Party responsiveness and socio-economic problem-solving in western democracies

What factors influence party responsiveness to socio-economic problems in OECD countries! Four alternative regression equations are tested that model the influence of objective conditions, public preferences and party ideology. It appears that the way political parties respond to socio-economic problems is mainly determined by their left-right ideology. The influence of alternative factors is much weaker: Furthermore, party responsiveness is not only bounded by left-right ideology, but also by the institutional environment in which parties operate, i.e the welfare state regime.