Northern Ireland

Assembly election 2016 Voter Advice App - which party are you most closely aligned to?

Voters have the power to elect a new power sharing government on May 5
Voters have the power to elect a new power sharing government on May 5 Voters have the power to elect a new power sharing government on May 5

ACADEMICS in the School of Politics, International Studies and Philosophy at Queen's University have created an app that may help you decide who to vote for in the Assembly election.

The Voter Advice App, created by Professor John Garry and his team, compares your views on a range of issues to where each of the north's parties stand on those issues and provides you with a score for how similar you are to each party. 

Professor Garry said that while voters may know where they stand on contentious issues like flags and parading, some may be surprised at which party they turn out to be closely aligned to on economic and social issues. ?

"Users of these kind of apps often find them fun, as well as informative. We do not presume that policy issues are the only reason to vote in an election and there are lots of aspects of the election the app does not provide any information about," Professor Garry said.

"But if you would like a quick and easy sense of which party you are closest to on policy matters, then why not give it a go?"

"As well as getting an overall score showing how close are you to each party, the app provides maps of where you and the parties stand on some main policy dimensions: an economic left-right dimension, a socio-moral dimension ranging from liberal to conservative and a nationalist- unionist dimension," Professor Garry said.

"These graphical maps help the voter to quickly and easily see where they and the parties are located and a voter in search of ideological direction can quickly read the maps and see which party is closest to them".

John Garry is Senior Research Fellow at the Senator George J Mitchell Institute for Global Peace, Security and Justice, Queen’s University Belfast

Neil Matthews is a post doctoral researcher in the School of Politics, International Studies and Philosophy at Queen’s University Belfast.