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on Positive Political Economics |
| By: | Crozet, Matthieu; Hinz, Julian |
| Abstract: | Sanctions are meant to coerce political adversaries through economic measures. However, evidence for their effectiveness is scarce. In this paper we assess the impact of sanctions on a democracy - France - by studying the electoral consequences of the sanctions and countersanctions imposed between Russia and Western countries. Contrary to most of the existing literature we find clear evidence for exposure to the sanctions to cause an increase in the vote share for pro-Russian (and far-right) candidates during the French 2017 presidential election. Locally, the impact on voting is substantial. Back-of-the-envelope calculations indicate that about 16, 300 votes for the main far-right candidate can be directly attributed to the sanctions' impact. This is the total number of votes cast in a medium-sized French city. It is however not nearly enough to have affected the outcome of the election at the national level. |
| Keywords: | Sanctions, Elections, Embargo, Russia, France |
| JEL: | F13 F51 D72 D74 |
| Date: | 2023 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:zbw:ifwkwp:2246&r=pol |
| By: | Schulze, Günther G.; Zakharov, Nikita |
| Abstract: | We analyze media repression in Putin's Russia (2004-2019), a smart dictatorship that mimics democratic institutions, notably relatively free elections, and a relatively free press. Drawing on a unique granular dataset on journalist harassment and the pre-determined, staggered timing of local elections, we find evidence of strong political cycles of media repression. This media repression ahead of elections leads to a more favorable tonality of the news coverage of incumbents. Free press and free elections are temporally decoupled, thus disallowing them to work as effective accountability mechanisms. This secures dictator's power while upholding an image of competence and democratic rule. |
| Keywords: | Authoritarian government, smart dictatorships, media repression, political election cycles, media tonality |
| JEL: | D72 H10 P43 |
| Date: | 2023 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:zbw:bofitp:32023&r=pol |
| By: | Leogrande, Angelo; Costantiello, Alberto |
| Abstract: | In this article we analyze the impact of Labor Force Partecipation Rate-LFPR in the context of the Environmental, Social and Governance-ESG model at world level. We use data from the ESG dataset of the World Bank for the period 2011-2020. We use Panel Data with Fixed Effects, Panel Data with Random Effects, Pooled OLS, Dynamic Panel. We find that the level of LFPR is positively associated among others to “Ratio of Female to Male Labor Force Participation Rate” and “Life Expectancy at Birth”, and negatively associated among others, to “Unemployment” and “Agricultural Land”. Furthermore, we have applied a clusterization with the k-Means algorithm optimized with the Silhouette coefficient, and we found the presence of three clusters. Finally, we confront eight different machine learning algorithms to predict the value of LFPR. We find that the best predictor is the Linear Regression. Linear Regression predicts an increase in LFPR equal to 0.42% on average for the analyzed countries. |
| Keywords: | Analysis of Collective Decision-Making, General, Political Processes: Rent-Seeking, Lobbying, Elections, Legislatures, and Voting Behaviour, Bureaucracy, Administrative Processes in Public Organizations, Corruption, Positive Analysis of Policy Formulation, Implementation. |
| JEL: | D7 D70 D72 D73 D78 |
| Date: | 2023–06–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pra:mprapa:117500&r=pol |
| By: | Andres Reiljan; Lorenzo Cicchi; Diego Garzia |
| Abstract: | the pan-European Voting Advice Application (VAA) EU Profiler/euandi – a project in which Peter Mair had a very crucial role in its early years. We describe the unique standing of the EU Profiler/euandi in the VAA landscape and take an analytical look at the central elements of this tool. We show the project has been innovative in many ways, such as: a) in 2014 and 2019, more than half of the over 200 parties included in the project took part in the self-placement procedure, showing great interest towards the pan-European VAA; b) the EU Profiler/euandi team has managed to apply a common set of issue-statements to the whole EU and find the topics that are both salient (on most statements, more than 80% of the parties have been coded to have a distinguishable position) and polarize between parties (in a large majority of issues, there is a considerable share of parties on both sides of the centrepoint of the scale); c) the party placements on the central dimensions of the political space show high external validity with other prominent methods of party placement. At the same time, we reveal worrisome regional divergences, as the post-communist countries are less likely to co-operate with the VAA in self-placing themselves, have more parties that are left uncoded on many issues, and party positions in this region show less convergence with other methods. Also, when studying issue polarization at the European level, we demonstrate that party positions are often determined rather by the regional than ideological affiliation of the parties, raising some questions about whether and to what extent can we even talk about common EU political space. In the end of the paper, we present the data from the German euandi2021, one of the national stepping stones towards improving the VAA for the 2024 European edition. The paper ends with a retrospective discussion of which hopes and promises from more than a decade ago have/have not materialized. |
| Keywords: | Political parties, expert surveys, manifesto analysis, party placement methods, policy positions, Voting Advice Applications (VAAs), European elections, German elections, Chapel Hill Expert Survey. |
| Date: | 2023–03 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:rsc:rsceui:2023/20&r=pol |
| By: | Pushkar Maitra (Department of Economics, Monash University); Sandip Mitra (Sampling and Official Statistics Unit, Indian Statistical Institute); Dilip Mookherjee (Department of Economics, Boston University); Sujata Visaria (Department of Economics, The Hong Kong University of Science and Technology) |
| Abstract: | As in many other parts of the world, India has witnessed a surge in the popularity of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), a right wing nationalist party. This paper examines the respective roles of economic policy and “identity politics†for the sharp rise in support for BJP in a region where it had a negligible vote share until 2014. Using household level panel data from 3500 rural households in West Bengal, we examine the effect of different welfare benefits delivered by state and national governments, on support for the regional incumbent (Trinamool Congress (TMC)) and the BJP after 2014. We find that receipt of these benefits was associated with increased support for the respective party controlling either level of government. However, changes in scale, effectiveness, composition or targeting of these benefits cannot account for the large observed increase in the relative popularity of the BJP. We also find no evidence of any association with post-2014 economic distress of the household, or political violence attributed to TMC party activists in the 2018 local government elections. On the other hand, religion, tribal and immigrant status of households are strong and robust predictors of changes in political support, irrespective of controls for welfare benefits and household incomes. Hence the results indicate that the BJP’s rise in West Bengal reflected the growing importance of identity politics per se, rather than economic policies. |
| Keywords: | clientelism, identitypolitics, rightwingnationalism, WestBengal, federalism |
| JEL: | H31 H42 H75 P16 |
| Date: | 2023–06 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hke:wpaper:wp2023-01&r=pol |
| By: | Pushkar Maitra (Department of Economics, Monash University); Sandip Mitra (Sampling and Official Statistics Unit, Indian Statistical Institute, Kolkata); Dilip Mookherjee (Department of Economics, Boston University, Boston); Sujata Visaria (Department of Economics, Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, Clear Water Bay, Hong Kong) |
| Abstract: | As in many other parts of the world, India has witnessed a surge in the popularity of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), a right wing nationalist party. This paper examines the respective roles of economic policy and "identity politics" for the sharp rise in support for BJP in a region where it had a negligible vote share until 2014. Using household level panel data from 3500 rural households in West Bengal, we examine the effect of different welfare benefits delivered by state and national governments, on support for the regional incumbent (Trinamool Congress) and the BJP after 2014. We find that receipt of these benefits was associated with increased support for the party that controlled the level of government responsible for the program. However, changes in scale, effectiveness, composition or targeting of these benefits cannot account for the large observed increase in the relative popularity of the BJP. We also find no evidence of any association with post-2014 economic distress of the household, or political violence attributed to TMC party activists in the 2018 local government elections. On the other hand, religion, tribal and immigrant status of households predict changes in political support, whether or not we control for welfare benefits and household incomes. Hence the results indicate that the BJP's rise in West Bengal reflected the growing importance of identity politics per se, rather than economic policies. |
| Keywords: | clientelism, identity politics, rightwing nationalism, West Bengal, federalism |
| JEL: | H31 H42 H75 P16 |
| Date: | 2023–06 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:mos:moswps:2023-12&r=pol |
| By: | Gold, Robert; Hinz, Julian; Valsecchi, Michele |
| Abstract: | Do economic sanctions affect internal support of sanctioned countries' governments? To answer this question, we focus on the sanctions imposed on Russia in 2014 and identify their effect on voting behavior in both presidential and parliamentary elections. On the economic side, the sanctions significantly hurt Russia's foreign trade - with regional-level variation. We use trade losses caused by the sanctions as measure for regional sanction exposure. For identification, we rely on a structural gravity model that allows us to compare observed trade flows to counterfactual flows in the absence of sanctions. Difference-in-differences estimations reveal that regime support significantly increases in response to the sanctions, at the expense of voting support of Communist parties. For the average Russian district, sanction exposure increases the vote share gained by president Putin and his party by 13 percent. Event studies and placebo estimations confirm the validity of our results. |
| Keywords: | Economic sanctions, voting behavior, gravity estimation, rally-around-the-flag |
| JEL: | F12 F14 F15 |
| Date: | 2023 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:zbw:ifwkwp:2212&r=pol |
| By: | Despina Gavresi (University of Ioannina); Anastasia Litina (University of Macedonia); Georgios Tsiachtsiras (AQR-IREA University of Barcelona and University of Bath) |
| Abstract: | This paper explores the interplay between the extent of transportation infrastructure and various aspects of trust (interpersonal and political trust). We test our hypothesis by exploiting cross regional variation during the period 2002-2019. We focus on two measures of infrastructure, i.e., the length of railroads and railways in European regions. Interpersonal and political trust variables are derived from individual level data available in nine consecutive rounds of the European Social Survey. We document that individuals who live in regions with extended infrastructure network manifest higher trust both in people and political institutions. To mitigate endogeneity concerns, we extend our analysis to a sample of international and inter-regional immigrants. We further adopt an IV approach, where we use as an instrument the pre-existing Roman roads networks. The results from all three specifications are aligned to those of the benchmark analysis. We explore access to differential levels of trust as one of the underlying mechanisms behind our results. Relying on an expanding literature we hypothesize that the effect of infrastructure on trust operates directly via the degree of exposure to new people and ideas, as well as indirectly, via the effect of infrastructure on the structure of the economy. |
| Keywords: | Motorways, Railroads, Political trust, Interpersonal trust JEL classification: Z10, P48, R10, R40. |
| Date: | 2022–10 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:aqr:wpaper:202208&r=pol |
| By: | Arthur Silve; Thierry Verdier; Thierry Verdier |
| Abstract: | We introduce a dynamic model that investigates the persistence and evolution of elite-dominated societies, where inherited political capital determines one’s social standing. Our analysis highlights the critical role of the distribution of exit options in the evolution of political inclusiveness across generations. An elite comparatively more mobile than the masses generally entrenches a politically stratified society, whereas a more widespread distribution of exit options can encourage inclusiveness. Under certain conditions differential mobility may still induce political inclusiveness across generations. Exit options across different political entities lead to a joint evolution of local power structures. |
| Keywords: | political dynasties, elite dynamics, exit options, rent-seeking, political spillovers |
| JEL: | D72 F42 H26 P16 P48 |
| Date: | 2023 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ces:ceswps:_10410&r=pol |
| By: | Lundin, Erik (Research Institute of Industrial Economics (IFN)) |
| Abstract: | Green parties are commonly seen as strong proponents of wind power. This paper presents an alternative view, examining data from the highly decentralized institutional setup in Sweden where approval of wind power applications is delegated to local governments. I demonstrate that the approval rate of land based wind power drops by 11 percentage points (from 49 % to 38 %) in municipalities where the Greens are in the ruling coalition, conditional on the share of Green seats in the local council. The association is identified using a twoway fixed-effects logit model with panel data on electoral outcomes from six election terms (2000-2020) in 290 municipalities, combined with detailed data on every application for wind power in Sweden. No statistically significant effect is found for any other of the main parties. A likely mechanism is that even if the Greens have relatively stronger preferences for climate policy than other parties, they are also relatively more concerned about local environmental disamenities caused by wind power. Since decision making is decentralized, local environmental concerns dominate preferences for climate policy, which should be especially pertinent in small municipalities. In line with this argument, I also show that the effect is inversely correlated with municipality population size. |
| Keywords: | Wind power; Decentralization; Negative externalities; Electricity market; Energy transition; Climate policy; Elections; Nimbyism; Green Party |
| JEL: | D62 D72 H73 P18 Q48 |
| Date: | 2023–05–29 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hhs:iuiwop:1464&r=pol |
| By: | Valérie Mignon; Jamel Saadaoui |
| Abstract: | This paper assesses the effect of US-China political relationships and geopolitical risks on oil prices. To this end, we consider two quantitative measures — the Political Relationship Index and the Geopolitical Risk Index — and rely on structural VAR and local projections methodologies. Our findings show that improved US-China relationships, as well as higher geopolitical risks, drive up the price of oil. Positive shocks on the political relationship index are associated with optimistic expectations regarding economic activity, whereas positive shocks on the geopolitical risk index reflect fears of supply disruption. Political tensions and geopolitical risks are thus complementary factors, the former being linked to the demand side and the latter to the supply side. |
| Keywords: | Oil prices, political relationships, geopolitical risk, China. |
| JEL: | Q4 F51 C32 |
| Date: | 2023 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ulp:sbbeta:2023-15&r=pol |