
INR 2 million (Table 1).
Measures
Multi-item indicators were used for all constructs. There were no scales in the literature
which captured mentioned constructs in the political market context. As a result, we
adopted scales utilized to measure considered constructs from existing literature with
necessary adaptation according to the domain of the study. Fleck and Quester (2007)
three items semantic differential expectancy scale was adapted to measure opponent alli-
ance expectancy. The opponent alliance perceived fit was measured adapting three items
semantic differential perceived fit scale proposed by Aaker and Keller (1990). We adapted
three items semantic differential scale proposed by Chaudhuri and Holbrook (2001) to
measure opponent alliance affect. Attitude about opponent alliance was measured adapt-
ing three items semantic differential attitude measurement scale of Osgood, Suci, and Tan-
nenbaum (1957) and Burnkrant and Unnava (1995). We assessed opponent alliance
perception with 10 items scale inspired by the work of Das et al. (1998), and Mizik and
Jacobson (2003). We measured voter’s political product involvement with an eleven
items scale we developed from the work of Zaichkowsky (1994) and Schneider and
Rodgers (1996). Eleven items political brand trust scale proposed by Banerjee and Chaud-
huri (2016) was adapted to measure opponent alliance trust. Opponent alliance preference
was measured adapting five items brand preference scale of Chang and Liu (2009) and
opponent alliance voting intention was captured adapting three items purchase intention
scale of Baker, Levy, and Grewal (1992). Those explanatory constructs in our model were
measured using seven-point Likert scales (1 = strongly disagree, 7 = strongly agree).
Pilot test of questionnaire had been conducted to investigate suitability of the survey
instrument within a sample of forty respondents following the general agreement that
pilot test sample should be a right representative of target population (Oppenheim,
2000). The pilot test result was satisfactory and indicated that all questions were well
worded and easy to comprehend. To calculate the internal consistency of the data, the
coefficient alpha was measured and assessed the quality of the instrument. All constructs
had no problems in reliabilities if the Cronbach’s α values exceeded the criterion of 0.60
which was acceptable for exploratory research (Streiner, 2003; Hair, Babin, Anderson, &
Tatham, 2006). For all variables Cronbach’s α range was within range of 0.78–0.97 which
was above cut-off value of 0.60. As the Cronbach’s alpha values of the variables were all
above 0.70, the questionnaire used in this study met the required level of reliability
(Chow, 2004). Additionally, variable characteristics were measured to determine the
content validity of the questionnaire. Since this study adapted research scales developed
by past researchers, it met the requirement of content validity. Accordingly, it explained
that the survey instrument was reliable to measure all construct consistently and freed
from random error. Survey questionnaire was accepted accordingly for the next level of
data collection. Respondents considered at the time of pilot test were excluded from
final survey.
Construct validity and reliability

As the first step of the analysis, to test the validity of all adapted scales, we had used the
exploratory factor analysis approach for aggregation of data (Landis, Beal, & Tesluk,
2000).Gonzalez and Bello (2002)’s approach was used in factor analysing the responses
from various measurable characteristics of variables. The principal component extraction
method was used with varimax rotation (Hair et al., 2006). In the analysis, the varimax
rotation with Kizer normalization was used for orthogonal rotation of the loadings so
that the variance of the squared loading in each column was maximized and in turn,
varimax provided a clear interpretation of the factors. The principal component analysis
was conducted separately for each constructs involving the variables. Principal com-
ponents with Eigen values greater than one was considered for aggregation purpose.
The loadings of the selected PC with the items were then scrutinized to find out
whether they were greater than corresponding loadings of other PCs. Items were presented
in a factor only if there factor loading was greater than 0.4 which had been described to be
a common factor loading (Hair et al., 2006). In our study, loading of all items were >0.65
and the same was in line with recommendations by Churchill and Peter (1984) who
argued for minimum reliability score of 0.50. The Kaiser–Meyer–Olkin (KMO) measure
of sampling adequacy and the Bartlett test of sphericity were used to confirming the appro-
priateness of proceeding with the analysis the number of items, and identify the dimension
of latent variables. The KMO measure of the sampling adequacy (range of 0.60–0.95) and
significant value of the Bartlett test of sphericity confirmed the appropriateness of pro-
ceeding with the analysis with the present data and there were none of the items
dropped in the analysis. Those factors were used for further analysis.
Convergent validity was evaluated using construct composite reliability (CR), as well as
the average variance extracted (AVE) of the used variables (Fornell & Larcker, 1981). The
AVE of all constructs in the model exceeded 0.50 with all constructs possessing a
composite reliability of more than 0.70, indicating that the model displayed a good con-
vergent validity (Table 2). It is viewed that the tests establish discriminant validity if all
constructs have an AVE of at least 0.50 (Fornell & Larcker, 1981), which this study
achieved. Furthermore, in this study, the AVE empirically assessed discriminant validity
(i.e. the degree to which items of constructs are distinct). The criterion to examine discri-
minant validity was to check whether square root of the AVE exceeded the correlation
between every pair of constructs (Hulland, 1999). As the result is within the acceptable
limit, this condition existed and the model displayed good discriminant validity. The
exploratory factor analysis result revealed that apart from political product involvement
and alliance preference constructs, all adapted scales were uni-dimensional as for every
adapted scale there was only single factor extracted with Eigen value > 1 and rotation
was not necessary for those cases. For extracted factor political brand involvement, the
result indicated a clear two-component structure with eigenvalue > 1. Similarly, alliance
preference factor was split into two composites based on our method. In this study,
SEM method for estimating the model is used as it is recommended to detect theoretically
established indirect effect of another construct in case direct relationship between the pre-
dictor and criterion has not been established and researcher would like to find support for
an indirect pathway (Capaldi, Crosby, & Clark, 1996; Holmbeck, 1997). (Table 2)
Data analysis
The measurement model
In this study, we have used pre-existing scales to measure the constructs. Those scales were
used either in different product fields or in different country set-up. Thus, confirmatory
factor analysis (CFA) had been employed to validate the scales in the Indian context as
well as testing the adequacy of the proposed model. The measurement model involving
all the constructs was estimated. Initial model estimated was satisfactory as the overall
fit (CMIN/DF) obtained is 3.887. The measurement model exhibited adequate fit χ 2
(58.307); p-value (.00); CFI (0.985); RMSEA (0.088); and PCLOSE (0.004). The precision
of the estimated parameters was judged by those measures for which ideal value of RMSEA
was <0.10 (Browne & Cudeck, 1993) and CFI measuring complete covariation in the data
was >0.90 (acceptable value according to Bentler, 1992). Moreover, our analysis revealed
no significant modification indexes or estimated residual (Heide, 2003). Thus the CFA
validated the constructs used in the proposed model.
The structural model

After confirming a validated measurement model, the structural model and hypotheses
were estimated. Diagnostics presented in Table 3 shows that the original structural
model exhibited a good model fit: χ 2 (60.984); p-value (.00); CMIN/DF (3587); CFI
(0.985); RMSEA (0.083); and PCLOSE (0.008). The result showed that specification of
factor loading, factor variances and covariances and error variance for the measurement
model were valid. CFI value indicated that the model fitted the data well implying the pro-
posed model adequately described the sample data (Hu & Bentler, 1995). RMSEA value
indicated a good fit between hypothesized model and observed data. The issue of
Table 2. Construct, scale detail, factor loading, construct validity and reliability.
Variance
Construct: Items Loadings explained (%)
Opponent Alliance Perception (Adapted from The alliance between opponent parties is .895 79.607
Das et al., 1998; and Mizik & Jacobson, 2003) formed to develop joint manifesto
KMO = 0.95 Cronbach’s α = 0.971; CR = 0.975; together .891
AVE = 0.796 The alliance between opponent parties is
formed to inject new dynamism in the .883
political system together
The alliance between opponent parties is .897
formed to improve socio-political
environment together. .898
The alliance between opponent parties is
formed to grab sizeable share of vote. .875
formed to improve voting performance .920
of both the partners
The alliance between opponent parties is .887
formed to take short-term advantage of
political situation .891
a growth strategy for both the parties .885
formed to share voting expenditure
together
formed to ensure overall competitive
advantage
formed to improve image of both the
parties
Political Product Involvement (Adapted from I have strong interest in politics .798 74.012
Zaichkowsky,1994 and Schneider & Rodgers, I know ideologies of different political .881
1996) KMO = 0.92 Cronbach’s α = 0.941; CR = parties .864
0.945; AVE = 0.614 I know how political ideologies are going .821
to impact me .822
I have strong political opinion .701
I think carefully about politics a lot .671
I am alert to changes in the political scene .677
I am very aware about politics .669
Being a voter is very important to me .816
Casting vote in election is important to .856
me
I don’t favour any particular political party
I select whom to vote based on
performance of the party
Opponent Alliance Expectancy (Adapted from Not unexpected/Extremely unexpected .911 70.171
Fleck & Quester, 2007) KMO = 0.60 Cronbach’s Not surprising/Extremely surprising .919
α = 0.783; CR = 0.873; AVE = 0.702 Non-Credible/Credible .656
Opponent Alliance Perceived Fit (Adapted A poor fit/ A good fit .917 87.882
from Aaker & Keller, 1990) KMO = 0.75 Not logical/ Logical .953
Cronbach’s α = 0.930; CR = 0.956; AVE = 0.879 Not appropriate/ Appropriate .942
Opponent Alliance Affect (Adapted from Unhappy/Happy .941 89.485
Chaudhuri and Holbrook 2001) KMO = 0.77 Feel Bad/Feel Good .956
Cronbach’s α = 0.941; CR = 0.962; AVE = 0.895 Feel cheated/ Feel Benefited .941
Opponent Alliance Attitude (Adapted from Negative/Positive .954 92.928
Osgood et al., 1957 and Burnkrant & Unnava, Unfavourable/Favourable .976
1995) KMO = 0.76 Cronbach’s α = 0.961 CR = Bad/Good .961
0.975; AVE = 0.929
(Continued )
Table 2. Continued.
Variance
Construct: Items Loadings explained (%)
Opponent Alliance Trust This alliance is interested in more than .898 80.065
(Adapted from Banerjee & Chaudhuri, 2016) just getting my vote and rule
KMO = 0.94 Cronbach’s α = 0.975; CR = 0.978; There are no limits to how far this alliance .873
AVE = 0.801 will go to solve a problem I might have
This alliance is genuinely committed to .917
my satisfaction .888
This alliance will do whatever it takes to
serve me better .889
When I see a publicity or advertisement of
this alliance, I believe the information in .890
it is accurate.
Most of what the party leaders say about .858
their alliance is true.
I think some of claims /promises about .925
alliance are puffed up to make it seem
better than they really are. .921
If this alliance makes a claim or promise .894
about its activity, it’s probably true. .889
To me, this alliance is very reliable.
I feel I know what to expect from this
alliance
I feel this alliance knows about my
expectations from the party.
Opponent Alliance Preference (Adapted from I consider this alliance is superior to other .906 83.999
Chang & Liu, 2009) KMO = 0.75 Cronbach’s α competing political parties
= 0.847; CR = 0.951; AVE = 0.795 If I am to vote, I would go for candidate .901
from this alliance first
I prefer this alliance among opponent .866
parties
I am keen to try other political parties for .888
voting
I am interested in voting for other political .896
party instead of this alliance
Opponent Alliance Voting Intention (Adapted I am very likely to vote for the alliance .954 90.662
from Baker et al., 1992) KMO = 0.77 Cronbach’s I would be willing to recommend alliance
α = 0.948; CR = 0.967; AVE = 0.907 to others to vote .956
I would be willing to vote this alliance as a
better party .947
parsimony in the assessment of the model fit was tested through AIC and BCC based on
Browne and Cudeck (1993). For all the estimated models the value for AIC and BCC were
less than the independence model but more than the saturated model. ECVI and its
modified version MECVI measured the likelihood that the model crosses-validates
across similar-sized samples from the same population. The final measure Hoelter’s fit
statistic (Hoelter, 1983) estimated a sample size that would be sufficient to yield an ade-
quate model fit for a χ 2 test. Here, the value showed that the model adequately fitted
the sample data.
Out of eight direct effects corresponding to the hypotheses (H1through H8), three are
found to be statistically significant (Figure 2). Opponent alliance perceived fit impacts
voting intention positively. Opponent alliance trust has a positive impact on voting inten-
tion. In addition, opponent alliance preference impacts voting intention positively. These
results thus confirm to our hypotheses H4 (β = 0.110; S.E = 0.054; p < .05), H7 (β = 0.156;
S.E = 0.050; p < .05) and H8 (β = 0.811; S.E = 0.106; p < .001). However, our result shows
that there is no direct impact of opponent alliance perception, political product
Table 3. Structural model estimates.

Structural model
Paths Path coefficients
Hypotheses From To Unstandaridized Standaridized
coefficient coefficient
H1 Opponent alliance Voting intention −.035 −.034
perception
H2 Political product Voting intention −.042 −.035
involvement
H3 Opponent alliance Voting intention −.050 −.047
expectancy
H4 Opponent alliance Voting intention .110* .106
perceived fit
H5 Opponent alliance affect Voting intention .074 .074
H6 Attitude about opponent Voting intention −.068 −.069
alliance
H7 Opponent alliance trust Voting intention .156* .135
H8 Opponent alliance Voting intention .811** .770
preference
H9a Opponent alliance Opponent alliance trust .409** .451
perception
H9b Opponent alliance Opponent alliance trust −.024 −.026
expectancy
H9c Opponent alliance Opponent alliance trust .263** .291
perceived fit
H9d Attitude about alliance Opponent alliance trust .129* .152
H10a Opponent alliance Opponent alliance .155** .156
perception preference
H10b Political product Opponent alliance .166** .144
involvement preference
H10c Opponent alliance Opponent alliance −.069 −.068
expectancy preference
H10d Opponent alliance Opponent alliance −.073 −.074
perceived fit preference
H10e Opponent alliance affect Opponent alliance .121 .128
preference
H10f Attitude about alliance Opponent alliance .398** .430
preference
H10g Opponent alliance trust Opponent alliance .207** .189
preference
χ 2
60.984
CMIN/DF 3.587
(Prob. Level) (0.000)
CFI 0.985
RMSEA 0.083
PCLOSE 0.008
AIC 158.984
BCC 162.251
MECVI
Default .436
Saturated .367
Independent 7.924
Hoelter
0.05 169
0.01 204
Note: ** implies significance at 1% level, * indicates significance at 5% level.
involvement of voters, opponent alliance expectancy, affect and attitude on voting inten-
tion. Among eleven indirect effects (H9a through H9d and H10a through H10g), seven are
found to be significant. Opponent alliance perception, perceived fit and attitude impact
alliance trust positively. Thus, these factors impact alliance trust indirectly and alliance
Figure 2. Overall structural model showing significant and non-significant relationship.
trust, in turn, impacts voting intention positively. These confirm to our hypotheses H9a (β
= 0.409; S.E. = 0.037; p < .001), H9c (β = 0.263; S.E. = 0.055; p < .001), and H9d (β = 0.129;
S.E. = 0.052; p < .050). However, expectancy has no significant indirect impact on alliance
trust the way it has no direct impact on voting intention. Furthermore, opponent alliance
perception, voters’ political product involvement, alliance attitude, and trust have a posi-
tive indirect impact on alliance preference and alliance preference have direct positive
impacts on voting intention. These results support our hypotheses H10a (β = 0.155; S.E
= 0.051; p < .050), H10b (β = 0.166; S.E = 0.050; p < .001), H10f (β = 0.398; S.E = 0.081; p
< .001), and H10g (β = 0.207; S.E = 0.061; p < .001). On the other hand, opponent alliance
expectancy, perceived fit, affect have no indirect impacts on alliance preference.
Discussion
From the result, one can see that direct effect H4 predicts that opponent alliance perceived
fit is positively related to respondents’ voting intentions in favour of alliance candidate.
This indicates that the greater the respondents perceive the strategic fit between alliance
partners, the higher the chance they will vote for alliance candidate. Additionally, the
result shows that perceived fit indirectly impacts respondents’ trust on alliance (H9c) posi-
tively. Our finding is in line with the viewpoint of Simonin and Ruth (1998) in which it is
viewed that perceived fit leads to positive alliance evaluation. This also supports the view-
point that consumers prefer a high perceived fit between partners as consumers prefer
consistency in their thoughts and react negatively to a violation or inconsistency
(Becker-Olson & Hill, 2006). This finding is likely due to the fact that among political
opponents, ideological and political differences are present. Political ideologies and mani-
festo create political party identity and offer uniqueness to a political party in comparison
to other competitors. Both loyal and independent voters frame their understanding about
individual political party considering its ideology and manifesto. In that scenario,
whenever there is pre-poll alliance between two opponents, perceived fit becomes an

essential criterion for the success of alliance. Voters will have trust and in turn, develop
positive voting intentions in favour of alliance candidate if there is a high degree of fit
between alliance partners. This result highlights that opponent alliance success largely
depends on whether alliance partners are able to present the alliance as a natural fit in
the context of existing political scenario. Perceived fit will be high when alliance is convin-
cing to voters in connection with alliance partners shared ideology related associations as
perceived by voters. We may thus conclude that trust and voting intention in favour of
political alliance are affected positively or negatively, depending on the intensity of per-
ceived fit between alliance partners. For political alliance partners, task is to build a favour-
able fit perception among voters.
Result shows that opponent alliance perception of respondents indirectly influences
voters’ trust (H9a) and preferences on alliance (H10a) which in turn impact voting inten-
tions. However, opponent alliance perception has no direct impact on respondents’ voting
intentions. This is due to the fact that in case of an electoral alliance, competing parties
form alliance to share seats to contest. Intention is to ensure vote of supporters of both
the alliance partners in favour of alliance candidate. For a typical voter, the alliance can-
didate may not be from the party he supports because of seat share policy wherein stron-
gest member between alliance members would like to contest from a particular seat to gain
maximum vote. In reality, in case of opponent alliance, it may so happen that the alliance
candidate in a particular seat may be from a party which voter dislikes most. However, as
the said candidate is represented as alliance candidate, the voter is expected to cast vote in
favour of that candidate assuming the said candidate as a true representative of the partner
party which he likes most. In that scenario, voter’s perception about alliance may not have
direct impact of voting intention as the voter has no choice. However, the same has a
strong impact to shape voter’s trust and preference for alliance. In case the voter has
low trust and preference for alliance, he may decide not to participate in voting process
and the same may not only lower overall voter turn-out rate but also indicates vote loss
for opponent alliance. Accordingly, alliance partner should focus on the development of
trust around alliance. This may be done by proposing common manifestos by keeping
in mind individual political ideology of both the partners. A joint campaign plan may
be initiated highlighting common or shared election propositions to brew trust and resul-
tant preference in the mind of the voters.
We may see from the result that political product involvement of respondents has no
direct impact on their voting intention. So, our study does not support findings of Yoon
et al. (2005) in which it is viewed that the voter’s political product involvement has great
importance in his/her voting decision (Yoon et al., 2005). However, it has an indirect
impact on alliance preference (H10b) which in turn has an impact on respondents’
voting intentions. As higher level of involvement in politics ensures higher degree of pol-
itical knowledge consumption by voter and the same may shape his preference. A politi-
cally involved voter will be more knowledgeable about alliance political partners, intensity
of their rivalry and rationale behind such alliance. As a result voter’s preference for the
alliance candidate in a particular constituency will depend on his level of understanding
about the candidate. Thus, this study indicates voter’s political product involvement as
an instrumental factor behind his party preference. As higher level of political product
involvement may encourage voter to gather more information about opponent alliance,
alliance partner should identify high involved voters from a particular constituency. Those
informed voters may be used to communicate with other not-so-involved voters to spread
positive word-of-mouth about rationale of such opponent alliance. As the same may help
to develop credibility by reducing confusion among general voters, the same may shape
their alliance preferences.
We may further see that opponent alliance expectancy has no significant direct effect on
respondents’ voting intentions. Similarly, the same has no indirect effect on trust and pre-
ference. We have already seen that expectancy of opponent alliance is conditioned with the
existing knowledge or preconceptions about alliance partners. As voters become accus-
tomed with several types of political alliances in Indian political market which are oppor-
tunistic in nature, the role of expectancy has lost its importance to influence voters’ voting
behaviour. Voters become ready for any expected or unexpected political alliances that
may form during election. Similarly, the result shows that affect has no significant
direct effect on voting intention and indirect effect on alliance preference. Though
affect associated with partnering brands is evoked when consumers encounter a brand alli-
ance (Boush & Loken, 1987), the same does not hold true in this particular context of pol-
itical alliance. As both partner political parties are well-known to voters, emotion does not
play a significant role behind alliance preference. This supports the earlier research
findings wherein it is propagated that affect plays a more dominant role in shaping
views towards an unknown brand (Homer, 2006).
The result shows that attitude about opponent alliance has no significant direct impact
on respondents’ voting intentions. However, it has a significant positive indirect impact on
alliance trust (H9d) and preference (H10f). Attitude about alliance shapes the voter’s trust
and preference about alliance. Thus, we may see that indirect effects become important in
Indian political market as those are conditioning voters’ mind-sets. Positive attitude about
alliance leads to higher level of trust and it helps to increase preference for alliance candi-
date. We may argue that if voters develop substantial trust and preferences about alliance
candidate before making their choices, those may indirectly impact their voting intentions.
Hence, the learning from this result is that the alliance partners should assess voter’s atti-
tude about the proposed alliance before designing the common manifesto and campaign.
Specifically, targeted communication may be done on the basis of current attitude level of
the voters to initiate a positive attitude about the alliance. This may be a crucial lead for
Indian political parties.
Impact of alliance trust is positively impacting respondents’ voting intentions (H7) and
it has an indirect effect on their alliance preferences (H10d). This shows that higher level of
alliance trust creates a positive motivation to vote for alliance. Similarly, trust shapes alli-
ance preference indirectly which has a direct impact on voting intention. Our finding is in
line with view of past researches wherein it is propagated that significant relation exists
between trust and voting intention as trust is the main binding force in cementing the
relationship between political brand and the voters (Ahmed et al., 2011; Jones & Kim,
2010; Komiak & Benbasat, 2006). Alliance preference has a significant positive impact
on respondents’ voting intentions (H8). The result supports findings of Komiak and Ben-
basat (2006) wherein it is propagated that the higher the preference in favour of a political
party, the more would be voters’ voting intentions. Thus overall, the results show that for
the sample selected, alliance trust and preference are evolved as most important elements
to influence voters’ voting intention. Though alliance trust and preference directly
influence voting intention, those are indirectly influenced by four significant factors
namely opponent alliance perception, political involvement of voters, opponent alliance
perceived fit and alliance attitude.
Relevance and implications

Alliance supposed to help a political party to realize its growth potential more quickly than
pursuing individually. Indian politics is known for alliances but most of the time the alli-
ance formed by the like-minded ideologically similar parties. But when rival parties collide
together to achieve a particular goal it may create substantial confusion in the voters’ mind
and various factors may play a significant role to influence their voting intentions. The
objective of this study is to identify factors impacting opponent alliance voting intention
in an emerging country like India. The study explores the most important factors in the
eyes of the respondents that influence their voting intentions for opponent alliance can-
didate. The research builds a model which predicts the direct and indirect relationship
among opponent alliance perception, political involvement, alliance expectancy, fit,
affect, attitude, trust and preference on voting intention of electorates. For political mar-
keting professionals some significant findings emerge from the results in the context of
regional electoral competition. Firstly, during alliance formation between rivals, perceived
fit between partners should be reviewed intensely as the same has a direct impact on voting
intention. Electoral sentiments should be verified before formation of alliance between
rivals. Secondly, the success of such alliance is based on voters’ trust on said alliance
and the way they prefer the same. In political market, voters often are taken for granted
as they have no direct role on political decisions taken by political parties. However, the
study shows that if voters have mistrust on such alliance between competing political
parties, that has direct impact on their voting intentions and indirect impact on alliance
preferences. Thus, before strategizing any such alliance, it is important to access voters’
trust and preferences about proposed political alliance. Thirdly, to ensure trust and prefer-
ence, political parties should carefully focus on voters’ perceptions about opponent alli-
ance, their political involvements and attitudes about alliance as those are building
blocks to shape trust and preference which in turn influence voting intention.
This research explores the factors that need to be considered by the political parties
during decision process of alliance formation with opponent. The research findings are
outcomes of empirical study conducted among electorates of India which is the largest
democracy of the world. As the sample set is in the city of Kolkata, India, hence the
results may be referred with caution in terms of generalization of the same to other
regions and countries. This study should be repeated in other major emerging markets
to test the general applicability of the theoretical model and the empirical results intro-
duced in this paper. We adopted convenience sampling technique to conduct the
survey process, which may be an area of concern. To get more accurate result, future
research should be conducted with a random sample more representative of the entire
population.
This empirical research focused exclusively on the views of voters. For a more holistic
understanding, views of political experts should be considered. Further, to capture view of
political parties in this particular context, survey may be conducted among political party
members using same survey instrument. A comparative view of both the views may
unearth the differences of thought process between political party members and their
target voters. These are exciting new areas where future research may be conducted. Simi-
larly, the proposed model may be tested in different geographies to examine the result
further.
Notes on contributors
Saikat Banerjee (saikat1972@rediffmail.com) is Professor at Indian Institute of Foreign Trade
(IIFT-Deemed University under Ministry of Commerce), 1583, Madurdaha, Chowbaga Road, Ana-
ndapur Road, Kolkata – 700 107, India. He has contributed research papers and articles in well-
known journals like Journal of Brand Management, Marketing Intelligence & Planning, Journal
of Political Marketing, Europen Business Review, Journal of Product & Brand Management, Asia
Pacific Journal of Marketing & Logistics, Cross Cultural Management-An International Journal,
Journal of Food Products Marketing, Journal of Medical Marketing, International Journal of
Pharmaceutical and Health Care Marketing, Health Marketing Quarterly, International Journal
of E-Health and Medical Communications, Journal of Research in Marketing and Entrepreneur-
ship, Journal of Asia Entrepreneurship and Sustainability, The Marketing Review, Journal of
Asia Business Studies, International Journal of Commerce and Management, South Asian
Journal of Management. His areas of interest are Brand Management and Consumer Behavior.
Paroma Mitra Mukherjee (paromamitra@mdim.ac.in) is Assistant Professor at Management
Development Institute (MDI), Sakim-Katnai, Kulori, P.O. – Uttar Ramna, P.S. – Raghunathganj,
Dist. – Murshidabad, West Bengal, PIN – 742235, India. She is Ph.D.in Management, MBA and
B.Sc in Economics from the University of Burdwan. Her teaching and research interests are in
the area of Indian Economics and Strategic Management. She is an active researcher and published
several papers in reputed International and National Journals of repute and also participated in
various International and National conferences, Seminar, Workshop.
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.
ORCID
Saikat Banerjee http://orcid.org/0000-0001-8883-0903
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Asian Journal of Political Science

ISSN: 0218-5377 (Print) 1750-7812 (Online) Journal homepage: https://www.tandfonline.com/loi/rasi20

Electoral alliance with sworn opponent political

Saikat Banerjee & Paroma Mitra Mukherjee

To link to this article: https://doi.org/10.1080/02185377.2019.1579105

Published online: 11 Feb 2019.

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Electoral alliance with sworn opponent political party: factors

CONTACT Saikat Banerjee saikat@iift.edu

Literature review, hypotheses development and conceptual framework

Political product involvement and voting intention

Opponent alliance expectancy and voting intention

Opponent alliance perceived ﬁt and voting intention

Opponent alliance aﬀect and voting intention

Opponent alliance attitude and voting intention

Opponent alliance trust and voting intention

Opponent alliance preference and voting intention

Indirect eﬀects of sources of association on opponent alliance preference

Sampling and data collection

Table 1. Sample characteristics.

Construct validity and reliability

The structural model

Table 3. Structural model estimates.

Figure 2. Overall structural model showing signiﬁcant and non-signiﬁcant relationship.

whenever there is pre-poll alliance between two opponents, perceived ﬁt becomes an

Relevance and implications

Oppenheim, A. N. (2000). Questionnaire design: Interviewing and attitude measurement (New

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