Why Appeals to Urban Voters Backfire While Rural Appeals Succeed

Why Place-Based Appeals Matter

Group-based identities shape political competition, and politicians frequently craft appeals aimed at particular social groups. In this article, Tabea Palmtag (BJPS) investigates a common campaign strategy—place-based appeals that invoke urban or rural identity—and asks when such appeals improve candidate evaluations and when they backfire.

What Palmtag Tests

The study contrasts dominant and subordinate social groups in a place-based context: urban voters are treated as the dominant group and rural voters as the subordinate group. The central question is whether appeals targeted at these groups affect voters’ evaluations of candidates differently, and why those differences arise.

How the Experiments Work

• Two survey experiments were run, one in Germany and one in England.
• Respondents received candidate messages framed as benefiting either urban or rural residents; some messages framed the same policies as benefiting both groups.
• Outcomes focus on changes in candidate evaluation and on mediators such as local identity strength, place-based resentment, and reactions to antagonistic framing.

Key Findings

• Appeals to the subordinate group (rural voters) improve candidate evaluations among those voters.
• Appeals to the dominant group (urban voters) produce a negative reaction rather than a boost.
• Differences in local identity strength and lower place-based resentment among urban respondents partly account for the asymmetry, but the primary driver is the perceived antagonistic nature of group-based appeals: dominant-group members dislike political frames that present politics as structured by intergroup antagonism.
• When identical policies are framed as benefiting both urban and rural residents, candidate evaluations among urban respondents improve, demonstrating that neutral or inclusive framing can avoid the backlash.

What This Means for Campaigns and Research

Palmtag’s results show that targeting the dominant side of an identity divide carries the risk of backlash because many dominant-group members reject antagonistic, zero-sum framings—even when they identify with the dominant group. The findings highlight the importance of framing choices in appeals based on place and suggest that inclusive messaging can mitigate negative reactions. The cross-national experimental design (Germany and England) strengthens the generalizability of the asymmetry in place-based appeals and points to new questions about identity strength and perceived intergroup conflict in electoral persuasion.