ABSTRACT
Based on a nationwide Gallup poll conducted in Mexico in May 1988, we study voters who said that they had voted for Mexico’s ruling party (the Institutional Revolutionary Party — PRI) in 1982 hut would not in the July 1988 presidential election. By means of logistic regression, we argue that the intended behaviour of these self-identified PRI defectors is best explained by their judgements about the prospects for the political regime’s institutions and by their view of candidate Carlos Salinas’s personal qualities. Defection was not explained, however, by the demographic characteristics or life circumstances of voters nor by their attitudes about specific policy issues nor by their views about the performance of the country’s economy.
