Voting for a candidate because you like their past actions in office describes which type of voting?

Voting for a candidate because you like their past actions in office describes which type of voting?

• A. Rational Choice Voting
• B. Prospective Voting
• C. Retrospective Voting
• D. Issue Voting

Answer: (C)

Retrospective voting focuses on how a candidate has performed in office in the past. If you choose to vote for someone because you like what they already did—their track record—you’re rewarding or punishing them based on past actions. This contrasts with prospective voting, where the decision rests on what the candidate says they will do in the future and the policies they promise to implement. Issue voting centers on a single policy issue rather than overall performance, and rational choice voting frames the choice as a calculation of which candidate best advances your personal interests, which can involve past results but is driven by a broader cost-benefit assessment. In this scenario, liking a candidate’s past actions aligns with evaluating and voting based on that history, which is retrospective voting.

Retrospective voting focuses on how a candidate has performed in office in the past. If you choose to vote for someone because you like what they already did—their track record—you’re rewarding or punishing them based on past actions. This contrasts with prospective voting, where the decision rests on what the candidate says they will do in the future and the policies they promise to implement. Issue voting centers on a single policy issue rather than overall performance, and rational choice voting frames the choice as a calculation of which candidate best advances your personal interests, which can involve past results but is driven by a broader cost-benefit assessment. In this scenario, liking a candidate’s past actions aligns with evaluating and voting based on that history, which is retrospective voting.