Collectif ALCoV (Ed.), Voting contexts. The social roots of electoral practices, Presses universitaires du Septentrion, 31 October 2025.

ALCoV is the acronym of the ANR-funded research programme «Analyse localisée et comparative du vote». For further information, visit https://spx.hypotheses.org/6275 

Presentation:

This book retraces two decades of French research on voting contexts, opening up new perspectives for understanding electoral preferences.

How can we understand voting and elections beyond the polls and the figures discussed on election night? Electoral analyses place individual rationalities and preferences at the heart of the mechanisms of electoral choice. The logic behind the vote is said to lie in the innermost recesses of voters' consciences. Yet an ever-growing body of French and international research shows that voting should be read primarily in the light of the affiliations and contexts in which it takes place. Territories, families, friends and work groups are the very concrete spaces in which norms and (dis)tastes circulate and political socialisation takes place. This book looks back over two decades of French research into the contexts of voting, and places it in the context of international controversies.

The book was co-edited by the ALCoV collective (Catherine Achin, Éric Agrikoliansky, Philippe Aldrin, Lorenzo Barrault-Stella, Kevin Geay, Christèle Lagier, Patrick Lehingue, Sandrine Lévêque and Anne-France Taiclet). It includes contributions from Pierre-Yves Baudot, Marie-Victoire Bouquet, Céline Braconnier, Baptiste Coulmont, Katherine Cramer, Diane Delacourt, Jean-Yves Dormagen, Saphia Doumenc, Baptiste Giraud, Tristan Haute, Patrick Lehingue, Camille Masclet, Emmanuel Monneau, Jean Rivière and Muriel Surdez.

Link to the book