To test the plausibility of various theoretical mechanisms, which I assume to be at work, as discussed in Chapter 3, I conducted interviews with campaign managers of the incumbent NDC and the opposition NPP. Conducting qualitative interviews also helped me to draw my attention to possible alternative ex- planations for the pattern of campaigning I observe, which need to be addressed in the statistical models, in order to avoid omitted variable bias (Bennett, 2007). I followed a method of selection applied by Osei in her analysis of party-voter linkages in Ghana and Senegal (Osei, 2012). I selected a member of each of the national campaign teams of both parties, and a member each of the regional campaign teams of the Ashanti Region, which is an NPP stronghold, the Volta Region, which is an NDC stronghold, and the competitive region of Greater Accra. Furthermore, I conducted interviews with a few constituency- level campaign organizers. I interviewed a local campaign manager of the NDC in one constituency of its regional stronghold, the Volta Region, and one local campaign manager of the NPP in its regional stronghold of the Ashanti Region. In addition, I interviewed one constituency organizer each in a com- petitive constituency in the region of Greater Accra. Table 4.2 provides a list of the interviews that were conducted. For reasons of confidentiality, I do not cite the name of the regions or constituencies when I report findings from these interviews.
The procedure of selection of interview partners applied has two important advantages. First, it was important to select campaign managers from both the parties’ strongholds and competitive areas, as the strategies parties apply in their save havens are likely to differ from those they apply in competitive or swing areas, or the rival party’s strongholds. This is why choosing interview partners from these differ-
ent areas increased the representativeness of the sample and hence the quality of the inferences drawn from these interviews. Carefully selecting cases for qualitative small-N analyses like the present one is particularly important, to assure the representativeness of the results (Seawright and Gerring, 2008). Second, interviewing campaign managers at different levels of the party hierarchy had the advantage that they were likely to report on different aspects of the campaign. National and regional campaigners were more likely to explain the national strategy to me, as intended by the party executive, which was of primary interest to me. At the same time, however, local constituency-organizers were likely to be more open and frank about socially unaccepted or potentially even illegal strategies, such as how the parties organize vote and turnout-buying. It turned out that these expectations were met in the interviews.10
Table 4.2: List of semi-structured interviews
Interview Date Place
NDC National campaign team December 18, 2014 Accra
NDC Ashanti regional campaign team October 23, 2012 Kumasi NDC Greater Accra regional campaign team October 23, 2012 Accra NDC Volta regional campaign team October 26, 2012 Dzodze
NDC Weija Gbawe constituency campaign team December 1, 2012 Anyaa Sowotuom NDC South Tongu constituency campaign team October 23, 2012 South Tongu
NPP National campaign team November 28, 2012 Accra
NPP Ashanti regional campaign team October 22, 2012 Kumasi NPP Greater Accra regional campaign team November 29, 2012 Accra NPP Volta regional campaign team December 15, 2012 Hohoe
NPP Afigya Sekeyere West constituency campaign team October 24, 2012 Afigya Sekeyere West NPP Anyaa Sowotuom constituency campaign team December 14, 2012 Weija
My principle interest in the interviews was to understand the logic of which groups of voters these campaign teams targeted. I asked interview partners about where they organized most campaign rallies and why. I posed the same questions about campaign promises candidates made at presidential campaign rallies. I also asked the campaign managers where they distributed most cash, party paraphernalia and other small benefits to voters. The questionnaire in Appendix A.1 provides details on the questions I asked. Asking interview partners to describe how and in which areas they campaign not only helped me understand the rationale of these campaign managers, but also served to validate the findings from the quantitative analyses. I interviewed most campaign managers in their offices or on the road, in their cars, on way to a meeting or a campaign rally. Conducting interviews in settings familiar to interview partners, where they feel at ease is generally advised in qualitative research methodology, because it lets interview partners behave most naturally (Girtler, 1992).
As it is common practice, I began the interviews with easy to answer and non-controversial questions and posed more sensitive questions after the interview partners seemed at ease to talk to me about their work (see Mishler, 1986). The interviews I conducted were semi-structured, which have the advantage
to assure comparability of the interviews, as I asked the same, or nearly the same set of questions in each interview. At the same time, these semi-structured interviews allow the researcher an important degree of flexibility to ask additional questions, and leave out questions that seem less relevant, if the interview is taking an interesting turn. This flexibility was also assured by recording interviews which allowed me to “think through potential follow-up questions when the conversation takes an interesting turn without worrying about taking down the exact text” (Rathbun, 2008, p. 697).