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on Collective Decision-Making |
| By: | Dan M. Bernhardt; Laurent Bouton; Stefan Krasa; Francesco Squintani |
| Abstract: | We propose a model of costly voting in a canonical spatial setting that reconciles key empirical features of electoral turnout. We integrate citizens with prosocial voting motives who realize higher payoffs from voting when (i) they expect more fellow supporters to vote, (ii) such votes collectively matter more for winning probabilities, and (iii) they care more about which candidate wins. We establish existence of Nash equilibria satisfying an additional condition that ensures equilibria correspond to those in a finite setting with many voters. We derive how electoral primitives—e.g., voter ideology, voting costs, elite polarization, expected closeness—affect outcomes such as turnout, turnout rates, and winning margins. We relate the predictions to empirical findings both from existing studies and our original data work. With all three prosocial motive components, our model reconciles the empirical regularities qualitatively and quantitatively; while existing models fail on multiple dimensions. |
| JEL: | D7 P0 |
| Date: | 2026–09 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:35723 |
| By: | Cécile Couharde; Rémi Generoso; Michaël Guillossou |
| Abstract: | This paper examines whether climate shocks are associated with electoral behavior beyond the counties in which they occur. The analysis covers 3, 069 counties in the contiguous United States across five presidential elections from 2008 to 2024. County-level election returns are combined with pre-election drought measured using the Palmer Z Index and with network exposure constructed from estimated county-to-county food flows in 2007. A model in which voters interpret drought through pre-existing partisan preferences predicts that the electoral association of drought becomes more favorable to the Democratic candidate as a county's historical Democratic vote share increases. The estimates are consistent with this prediction. Local drought is associated with lower Democratic two-party vote shares in historically Republican counties and higher shares in historically Democratic counties. Network drought exhibits the same sign-changing pattern, including where measured local drought is absent. The estimated relationships cross zero at historical Democratic vote shares of about 0.40 for local drought and 0.44 for network exposure. Directional exposure through suppliers versus buyers adds little explanatory power conditional on total network exposure. The network relationship is comparatively stable across alternative specifications. Turnout and party-vote results suggest that the pattern reflects changes in party-specific electoral support rather than a common change in aggregate participation across counties. |
| Keywords: | drought; food-flow networks; partisan heterogeneity; U.S. presidential elections |
| JEL: | Q54 D72 Q13 L14 R15 |
| Date: | 2026 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:drm:wpaper:2026-21 |
| By: | Ottone, Nicholas |
| Abstract: | A long line of research has shown that door-to-door canvassing is a potent campaign tactic for increasing turnout and, in some cases, vote share. More recent work has theorized, however, that canvassing effects are largest in low-salience elections without party cues and concentrated among occasional voters canvassed closer to Election Day. In this research note, I test these theoretical expectations by examining the effect of canvassing in a February local election in Seattle for a housing-related ballot measure. Using a novel geo-coded dataset of seventy doorknocking campaigns over three months, I find that voters more proximate to canvassing operations were more likely to vote and that proximate precincts had a slightly higher vote share for the targeted ballot measure. Moreover, consistent with recent theorizing, I find that turnout effects were concentrated among targeted Democrats canvassed soon before the election. |
| Date: | 2026–08–22 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:osf:socarx:u47s3_v1 |
| By: | Elliott Johnson (Northumbria University [Newcastle]); Graham Stark (Northumbria University [Newcastle]); Anna Thew (Northumbria University [Newcastle]); Claire Hart (Northumbria University [Newcastle]); Kathryn Mcewan (Northumbria University [Newcastle]); Howard Reed (Northumbria University [Newcastle]); Matthew Johnson (Northumbria University [Newcastle]); Daniel Nettle (IJN - Institut Jean-Nicod - DEC - Département d'Etudes Cognitives - ENS-PSL - ENS-PSL - École normale supérieure - Paris - PSL - Université Paris Sciences et Lettres - EHESS - École des hautes études en sciences sociales - CdF (institution) - Collège de France - CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique - Département de Philosophie - ENS-PSL - ENS-PSL - École normale supérieure - Paris - PSL - Université Paris Sciences et Lettres, Northumbria University [Newcastle]) |
| Abstract: | Material insecurity predicts support for right-wing populist parties, leading some to conclude that ambitious progressive policy programmes are electorally unviable in contexts of widespread economic anxiety. Yet an alternative scholarly tradition holds that material insecurity should increase, not decrease, demand for redistribution and social insurance, which are at the core of progressive policy offers. This article makes two contributions. First, we present a single-item measure of subjective material insecurity, perceived risk of destitution, that is suitable for cross-sectional surveys. Second, drawing on a survey of 1, 988 UK adults conducted in January 2024, we test whether perceived risk of destitution predicts support for an unambiguously progressive policy programme across ten domestic policy areas, presented without party label. Perceived risk of destitution is robustly positively associated with support for the programme, even after controlling for sociodemographic characteristics, prior voting behaviour and left–right self-placement. At the same time, it is negatively associated with faith in government, which partially suppresses the positive direct association with programme support. The findings are consistent both with the redistribution literature on welfare-state preferences, and with the populism literature on the political consequences of economic risk: material insecurity raises the demand for redistributive and progressive policies, but also the resonance of arguments for disrupting the current political class. |
| Keywords: | material insecurity, redistribution, policy preferences, populism, UK politics |
| Date: | 2026 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hal:journl:hal-05735950 |