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on Collective Decision-Making |
| By: | Enriqueta Aragonès; Clara Ponsatí |
| Abstract: | We propose a two party electoral competition model to analyze the effects of an exogenous shock over voters’ preferences on the strategic policy choices of the parties. We find that if the shock affects voters’ ideology regarding an issue that is already salient, then both parties strategically adapt their already moderated policy choices in the direction of the new median voter. However, if the shock changes the relative issue salience, then both parties strategically shift their policy choices from their ideal points towards the ideal point of the median voter of the newly salient issue. The asymmetry of the distribution of the voters preferences, that is possibly intensified by the shock, produces a disadvantage for one of the parties, which is forced to implement a large policy shift. We argue that a large policy shift may break a party internal balance among its different factions, which in turn may produce important disruptions in the party system. We illustrate our arguments with an analysis of recent events in Catalonia and the UK. |
| Keywords: | preference shock, relative salience, party consistency |
| JEL: | D72 |
| Date: | 2019–09 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:bge:wpaper:1118&r=all |
| By: | Michela, Cella; Elena, Manzoni |
| Abstract: | We model voters' gender bias as a prejudice on women's competence coming from a distorted prior. We analyse the effect of this bias in a two-period two-party election in which voters care about both ideology and competence. We find that female politicians are less likely to win office but, when elected have higher competence on average. As a consequence, they choose to seek re-election more often. We also show that if parties endogenously select candidates, the effect of gender bias is stronger, in that we observe fewer female candidates and elected politicians, and of higher competence. This holds even when parties are not biased. |
| Keywords: | gender bias, elections, female politicians. |
| JEL: | D72 D91 J16 |
| Date: | 2019–06 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:mib:wpaper:414&r=all |
| By: | Mario, Gilli; Elena, Manzoni; |
| Abstract: | The aim of this paper is to investigate the links between lack of trust in ruling politicians and the functioning of a representative democracy. Within a standard principal-agent model of democracy, we show how lack of trust by citizens as reflected by passive beliefs updating may lead to the malfunctioning of representative democracy. We highlight how de facto accountability crucially depends on out-of-equilibrium beliefs, and that this is indeed descriptive of a substantive feature of public opinion that affects the functioning of democracy. Specifically, we show that effective accountability needs more than simple retrospective voting, as it requires voters to believe in the existence of good politicians that always choose according to voters’ interests, so that a deviation from bad policies can happen only because the leader is congruent. In this case, the unique equilibrium is an efficient one that maximizes voters’ welfare. However, if, on the other hand, the citizens share an overall lack of trust in ruling elites, then there is another inefficient equilibrium, where even the congruent politician behaves badly because of the adverse but rational voters’ behavior. This inefficient equilibrium does not depend on fake news or on distorted beliefs or, again, on voters’ heterogeneous preferences, since the voters' perfectly observe the quality of the policy implemented by the government, are fully rational and share the same interests. This result might contribute to explain the increasing negative perceptions on the working of democracy as due to a self-fulfilling equilibrium. |
| Keywords: | Government Performance, Democracy, Representation, Out-of-equilibrium Beliefs. |
| JEL: | H11 D72 D78 |
| Date: | 2019–08 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:mib:wpaper:417&r=all |
| By: | Mikhail Freer; César Martinelli; Siyu Wang |
| Abstract: | We develop a simple model of collective experimentation and take it to the lab. In equilibrium, as in the recent work of Strulovici (2010), majority rule has a bias toward under experimentation, as good news for a minority of voters may lead a majority of voters to abandon a policy when each of them thinks it is likely that the policy will be passed by a future majority excluding them. We compare the behavior in the lab of groups under majority rule and under the optimal voting rule, which precludes voting in intermediate stages of the policy experiment. Surprisingly, simple majority performs better than the (theoretically) optimal voting rule. Majority rule seems to be more robust than other forms of voting when players make mistakes. |
| Date: | 2018–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ete:ceswps:611941&r=all |
| By: | Christopher Blattman; Horacio Larreguy; Benjamin Marx; Otis R. Reid |
| Abstract: | We estimate the effects of one of the largest anti-vote-buying campaigns ever studied — with half a million voters exposed across 1427 villages—in Uganda’s 2016 elections. Working with civil society organizations, we designed the study to estimate how voters and candidates responded to their campaign in treatment and spillover villages, and how impacts varied with campaign intensity. Despite its heavy footprint, the campaign did not reduce politician offers of gifts in exchange for votes. However, it had sizable effects on people’s votes. Votes swung from well-funded incumbents (who buy most votes) towards their poorly-financed challengers. We argue the swing arose from changes in village social norms plus the tactical response of candidates. While the campaign struggled to instill norms of refusing gifts, it leveled the electoral playing field by convincing some voters to abandon norms of reciprocity—thus accepting gifts from politicians but voting for their preferred candidate. |
| JEL: | C93 D72 O55 |
| Date: | 2019–09 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:26293&r=all |
| By: | Blattman, Christopher; Emeriau, Mathilde; Fiala, Nathan |
| Abstract: | High-impact policies may not lead to support for the political party that introduces them. In 2008, Uganda's government encouraged groups of youth to submit proposals to start enterprises. Of 535 eligible groups, a random 265 received grants of nearly $400 per person. Prior work showed that after four years, the Youth Opportunities Program raised employment by 17% and earnings by 38%. Here we show that recipients were no more likely to support the ruling party in elections. Rather, recipients slightly increased campaigning and voting for the opposition. Potential mechanisms include program misattribution, group socialization, and financial independence freeing voters from transactional voting. |
| JEL: | N0 |
| Date: | 2018–12–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ehl:lserod:101663&r=all |
| By: | Lian Xue (Wuhan University); Stefania Sitzia (University of East Anglia); Theodore L. Turocy (University of East Anglia) |
| Abstract: | We use experimental methods to test the effects of joint endowment on coordination success in tacit bargaining games. It has been well established that people use existing focal points to facilitate coordination and the power of such cues declines as payoff becomes increasingly unequal. We conducted an experiment in which two players jointly engaged in an interactive team building activity and together earned the stakes over which they bargain. In the team building exercise, two players jointly complete a shortest route task in a metaphor of a treasure hunt. After the two treasure hunters complete the journey, they independently decide how to divide their rewards using a tacit bargaining table. We find that when participants bargain over the fruits that result from joint activity, they are more likely to coordinate the focal point equilibrium. |
| Keywords: | Team building; Joint production; Group identity; Tacit bargaining; Focal point |
| JEL: | C72 C91 C92 |
| Date: | 2017–11–27 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:uea:wcbess:17-12&r=all |
| By: | Felix Bierbrauer (University of Cologne); Aleh Tsyvinski (Yale University); Nicolas WERQUIN (Toulouse School of Economics) |
| Abstract: | We develop a model of political competition with endogenous turnout and endogenous platforms. Parties face a trade-off between maximizing their base and getting their supporters out to vote. We study the implications of this framework for non-linear income taxation. In equilibrium, both parties propose the same tax policy. This equilibrium policy is a weighted combination of two terms, one reflecting the parties' payoff from mobilizing their own supporters, one reflecting the payoff from demobilizing the supporters of the other party. The key determinant of the equilibrium policy is the distribution of the voters' party attachments rather than their propensity to swing vote. Our analysis also provides a novel explanation for why even left-leaning parties may not propose high taxes on the rich. |
| Date: | 2019 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:red:sed019:377&r=all |
| By: | Bijl, A.; Ahaus, K.; Gemmel, P.; Meijboom, B. (Tilburg University, School of Economics and Management) |
| Abstract: | Objectives:To investigate the relationship between lean adoption and problem-solving behaviour in nursing teams, and to explore the practices of lean leaders on nursing wards to reveal how they can stimulate second-order problem-solving within their teams.Design:A mixed-methods retrospective multiple case study using semistructured interviews. Interview data were used to assess the level of lean maturity (based on a customised validated instrument) and the level of second-order problem-solving (based on scenarios). Within-case and cross-case analyses were employed to identify lean leadership practices.Setting:14 nursing teams, with different levels of lean maturity, in a Dutch hospital.Participants:Three members of each nursing team were interviewed: the team leader, one nurse from the ward's core team for the lean-based quality improvement programme and one nurse outside the core team.Interventions:The nursing teams were in various phases of a lean-based quality improvement programme: 'The Productive Ward - Releasing Time to Care'.Results:A strongly significant positive relationship between lean maturity and second-order problem-solving was found: β=0.68, R2=0.46, p<0.001. Further, the results indicated a potential strengthening effect of lean leadership on this relationship. Seven lean leadership practices emerged from the data collected in a nursing ward setting: (1) convincing and setting an example; (2) unlocking individual and team potential; (3) solving problems systematically; (4) enthusing, actively participating and visualising; (5) developing self-managing teams; (6) sensing, as orchestrator, what is needed for change; and (7) listening, sharing information and appreciating. These practices have a strong link with transformational leadership.Conclusions:As lean matures, nursing teams reach a higher level of second-order problem-solving. In later stages, lean leaders increasingly relinquish responsibility by developing self-managing teams. |
| Date: | 2019 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:tiu:tiutis:48ee5300-bc25-437a-b446-564492014fc3&r=all |
| By: | Molinder, Jakob (Department of Economic History, Uppsala University); Karlsson, Tobias (Department of Economic History, Lund University); Enflo, Kerstin (Department of Economic History, Lund University) |
| Abstract: | This paper revisits the Power Resource Theory (PRT) by testing one of its more influential claims: the relation between the strength of the labor movement and the reduction of industrial conflicts. Using panel data techniques to analyze more than 2,000 strikes in 103 Swedish towns we test whether a shift in the balance of power towards Social Democratic rule was associated with fewer strikes. The focus is on the formative years between the first general election in 1919 and 1938, when Sweden went from a country of fierce labor conflicts to a state of industrial peace. We find that Social Democratic power reduced strikes, but only in towns where union presence was strong. We do not see any tangible concessions in terms of increased social spending by local governments after a left-wing victory as predicted by PRT. Instead the mechanism leading to fewer strikes appears to be related to corporatist explanations. |
| Keywords: | Power Resource Theory; industrial conflicts; strikes; labor markets; local politics |
| JEL: | H53 J51 N34 N44 |
| Date: | 2019–09–25 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hhs:luekhi:0207&r=all |