Replication data for: Something old, something new .... Institutions and turnout in Western democracies

While his article builds on an interesting theoretical argument about the impact of institutions on attitudes, his claims about causal relationships are not backed by data. There is no rationale for the selection of countries, and most explana tory variables are actually constant within countries.

The specification of the model is problematic in many ways. A careful re-analysis shows that the t-values reported in Lister's article are far too large, and that the estimates for Lister's model are highly unstable and dependent on the selection of observations. There is no robust evidence for a universal, politically relevant relationship between inequality and turnout.