As a result, second-order elections are often used by voters to punish or reward the current governing parties.
This occurs due to voters feeling freer to vote for parties that align with their personal views as second-class elections have less importance on who wins so less Strategic voting occurs.
This is due to their lack of voter turnout compared to national elections.
However, the second-order elections approach has not been confirmed for the twelve new member states of the European Union (Bulgaria, Czech Republic, Cyprus, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Malta, Poland, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia).
Despite being low stake, second-order elections can still have implications for national politics.