Effects of seating arrangements on parliamentary collaborations

Does parliamentary seating affect parliamentary behavior? In this paper, we dig into the question of whether spatial proximity affects the behavior of elected representatives. Using data from the 50th legislative period of the Swiss parliament and an inferential network model, we estimate the effects of different operationalizations of seating proximity and find that direct and indirect left and right neighbors tend to support each other's legislative work. However, when ideological and regional closeness (among other factors) is controlled for, the proximity effect remains small, pointing to the limited effects of seating proximity on legislative behavior.