A Comparative Study of Voters' Electoral Behaviours in the Presidential and Islamic Consultative Assembly Elections in Kohgiluyeh and Boyer-Ahmad Province

Presidential and Islamic Consultative Assembly elections in Kohgiluyeh and Boyer-Ahmad Province have been associated with high voter turnout in different periods. In fact, this province has always been one of the provinces with the highest turnout in both elections. In this study, the voters’ electoral behaviours in Kohgiluyeh and Boyer-Ahmad Province in the two Presidential and Islamic Consultative Assembly elections were investigated and compared with each other. To this end, the most important factors affecting their electoral behaviours in the two presidential and parliamentary elections were studied. By comparing the voters’ electoral behaviours in these two types of elections, it was sought to examine the impacts of varied factors on the presidential and parliamentary elections. This research was done since some research had tended to assume the voters’ equal electoral behaviours in the two mentioned elections by adopting a reductionist view and had consequently considered that similar factors could affect the voters’ electoral behaviours in Kohgiluyeh and Boyer-Ahmad Province in all elections.

The present survey was performed quantitatively with a descriptive-analytical purpose. The statistical population of the study included the citizens of Kohgiluyeh and Boyer-Ahmad Province, from among whom a sample of 368 subjects was selected through the cluster sampling method. The data were collected by using a combined questionnaire (researcher-made questionnaire and those made by others). In other words, two questionnaires were utilized in this investigation, one related to the Islamic Consultative Assembly elections and another one related to the presidential elections. The items were almost the same for the titles of the relevant elections in both questionnaires. The independent variables consisted of thought leaders, religiosity, political propaganda, political orientation, economic factors, sociological factors, and tribal relations, as well as contextual variables. The validity and reliability of the questionnaires were evaluated and confirmed based on the formal validation method and Cronbach's alpha test, respectively.

The findings revealed that the voters’ average electoral behaviours in the Islamic Consultative Assembly elections were higher than those related to the presidential elections. In explaining both types of electoral behaviours, the data showed that the variables of religiosity, political orientation, political propaganda, thought leaders, socio-economic factors, and sociological factors had a positive and significant relationship with the voters’ participations in both elections. The results also indicated that the extents to which each of these variables affected their electoral behaviours in the two elections were different, i.e., the independent variables did not equally accounted for the voters’ electoral behaviours in the mentioned elections. The results demonstrated that the variables of tribal relations, religiosity, and social factors had the greatest impacts on the electoral behaviours in the Islamic Consultative Assembly elections; on the other hand, the variables of thought leader, education, propaganda, and political orientation turned out to be the most influential factors in the presidential elections. Inconsistent with the research findings in other provinces, this study showed that people of all ages and genders participated in parliamentary elections. In more modern societies, the degrees of men and women’s participations are somewhat different. However, in this province, due to the entanglement of the phenomenon of the Islamic Consultative Assembly elections with many aspects of life and especially the issue of power, there was little or no difference between an old woman and a young man in terms of participation rate. However, in national events like presidential election, age and age group tended to affect the voters’ electoral behaviours. The research findings enabled us to argue that the voters’ electoral behaviours could be determined by the context, in which the research was conducted. In other words, while the variables influencing on the voters’ local electoral behaviours were all relatively traditional, the factors affecting their national electoral behaviours were of a more modern nature. To put this into perspective, due to the traditional context of Kohgiluyeh and Boyer-Ahmad Province, a great deal of value was attached to local elections in the transition towards modernity and a set of more traditional variables tended to affect the voters’ electoral behaviours.In fact, the Islamic Consultative Assembly elections in the province were not just a political phenomenon independent of the context of life; it was rather one of the main components of everyday life serving as a major topic of public and private debates. In recent years, due to the dominant roles of the members of the parliament in the authoritative distribution of goods and services (politics) and the ordinary people and influential groups’ ties of interests with the parliament members, social variables, such as clan and tribal relations, tribal and traditional gaps, and consequently thought leaders’ positions, played a more prominent role in social mobilization and electoral participation, which ultimately shaped the voters’ behaviours.