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on Positive Political Economics |
| By: | Chad W. Kendall |
| Abstract: | I study how political parties affect representation in the U.S. House. To do so, I account for party pressure on the votes of members in an otherwise standard spatial model that uses roll call voting patterns to identify member ideologies. I simultaneously estimate voter ideologies from survey responses, leveraging their responses on issues before Congress to bridge voters and members into the same ideological space. I find that, relative to a model without party pressure, member ideologies and those of their constituents are much more closely aligned. The results imply that, in terms of actual votes, parties drive a wedge between members and those they represent. I provide evidence that parties do so strategically, balancing the need for legislative wins and the electoral concerns of their members. |
| JEL: | D72 P0 |
| Date: | 2026–01 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:34697 |
| By: | Nathan Goldstein (Bar-Ilan University); David Lagziel (BGU); Ohad Raveh (Hebrew University of Jerusalem) |
| Keywords: | Political rational inattention, political expectations, polarization |
| JEL: | D72 P00 |
| Date: | 2025 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:bgu:wpaper:2511 |
| By: | Cáceres Delpiano, Julio; Pinto Machado, Matilde |
| Abstract: | Recent research shows that municipal councilors direct resources and amenities toward the areas surrounding their own residences. This finding underscores the importance of residential diversification within councils, particularly in developing countries where inequalities betweenneighborhoods in the same municipality are especially pronounced. Yet evidence indicates that politicians frequently reside close to one another, which may lead to spatially concentrated representation in municipal councils. This observation raises a key question: what drives the geographicconcentration of politicians? If the election of one resident motivates others from the same neighborhood to run for office, the result may be a council that systematically under-represents other areas. The political process would unintentionally perpetuate, rather than alleviate, spatial inequalities within municipalities. Using precise data on the residences of municipal election candidates in Chile, we estimate the causal effect of electing a candidate on the emergence of future candidacies within a very narrow radius (300 meters) of their home. Applying a regression discontinuity design, we compare neighborhoods where a resident candidate was narrowly elected with those where a resident candidate narrowly lost by a similarly small margin. Our results indicate that the election of a neighbor prompts the emergence of (new) candidacies in the neighborhood. We discuss at least three mechanisms underlying these candidacies. Importantly, our results indicate persistence in the geographic composition of the council, driven primarily by the re-electionof incumbents. This incumbent advantage, however, is conditional on the councilor being pivotal or not aligned with the mayor. |
| Keywords: | Local effects of politicians; Inequality within jurisdictions; Selection of local candidates; Effects of local governments; Municipal elections; Municipal councils |
| JEL: | I28 H75 D72 |
| Date: | 2026–01–29 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cte:werepe:49114 |
| By: | Julia Cagé (ECON - Département d'économie (Sciences Po) - Sciences Po - Sciences Po - CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, CEPR - Center for Economic Policy Research); Caroline Le Pennec (HEC Montréal - HEC Montréal); Elisa Mougin (ENS de Lyon - École normale supérieure de Lyon - Université de Lyon, CERGIC - Center for Economic Research on Governance, Inequality and Conflict - ENS de Lyon - École normale supérieure de Lyon - Université de Lyon, LIEPP - Laboratoire interdisciplinaire d'évaluation des politiques publiques (Sciences Po) - Sciences Po - Sciences Po) |
| Abstract: | We study France's 1995 ban on firm donations to politicians. We use a difference-in-differences approach and a novel dataset combining the campaign manifestos issued by candidates running in French parliamentary elections with data on their campaign contributions. We show that banning firm donations discourages candidates from advertising their local presence during the campaign, as well as economic issues. The ban also leads candidates from nonmainstream parties to use more extreme language. This suggests that private donors shape politicians' topics of interest, and that campaign finance reforms may affect the information made available to voters through their impact on candidates' rhetoric. |
| Keywords: | Campaign manifestos, Political rhetoric, Text analysis, Corporate donations, Campaign finance, Elections |
| Date: | 2024–08–01 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hal:journl:hal-05446535 |
| By: | David Lagziel (BGU); Ohad Raveh (Hebrew University of Jerusalem); Yan Zhang (School of Economics, the Institute of Ecological Civilization, Zhongnan University of Economics and Law, China) |
| Keywords: | Campaign contributions, political sabotage, negative campaigns, contests |
| JEL: | D72 P00 |
| Date: | 2025 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:bgu:wpaper:2512 |
| By: | Restrepo, Carlos Lleras |
| Keywords: | Political Economy |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ags:cladsp:262861 |
| By: | Ignacio Lago (Universitat Pompeu Fabra, Department of Political and Social Sciences, Barcelona, Spain); Andre Blais (Universite de Montreal, Departement de science politique, Canada) |
| Abstract: | This paper examines how asymmetric regional decentralization affects the politics of public goods provision. While global decentralization has increased since World War II, the political consequences of growing asymmetry in the distribution of authority across regions within states remain understudied. Using survey data from Belgium, Canada, Germany, and Spain, as well as panel data from 709 legislative elections in 73 democracies (1960Ð2018), the study explores how centralized, symmetric, and asymmetric territorial arrangements influence electoral accountability and party nationalization. We show that asymmetric decentralization decreases electoral accountability in national elections but increases it in regional elections. Moreover, it contributes to greater territorial heterogeneity in partisan support within countries. |
| Date: | 2026–01 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ays:ispwps:paper2602 |
| By: | Stutz, Hazel; Sicard, Francois |
| Abstract: | This working paper uses the Crown Dependency of Jersey as a case study to investigate young people's attitudes towards voting. Drawing on assemblage theory as a conceptual lens, we examine how interrelated aspects of young people's voting experiences shape engagement. Assemblage mapping is used to synthesise insights from focus groups with participants aged 18 to 24, identifying diverse yet related dimensions, including voting awareness, political exposure, social influence, social media dynamics, and confidence in the act of voting. Confirmatory Factor Analysis is then used to empirically validate these dimensions, operationalised as latent categories. We examine the sequence of awareness-building, political exposure, and social mediation using structural equation modelling, revealing how different configurations of these factors influence young people's perceptions of the importance of voting and their sense of confidence. Our findings show that pathways in which political exposure precedes awareness differ markedly from those in which awareness develops without sufficient exposure or social support. We further show that social media engagement plays a key role, either encouraging or limiting participation depending on how it is positioned within the structural model. Our work highlights that low youth turnout reflects a complex disconnection influenced by both personal relationships and institutional factors, with implications for interventions designed to foster meaningful engagement among young voters. |
| Date: | 2026–01–03 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:osf:socarx:8x6nh_v1 |
| By: | Wesley H. Holliday |
| Abstract: | We prove that there is no preferential voting method satisfying the Condorcet winner and loser criteria, positive involvement (if a candidate $x$ wins in an initial preference profile, then adding a voter who ranks $x$ uniquely first cannot cause $x$ to lose), and resolvability (if $x$ initially ties for winning, then $x$ can be made the unique winner by adding a single voter). In a previous note, we proved an analogous result assuming an additional axiom of ordinal margin invariance, which we now show is unnecessary for an impossibility theorem, at least if the desired voting method is defined for five-candidate elections. |
| Date: | 2026–01 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:arx:papers:2601.10506 |
| By: | Julia Cagé (ECON - Département d'économie (Sciences Po) - Sciences Po - Sciences Po - CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, CEPR - Center for Economic Policy Research) |
| Abstract: | Inequality in political participation and influence has strongly increased in recent decades, breeding economic inequality. In this review, we focus on three aspects of political inequality: the increasing concentration of both political and charitable donations, the growing gap in descriptive representation, and the persistent lack of substantive representation. Based on the existing literature as well as on novel evidence, we relate these aspects to the recent widening of turnout inequality. We then examine novel forms of participation—e.g., the rise of small donors in the United States—and the efficiency of policies aimed at improving representation. Finally, we discuss new avenues for research. |
| Keywords: | Political donations, Descriptive representation, Substantive representation, Representative democracies, Campaign finance, Turnout, Charitable giving, Economic inequality, Political inequality |
| Date: | 2024–08–22 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hal:journl:hal-05446439 |
| By: | Michelle Blom; Alexander Ek; Peter J. Stuckey; Vanessa J. Teague; Damjan Vukcevic |
| Abstract: | Constructing efficient risk-limiting audits (RLAs) for multiwinner single transferable vote (STV) elections is a challenging problem. An STV RLA is designed to statistically verify that the reported winners of an election did indeed win according to the voters' expressed preferences and not due to mistabulation or interference, while limiting the risk of accepting an incorrect outcome to a desired threshold (the risk limit). Existing methods have shown that it is possible to form RLAs for two-seat STV elections in the context where the first seat has been awarded to a candidate in the first round of tabulation. This is called the first winner criterion. We present an assertion-based approach to conducting full or partial RLAs for STV elections with three or more seats, in which the first winner criterion is satisfied. Although the chance of forming a full audit that verifies all winners drops substantially as the number of seats increases, we show that we can quite often form partial audits that verify most, and sometimes all, of the reported winners. We evaluate our method on a dataset of over 500 three- and four-seat STV elections from the 2017 and 2022 local council elections in Scotland. |
| Date: | 2025 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:msh:ebswps:2025-5 |
| By: | Marco Alfano; Margaux Clarr; Jaime Marques Pereira; Jean-Francois Maystadt |
| Abstract: | US drone strikes are popular with the electorate and overseen by the President. This paper investigates whether the US President uses drone strikes strategically for political gain. We document that US drone strikes in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Somalia, and Yemen are significantly more likely before US elections, when popularity has high payoffs. We find no changes for unpopular, piloted airstrikes. Consistent with unusually high drone approvals, abnormally cloudy skies before US elections lead to a postponement or redirection of strikes to other target countries. To examine whether drone strikes are used strategically to divert attention from damaging media coverage, we gather closed captions from all cable TV coverage of the President and analyze their tone using natural language processing. Drone strikes are more likely in weeks when news anchors cover the President more negatively, a relation that holds both during and outside of election periods. We find no such relationship for piloted airstrikes or during weeks of high news pressure. |
| Keywords: | drone strikes, strategic timing, conflict, political economy |
| Date: | 2025 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:lan:wpaper:425186808 |
| By: | Hodaya Barr; Eden Hartman; Yonatan Aumann; Sarit Kraus |
| Abstract: | Strategic manipulation of elections is typically studied in the context of promoting individual candidates. In parliamentary elections, however, the focus shifts: voters may care more about the overall governing coalition than the individual parties' seat counts. This paper studies this new problem: manipulating parliamentary elections with the goal of promoting the collective seat count of a coalition of parties. We focus on proportional representation elections, and consider two variants of the problem; one in which the sole goal is to maximize the total number of seats held by the desired coalition, and the other with a dual objective of both promoting the coalition and promoting the relative power of some favorite party within the coalition. We examine two types of strategic manipulations: \emph{bribery}, which allows modifying voters' preferences, and \emph{control}, which allows changing the sets of voters and parties. We consider multiple bribery types, presenting polynomial-time algorithms for some, while proving NP-hardness for others. For control, we provide polynomial-time algorithms for control by adding and deleting voters. In contrast, control by adding and deleting parties, we show, is either impossible (i.e., the problem is immune to control) or computationally hard, in particular, W[1]-hard when parameterized by the number of parties that can be added or deleted. |
| Date: | 2026–01 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:arx:papers:2601.07279 |
| By: | David Lagziel (BGU); Ehud Lehrer (Durham University); Tao Wang (International School of Economics and Management, Capital University of Economics and Business, Beijing) |
| Keywords: | Campaign contributions, political sabotage, negative campaigns, contests |
| JEL: | D72 P00 |
| Date: | 2025 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:bgu:wpaper:2513 |
| By: | Gavin Wang; Srinaath Anbudurai; Oliver Sun; Xitong Li; Lynn Wu |
| Abstract: | The emergence of large language models (LLMs) is reshaping how people engage in political discourse online. We examine how the release of ChatGPT altered ideological and emotional patterns in the largest political forum on Reddit. Analysis of millions of comments shows that ChatGPT intensified ideological polarization: liberals became more liberal, and conservatives more conservative. This shift does not stem from the creation of more persuasive or ideologically extreme original content using ChatGPT. Instead, it originates from the tendency of ChatGPT-generated comments to echo and reinforce the viewpoint of original posts, a pattern consistent with algorithmic sycophancy. Yet, despite growing ideological divides, affective polarization, measured by hostility and toxicity, declined. These findings reveal that LLMs can simultaneously deepen ideological separation and foster more civil exchanges, challenging the long-standing assumption that extremity and incivility necessarily move together. |
| Date: | 2026–01 |
| URL: | https://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:arx:papers:2601.20238 |