Voting and expressing dissatisfaction: an experiment during the 2017 French Presidential election

Abstract

This paper reports an experiment realised with 850 electors during the 2017 French presidential election. It tested a ballot di¤erent from the official one. Instead of voting for a unique candidate, participants were asked to cast one vote on each candidate. The vote could be "in favor", "neutral" or "against". The theoretical advantages of such a ballot are discussed and tested empirically.