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on Positive Political Economics |
| By: | Daniel Berkowitz |
| Abstract: | We contend that political institutions require a high level of bureaucratic capacity, as measured by the caliber of agency heads, if they are to have their preferred policy outcomes attained. Moreover, their policy objectives can only be realized when unified partisan majorities both delegate authority and constrain its exercise by administrative institutions. Panel evidence from the American states reveals that during times of unified Republican partisan control of state executive and legislative institutions are associated with higher income gains for affluent citizens, but only when bureaucratic capacity is sufficiently high. However, rising bureaucratic capacity at its lower levels only notably reduces incomes for affluent citizens when unified Democratic party governments hold power in the American states. These findings both highlight the critical role that agency leadership exerts for attaining policy outcomes consistent with democratic preferences, and underscore the limits of electoral institutions to shape policy outcomes of their own accord. |
| Date: | 2017–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pit:wpaper:6079&r=pol |
| By: | Menezes, Aline |
| Abstract: | I use the discontinuous allocation of single and dual-ballot rules across mayoral elections in Brazil to compare politicians fielded and elected in these systems. Dual-ballot candidates in general are not statistically different from their single-ballot counterparts in terms of age, education and occupational skill. Parties field female candidates at the same rate in both systems, but dual-ballot elections have less women in the top two and three positions, on average. These candidates raise and spend, on average, the same amount of resources in the electoral campaign and the rate at which they win and/or run for reelection is also similar. Interestingly, the only difference in performance found between the two types of mayors is in the attraction of discretionary transfers, which is larger in dual-ballot municipalities, but only in election years when mayors are eligible for reelection. Taken together, these results indicate that the experience demanded from candidates in major parties entering dual-ballot elections may translate into unobserved political skills that are required to deal with the electoral process in dual-ballot. That, by itself, punishes female candidates to the extent to which women's participation in politics has been historically low. |
| Keywords: | electoral rules, candidacy, regression discontinuity design |
| JEL: | D72 P16 |
| Date: | 2017 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:79370&r=pol |
| By: | Davis, Brent |
| Abstract: | Negative political advertising is a common feature of election campaigns in liberal democracies, whether in the milder form of ‘contrast ads’ or the more aggressive form of ‘attack ads’. Despite a substantial volume of scholarship, whether such advertisements generate persuasion effects (persuading voters of the deficiencies in the subject of the ads) or backlash effects (diminishing the standing of the candidate/party promulgating the ads) remains a still-unresolved question. This ‘persuasion or backlash’ question may well reflect the implicit assumption in many of the research designs, and their associated (and consequently mis-specified) models: that causality runs from negative political advertising to vote intention. This article tests that assumption, and finds it wanting. Testing for endogeneity indicates a bi-directional causality between negative political advertising and vote intention; each causes the other, but with differential temporal profiles. For electoral scholars (and campaign strategists) this means the decision(s) to engage in negative political advertising is not just if, by whom or how, but also when. |
| Keywords: | election campaigns; political advertising; voter behavior; politico-econometric modelling; endogeneity; election forecasting |
| JEL: | C53 C54 D72 |
| Date: | 2017–05–30 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:79449&r=pol |
| By: | Daniel Cardona (Universitat de les Illes Balears); Antoni Rubí-Barceló (Universitat de les Illes Balears) |
| Abstract: | This paper analyzes the welfare implications of requiring either unanimity or simple majority in negotiations to distribute a budget among agents who previously can invest to generate positive consumption externalities to others. The present paper studies this setting with simple-majority bargaining, complementing Cardona and Rubí-Barceló (2014), that consider the unanimity case. It is shown that reducing the majority requirement reduces the profitability of investments and, as a consequence, alleviates over-investment, which is predominant under unanimous bargaining. Nevertheless, simple majority reduces the aggregate surplus attained at the bargaining stage. Therefore, the relative performance of the bargaining rules is uncertain. We show how it evolves with respect to the size of consumption externalities. |
| Keywords: | Investments, multilateral bargaining, efficiency, externalities |
| JEL: | C78 D72 D62 |
| Date: | 2017 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ubi:deawps:85&r=pol |
| By: | Psofogiorgos, Nikolaos - Alexandros; Metaxas, Theodore |
| Abstract: | IMF was established as a financial institution for the promotion of world trade and international financial stability of members. However, IMF focused on assistance to developing countries and transition economies and as a result seems to have political implications. Many studies suggest that IMF lending programs undermine the quality of democracy in the countries which make use of the institution's resources. This conventional idea is rooted in two basic assumptions: First, when negotiations are made, the doors are closed. Secondly, the IMF programs impose strict limits on political power of borrowers that may result in power distribution consequences. Other studies result in a positive relationship between IMF programs and democracy. Maybe the presence of an IMF loan itself doesn’t affect the democracy, but high loan reforms required have negative impact on democratic practices. This effect depends on the type of reforms that are required by the loan. |
| Keywords: | IMF, democracy, reforms, political implications |
| JEL: | E02 F33 G01 O43 |
| Date: | 2017 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:79403&r=pol |
| By: | Nazeer, Abdul Malik; Masih, Mansur |
| Abstract: | Based on many studies, economic theories and real life experiences, we can understand that political instability has been a harmful factor that would hinder the flow of FDI and the growth of an economy. In our study, we would like to focus on Malaysia, which had its fair share of political instability issues due to the differences and existence of various races. But based on recent studies, it is considered a politically stable economy. Despite everything, Malaysia has been able to achieve consistent economic growth, therefore we believe Malaysia is an interesting country to explore further. This paper aims to analyze the impact of political instability on foreign direct investment and on economic growth of Malaysia. This study employs autoregressive distributed lag (ARDL) approach to cointegration proposed by Pesaran et al. (2001). It is based on a time series data over the period of 30 years ranging from 1984 to 2013. There has been no studies identified yet to our knowledge which has investigated the causal relationships between political instability, FDI and economic growth for Malaysia. Our study aims to fill this gap in literature and would be of great use for the policy makers and key decision makers of the economy. The empirical results reveal that there are both long and short run relationship between political instability, FDI and economic growth in Malaysia, with economic growth being the strongest driver for political instability and FDI. These findings have clear policy implications in that the government of Malaysia can make use of it by targeting the growth in the economy to impact FDI and political instability. |
| Keywords: | political instability, foreign direct investment, economic growth, Malaysia, ARDL |
| JEL: | C58 E44 G15 |
| Date: | 2017–05–12 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:79418&r=pol |