ABSTRACT
This chapter provides a broad perspective on previous research on party switching. It not only reviews the literature but also proposes to organise existing scientific findings into three main areas: definitions (understanding) of the concept of party switching, ways of conceptualising the concept, and methods of measuring party switching. The distinction is made between broad and narrow understandings of party switching, and the problems that these divergent approaches generate in empirical research are demonstrated. To avoid these problems, an original proposal is formulated on how to clearly distinguish related but non-synonymous concepts, namely: legislative party switching, political reaffiliation, and—the broadest of these—parliamentary volatility. Additionally, attention is paid to the three directions of parliamentary mobility: horizontal, vertical, and apparent. Key themes and typologies are presented as tables and figure.
