|
on Collective Decision-Making |
| By: | Prato, Carlo; Wolton, Stephane |
| Abstract: | Elections have long been understood as a mean to encourage candidates to act in voters' interest as well as a way to aggregate dispersed information. This paper juxtaposes these two key features within a unified framework. As in models of electoral control, candidates compete for office by strategically proposing policy platforms. As in models of information aggregation, agents are not always informed about the policy which maximizes the electorate welfare. Candidates face a trade-off between acting in the electorate's best interest and maximizing their chance of being elected. We provide conditions under which electoral institutions encourage candidates' conformism---thereby stifling proper competition among ideas---and render information aggregation unfeasible in equilibrium. In extensions, we highlight that the new political failure we uncover cannot be fully resolved by liberalizing access to candidacy or reducing voter information. |
| Keywords: | Elections, Information Aggregation, Access to Candidacy, Restrictions to Candidacy |
| JEL: | D70 D72 D82 D83 |
| Date: | 2017–11–11 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:82753&r=cdm |
| By: | Lukinova, Evgeniya; Babkina, Tatiana; Sedush, Anna; Menshikov, Ivan; Menshikova, Olga; Myagkov, Mikhail |
| Abstract: | This paper investigates how the group membership fee influences the cooperation rate within the groups formed through the socialization. Our previous findings suggest that socialization, or social interactions in groups, create sociality and, therefore, establish a society with sustained cooperation and fairness. In line with Social Identity Theory, we assert some esteem or value to be gained through group differentiation. What will happen with this additional value once we try to quantify it? For this purpose, we observed two cases: socialized participants should pay the fee to stay in-group; participants should pay the fee to join the group, socialize and stay there. We find that monetary transactions are not determinative on their own; rather the consequences of these transactions can hurt collective action through a forced division of participants into those who paid enough (in-group) and those who did not (out-group). More over, despite the fact that being in-group and out-group is an economically equal situation, participants are willing to pay the fee to stay in their socialized group or pay the fee to join the group before socialization. |
| Keywords: | Prisoner’s Dilemma, Socialization, Cooperation, Auction, Group Formation, Membership Fee, Experimental Economics |
| JEL: | C1 C71 |
| Date: | 2017–09–17 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:82800&r=cdm |
| By: | Hideo Konishi (Boston College); Chen-Yu Pan (Wuhan University) |
| Abstract: | Until recently, both Republican and Democratic administrations have been promoting free trade and market deregulation for decades without intensive policy debates. We set up a two-party electoral competition model in a two-dimensional policy space with campaign contributions by an interest group that promotes a certain agenda that many voters disagree. Assuming that voters are impressionable to campaign spending for/against candidates, we analyze incentive compatible contracts between the interest group and the candidates on agenda policy positions and campaign contributions. If the interest group pushes its agenda more than the candidates want by providing contributions, then the candidates can compete only over the other (ideological) dimension. As the agenda is pushed further by the interest group, ideological policy polarization and campaign contributions surge. |
| Keywords: | electoral competition, probabilistic voting, campaign contributions, interest groups, impressionable voters, polarization |
| JEL: | C72 D72 F02 F13 |
| Date: | 2018–01–11 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:boc:bocoec:944&r=cdm |
| By: | Anthony Edo; Yvonne Giesing; Jonathan Öztunc; Panu Poutvaara |
| Abstract: | Immigration has become one of the most divisive political issues in the United States, the United Kingdom, France and several other Western countries. We estimate the impact of immigration on voting for far-left and far-right parties in France, using panel data on presidential elections from 1988 to 2017. To derive causal estimates, we instrument more recent immigration flows by past settlement patterns in 1968. We find that immigration increases support for far-right candidates and has no robust effect on far-left voting. The increased support for far-right candidates is driven by low educated immigrants from non-Western countries. |
| Keywords: | Voting;Immigration |
| JEL: | D72 F22 J15 P16 |
| Date: | 2017–12 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cii:cepidt:2017-20&r=cdm |
| By: | Tjaša Bjedov (Distance Learning University of Switzerland Ueberlandstrasse 12 CH-3900 Brig, Switzerland); Simon Lapointe (VATT Institute for Economic Research, Arkadiankatu 7, 00100 Helsinki, Finland); Thierry Madiès (University of Fribourg, Bd. de Pérolles 90, 1700 Fribourg, Switzerland); Marie Claire Villeval (Univ Lyon, CNRS, GATE L-SE UMR 5824, F-69131 Ecully, France; IZA, Bonn, Germany) |
| Abstract: | Using a laboratory experiment with nested local and global public goods, we analyze the stability of global groups when individuals have the option to separate, according to the degree of decentralization of decision-making. We show that increasing the number of decisions made at the local level within a smaller group reduces the likelihood that individuals vote in favor of a break-up of the global group. Voting for a break-up of the global group is more likely when global group members are less cooperative and local group members are more cooperative. Reinforcing local group identity has no impact on votes. |
| Keywords: | Break-up of groups; decision rights, voting behavior, public goods, experiment |
| JEL: | C91 D72 H77 |
| Date: | 2018 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:gat:wpaper:1802&r=cdm |
| By: | Fafchamps, Marcel; Vaz, Ana; Vicente, Pedro C |
| Abstract: | Voter education campaigns often aim to increase voter participation and political accountability. Randomized interventions were implemented nationwide during the 2009 Mozambican elections using leaflets, text messaging, and a free newspaper. We study the local peer effecs triggered by the campaign. We investigate whether treatment effects are transmitted through social networks and geographical proximity at the village level. For individuals personally targeted by the campaign, we estimate the reinforcement effect of proximity to other individuals in our sample. For untargeted individuals, we estimate how the campaign diffuses as a function of proximity to others in the sample. We find evidence for both effects, similar across treatments and proximity measures. The campaign raises the level of interest in the election through networks, in line with the average treatment effect. However, we find a negative network effect of the treatment on voter participation, implying that the positive effect of treatment on more central individuals is smaller. We interpret this result as consistent with free-riding through pivotal reasoning and we provide additional evidence to support this claim. |
| Date: | 2018–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cpr:ceprdp:12580&r=cdm |
| By: | Mitja Stefancic; Silvio Goglio; Ivana Catturani |
| Abstract: | The governance of cooperative banks is arguably so distinctive that it cannot be properly captured by standard economic models. One of the problems that arises in the assessment of the assumed democratic governance in such banks refers to the members� commitment to the banks. This paper considers the fact that it is not always clear whether cooperative banks� members have the proper incentives to actively participate in making decisions that relate to bank strategies and policies. To shed light on this problem, this paper provides an improved framework of governance based on some seminal concepts by Albert O. Hirschman (1970), such as voice, exit and loyalty. Given the challenges that cooperative banks are currently facing, the arguments discussed in this paper should help illuminate the kind of reforms that such banks are expected to pursue in the coming years. Their governance model needs to be updated in practice to retain its specific features; otherwise, it may end up mirroring that of standard for-profit banks. |
| Keywords: | Cooperative banks, Democratic governance, Commitment of members, Albert O. Hirschman |
| JEL: | D71 D72 G21 G3 |
| Date: | 2017 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:trn:utwpeu:1799&r=cdm |
| By: | Chong, Alberto; Le�n, Gianmarco; Roza, Vivian; Valdivia, Martin; Vega, Gabriela |
| Abstract: | We use a field experiment to evaluate the impact of two informational get-out-the-vote (GOTV) campaigns to boost female electoral participation in Paraguay. We find that public rallies have no effect either on registration or on voter turnout in the 2013 presidential elections. However, households that received door-to-door (D2D) treatment are 4.6 percentage points more likely to vote. Experimental variation on the intensity of the treatment at the locality level allows us to estimate spillover effects, which are present in localities that are geographically more concentrated, and thus may favor social interactions. Reinforcement effects to the already treated population are twice as large as diffusion to the untreated. Our results underscore the importance of taking into account urbanization patterns when designing informational campaigns. |
| Keywords: | Electoral Politics; Paraguay; spillover effects; Urbanization; Voter Behavior |
| JEL: | D71 D72 O10 O53 |
| Date: | 2017–12 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cpr:ceprdp:12516&r=cdm |
| By: | Antoinette Baujard (GATE - CREM - Centre de recherche en économie et management - UNICAEN - Université de Caen Normandie - NU - Normandie Université - UR1 - Université de Rennes 1 - CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique); Frédéric Gavrel (CREM - Centre de recherche en économie et management - UNICAEN - Université de Caen Normandie - NU - Normandie Université - UR1 - Université de Rennes 1 - CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique); Herrade Igersheim (CEPERC - Centre d'EPistémologie et d'ERgologie Comparatives - UMR 7304 - AMU - Aix Marseille Université - CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique); Jean-François Laslier (PJSE - Paris Jourdan Sciences Economiques - UP1 - Université Panthéon-Sorbonne - ENS Paris - École normale supérieure - Paris - INRA - Institut National de la Recherche Agronomique - EHESS - École des hautes études en sciences sociales - ENPC - École des Ponts ParisTech - CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, PSE - Paris School of Economics); Isabelle Lebon (CREM - Centre de recherche en économie et management - UNICAEN - Université de Caen Normandie - NU - Normandie Université - UR1 - Université de Rennes 1 - CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique) |
| Abstract: | During the first round of the 2012 French presidential election, participants in an in situ experiment were invited to vote according to " evaluative voting " , which involves rating the candidates using a numerical scale. Various scales were used: (0,1), (-1,0,1), (0,1,2), and (0,1,...,20). The paper studies scale calibration effects, i.e., how individual voters adapt to the scale, leading to possibly different election outcomes. The data show that scales are not linearly equivalent, even if individual ordinal preferences are not inconsistent. Scale matters, notably because of the symbolic power of negative grades, which does not affect all candidates uniformly. |
| Keywords: | Range voting,Evaluative Voting, In Situ Experiment, Approval voting, Calibration |
| Date: | 2017 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hal:journl:halshs-01618039&r=cdm |
| By: | Peshkovskaya, Anastasia; Myagkov, Mikhail; Babkina, Tatiana; Lukinova, Evgeniya |
| Abstract: | Human behavior is greatly influenced by the social context. The currrent study on men’ and women’s cooperative behavior investigated the influence of long-term and short-term effects of socializing in group. The repeated Prisoner’s dilemma carried out in groups of 6 participants was used as the main experimental situation. The differences were found in changes in the level of cooperation, taking in to account the effects of mixing social and gender variables. Socialization made cooperation of group members strength and sustainable. However, men’ and women’s cooperative behavior in groups differed. Women were initially more inclined to cooperate in interaction with strangers. Men showed greater sensitivity to sociality effects. They tended to make cooperative decisions more often if there are friends in the group. Furthermore, men cooperated with previously unknown people after socializing with them significantly more than women. |
| Keywords: | cooperation, social dilemma, Prisoner’s Dilemma, sociality, gender differences, group, experiment |
| JEL: | C7 J16 |
| Date: | 2017–09–17 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:82797&r=cdm |
| By: | Adnan, Wifag (New York University, Abu Dhabi); Miaari, Sami H. (Tel Aviv University) |
| Abstract: | Striving for gender equality presents major challenges but the benefits are vast, ranging from reduced conflict, both within and between communities, to higher economic growth. Unfortunately, Israel's gender wage gap remains one of the highest among developed countries, despite a growing reverse gender gap in educational attainment. Investigating the gender wage gap for the Jewish majority and for the Arab minority, we find evidence of gender segregation by industry and occupations in addition to a glass ceiling effect for Jewish and Arab women. Using data from the Israeli Household Income Survey and electoral data from the Israeli parliamentary elections (2009), this paper provides novel evidence of the role of voter preferences in explaining the persistence of gender pay gaps. Importantly, we find strong evidence of an association between a higher share of votes allocated to nationalist parties, in a given locality, and a larger, (adjusted), gender wage gap for both Jewish-Israelis and Arab-Israelis. |
| Keywords: | gender wage gap, voting behavior, glass ceiling, glass door, social attitudes, discrimination |
| JEL: | J21 J31 J61 J45 C14 C24 |
| Date: | 2018–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp11261&r=cdm |
| By: | Troiano, Ugo A. |
| Abstract: | In this paper I first present a novel fact: women who have experienced democratic institutions during their adolescence are more likely to participate in the labor market, keeping constant the country, age and many other confounding factors. I then present evidence suggesting that discriminatory attitudes may be a channel for such a finding. Other explanations receive less support from the data. |
| Keywords: | gender economics, institutions, democratization, discrimination, labor supply. |
| JEL: | D72 J16 J71 |
| Date: | 2018–01–14 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:83927&r=cdm |
| By: | Brown, Ryan (University of Colorado Denver); Mansour, Hani (University of Colorado Denver); O'Connell, Stephen D. (Massachusetts Institute of Technology) |
| Abstract: | Gender gaps in leadership roles may be reduced by increasing the number of women in career stages that typically precede high-status positions. This can occur by increasing the supply of experienced women, inspiring new female candidates for these positions, and/or changing beliefs about women as leaders. In this study, we investigate whether and how adding women to a career pipeline can reduce gender gaps in higher-ranking positions over time. Specifically, we examine the effects of women's local electoral success on subsequent female candidacy at higher levels of government in India from 1977 to 2014. We use close elections won by women contesting state legislature seats to identify the effect of pipeline expansion on later candidacy for the national parliament. The results indicate that for each additional lower-level seat won by a woman, there is a 30 percent increase in the number of female candidates in subsequent national legislature elections. This effect is driven by new candidates and not by career politicians, and women receive a disproportionately favorable increase in the vote share. These effects are strongest in areas with low levels of existing female political participation and empowerment. The findings are consistent with a mechanism in which exposure reduces bias, allowing for updated beliefs about the viability of latent candidates who then run for higher office. |
| Keywords: | gender gap, political candidacy, female politicians, India |
| JEL: | J16 J71 P16 |
| Date: | 2018–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp11263&r=cdm |
| By: | Protopapas, Panos |
| Abstract: | We study solutions that choose an interval of alternatives when agents have single-peaked preferences. Similar to Klaus and Storcken (2002), we ordinally extend these preferences over intervals. Loosely speaking, we extend the results of Moulin (1980) to our setting and show that the results of Ching (1997) cannot always be similarly extended. Our main results are the following. First, strategy-proofness and peaks-onliness characterize the class of generalized median solutions. Second, although peaks-onliness cannot be replaced by the "weaker" property of continuity in our first result -as is the case in Ching (1997)- this equivalence is achieved when voter-sovereignty is also required. Finally, if preferences are symmetric and single-peaked, strategy-proofness and voter-sovereignty characterize the class of efficient generalized median solutions. |
| Keywords: | Social choice, strategy proofness, single peaked preferences, choice correspondences, voting, median solutions |
| JEL: | D71 |
| Date: | 2018–01–15 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:83939&r=cdm |
| By: | Xu, Xue (Tilburg University, School of Economics and Management) |
| Abstract: | This thesis consists of three chapters in experimental economics. It involves various dimensions in which laboratory experiments can play a role: testing the validity of a game theory, helping understand institutions, and measuring (the change in) social preferences. It relates to the effects of different institutions on cooperation and social preferences. Chapter 2 studies to what extent an overlapping membership structure, which in theory affects the incentives of short-lived players, is conducive to cooperation. Chapter 3 examines whether the presence of decentralized punishment, especially the possibility of retaliating a centralized enforcer, has an impact on the decisions of the enforcer and group cooperation. Chapter 4 studies whether interactions with out-group members matter for in-group-out-group differences in altruism and whether the nature of these interactions matters for in-group-out-group differences. |
| Date: | 2018 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:tiu:tiutis:d3cf4dba-b0f3-4643-a267-78718dacc773&r=cdm |
| By: | Grunewald, Andreas (University of Bonn); Kräkel, Matthias (University of Bonn) |
| Abstract: | In the last decade, social media and the Internet have amplified the possibility to spread false information, a.k.a. fake news, which has become a serious threat to the credibility of politicians, organizations, and other decision makers. This paper proposes a framework for investigating the incentives to strategically spread fake news under different institutional configurations and payoff structures. In particular, we show under what conditions institutions that foster transparency in the media cause more fake news. Complementary, we study what kind of environments are particularly susceptible to the production of fake news. |
| Keywords: | campaigning, electoral competition, signal jamming, vertical product differentiation |
| JEL: | D72 D8 H0 L1 |
| Date: | 2017–12 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:iza:izadps:dp11207&r=cdm |