The Prime Minister's mailbag

Abstract. This study is based on examination of a randomly selected sample of 2,150 letters representing all the mail received by Prime Minister Trudeau between February 1969 and June 1972. The object of the study was to ascertain the characteristics of the letter-writers and the nature of their concerns, arguments and strategies. Through interviews with the staff of the Correspondence Section of the Prime Minister's Office we were also able to discover how the mail is processed. This is described in the last section of our paper. As one might expect, the mail is unrepresentative of the regional, linguistic and class diversity of Canada. Metropolitan areas, rich provinces and English-speakers are over-represented, as are people who have access to typewriters. There is, however, a sizable group of letters from the very poor who write the Prime Minister to complain of their victimization by government bureaucracy or by life in general. These letters are personal and apolitical and approach the Prime Minister in a deferential manner. They appear to us to be carefully and sympathetically answered, and to be probably effective in rectifying small problems. The bulk of the mail is policy-oriented, but probably not effective in influencing policy. Public attention to policy, as expressed in the mail, is extremely transitory and focuses particularly on topics with strong emotional content or on those affecting economic welfare. The mail seems only weakly related to the government's own policy priorities. Sommaire. Cette étude est fondée sur un échantillon de 2,150 lettres tirées du courrier par le premier ministre Trudeau entire février 1969 et juin 1972. Nous avons voulu identifier les catégories de personnes qui s'adressaient au premier ministre, et déterminer le but de leur correspondence et la nature de leur argumentation etc. Nous avons interviewé le personnel de la section de la correspondance du cabinet du premier ministre pour connaître la procédure de réponse à ce courrier. Nous avons constaté que le courrier n'est pas représentatif de la diversité régionale, culturelle et sociale du pays. Les plus fortunés, les habitants des grandes villes, et les habitants des provinces sont surreprésentés. II y a, cependant, une proportion assez élevée de lettres venant d'économiquement faibles qui se plaignent au premier ministre de leur traitement par la bureaucratic ou de la vie en générate. Leurs problèmes sont formulés en termes personnels, et ces personnes s'adressent au premier ministre respectueusement. Les réponses à ces lettres nous paraissent sympathiques et souvent efficacies quant au redressement des plaintes. Le gros du courrier concerne l'orientation de la politique mais son influence est sans doute limitée. L'attention du public à l'égard de la politique gouvernementale est conditionnée par les évènements, en particulier les évènements à contenu émotif ou ceux qui touchent de près le bien-être des correspondants. Ce courrier ne se réfère que très indirectement aux priorités politiques du gouveniement.     

Intergovernmental Relations in Canada: The Emergence of Collaborative Federalism

"Executive federalism" or "federal-provincial diplomacy" haslong been considered the defining characteristic of Canadianfederalism, which combines federalism and Westminster-stylecabinet government. However, these processes have come underincreasing stress in recent years from a number of forces thathave affected the nature and conduct of federalism and intergovernmentalrelations in Canada. Executive federalism has not been displaced,but has been increasingly informed by a set of practices thatwe call "collaborative federalism," characterized more by theprinciple of co-determination of broad national policies ratherthan by the more traditional pattern of federal-leadership.     

Voter Buying: Shaping the Electorate through Clientelism

Studies of clientelism typically assume that political machines distribute rewards to persuade or mobilize the existing electorate. We argue that rewards not only influence actions of the electorate, but can also shape its composition. Across the world, machines employ “voter buying” to import outsiders into their districts. Voter buying demonstrates how clientelism can underpin electoral fraud, and it offers an explanation of why machines deliver rewards when they cannot monitor vote choices. Our analyses suggest that voter buying dramatically influences municipal elections in Brazil. A regression discontinuity design suggests that voter audits—which undermined voter buying—decreased the electorate by 12 percentage points and reduced the likelihood of mayoral reelection by 18 percentage points. Consistent with voter buying, these effects are significantly greater in municipalities with large voter inflows, and where neighboring municipalities had large voter outflows. Findings are robust to an alternative research design using a different data set.     

Fiscal Exchange and Tax Compliance: Evidence From a Field Experiment

Behavioral interventions appealing to taxpayers’ reciprocity often leave tax compliance unaffected. We provide evidence that a “fiscal exchange nudge” increased tax compliance in a setting where one might not expect it: crisis-ridden Argentina. In a randomized controlled trial with over 20,000 taxpayers, a tax bill visually celebrating realized public works benefiting children increased payment rates of tax delinquents by about 20 percent, or almost 40 percent when the bills were delivered in person. Without the appeal, the new bill design generated significantly fewer payments. Changes in the design of the tax bill also increased arrears cancellation. We estimate the ratio of marginal revenues to costs for the fiscal exchange bill to be 18. The factors we associate with the unexpectedly positive impacts are consistent with strengthening an affective response. We find persistent effects of the experiment two years later. The results suggest that communities have more scope to increase tax revenues through non-threatening interventions.     

Varieties of Clientelism: Machine Politics during Elections

Although many studies of clientelism focus exclusively on vote buying, political machines often employ diverse portfolios of strategies. We provide a theoretical framework and formal model to explain how and why machines mix four clientelist strategies during elections: vote buying, turnout buying, abstention buying, and double persuasion. Machines tailor their portfolios to the political preferences and voting costs of the electorate. They also adapt their mix to at least five contextual factors: compulsory voting, ballot secrecy, political salience, machine support, and political polarization. Our analysis yields numerous insights, such as why the introduction of compulsory voting may increase vote buying, and why enhanced ballot secrecy may increase turnout buying and abstention buying. Evidence from various countries is consistent with our predictions and suggests the need for empirical studies to pay closer attention to the ways in which machines combine clientelist strategies.     

The new U.S.-China rapprochement： A view from Africa

The U.S. and China recently held a ＂dialogue＂ at the behest of policy makers in Washington for the mutual benefit of their governments and people and ostensibly the rest of humanity as well. Coming at a time of increasing quest for natural resources by many countries including China and Chinese obviously bourgeoning influence in Africa, that Washington decided to engage Beijing certainly, not only betrays U.S. apprehension over the emergence of a strong competitor for Africa＇s resources but also an attempt to whittle down China＇s growing international stature especially on the African continent. While the Chinese will not likely succumb to the U.S., this new found rapprochement between the two will certainly intensify the resource scramble in Africa. Whether the ＂severe＂ interest for African resources will benefit the continent or not depends on how African countries are able to manage the ensuing resource race between the U.S. and China.