Does it matter whether people will know that I did not vote? The role of social norms and visibility

People behave in accordance with social norms when they feel observed or when they know their behaviour is monitored or could be disclosed. Get-Out-The-Vote experiments show that individuals are more likely to vote when told that their behaviour will be disclosed. In everyday life, however, there is much uncertainty about whether people will indeed know if one turns out to vote. I argue that fear of disapproval should only mobilize citizens to vote when they expect that their (non-)voting will be visible to others. Using original survey data from Canada, I measure expectations about whether others will vote, would disapprove if the person abstains, and will know whether they have voted or not. Furthermore, I distinguish between expectations concerning the partner, family, friends, and neighbours. Results suggest that respondents who expect others to vote are themselves more likely to vote, but I find no evidence that disapproval and visibility are related to turnout in everyday life.     

城市社区居委会选举失范问题探析

选举失范是选举中的相关主体难以遵从选举规范或遵从选举规范的成本大于收益,或违反规范的行为会带来更大的收益时发生的违反选举规范的行为而产生的社会现象。由于选举程序不够完善,监管体制不够健全等原因,使得当前居委会直选中存在着操纵选举、贿赂选民等一系列失范现象,对选举的公平性、民主性和结果的合法性带来了极大的冲击。这就要通过推动城市管理体制改革、完善社区直选程序、建立监督惩处机制等途径消除这些失范行为,推动选举的规范化。     

Labeling candidates as underdogs in political communications: The moderation of candidate-related factors

Underdogs are individuals or groups who are at a disadvantage in competitive situations or predicted to fail in competition against rivals. In elections, candidates often label themselves as underdogs, regardless of their poll rankings, using the associated image of weakness to appeal to voters. This study examines the advertising effects related to labeling candidates as underdogs (versus frontrunners) in political communications, and the possible moderating effects of candidate-related factors, including media-based poll rankings, biological sex, and physical attractiveness. The results of two experiments show that a candidate's use of the underdog label generates better advertising effects when polls indicate the promoted candidate is close to or substantially behind the competitor, or when the promoted candidate is female and moderately physically attractive. However, using the frontrunner label generates better advertising effects when the promoted candidate is male, highly physically attractive, or substantially prevailing over the competitor in the polls.     

The decision to lobby bureaucrats

Despite a good deal of interest in lobbyists?? tactics, virtually no research has been published examining the conditions under which interest groups lobby the bureaucracy rather than or in addition to the legislature. Using two comprehensive datasets, I show that lobbying increases in both branches when conflict is higher and when the lobbyist has professional or political connections to that venue. In addition, certain conditions cause lobbyists to specialize in one branch or a particular branch only, depending on the issue area being lobbied, the interest group type being represented, the lobbyist??s resources, and other factors.     

How does turnover affect turnout? Government alternation and voter participation in parliamentary democracies

A crucial difference between political systems is the nature of government alternation: that is, whether when a government changes, all parties now in government were previously in opposition (‘wholesale alternation’) or whether just some parties were (‘partial alternation’) (Mair 1997). Bergman and Strøm (2011) suggest that wholesale alternation gives voters a clear choice between alternative governments and allows them to hold the government accountable, while partial alternation is associated with one (centre) party becoming a (near-) permanent government party who can govern with either the parties to its right or to its left. However, this relationship has not been tested. We propose to examine the effect of partial and wholesale alternation on turn-out in a large-N cross-country study, showing that there is an interaction effect between disproportionality and wholesale turn-out. Wholesale decreases turn-out but only when it when disproportionality is high.     

Inferences from alarming events.

An extreme event, such as a nuclear accident, an earthquake, a cluster of adverse reactions to a particular drug, or excessive breakdowns of some class of equipment, frequently focuses attention for the first time on an important issue. By then, however, data on the incidence and magnitudes of relevant past events may be unavailable or too costly to reconstruct. Using a simple probability model, we derive methods for drawing statistical inferences based only on the magnitude of the first event noticed and the amount of exposure before this event occurred. We assume that an event is noticed only when its magnitude exceeds some threshold, and we develop methods of inference that are valid even when this threshold is unknown. One tempting but incorrect approach is to treat the magnitude of the observed event as if it were the threshold, forgetting that smaller magnitudes might have been noticed as well. The biases that arise when this mistake is made turn out to be substantial; risks can easily be overstated by a factor of 3.     

Optimal central banker contracts and common agency: a comment

We explore a setting where the central bank is offered an incentive scheme by an interest group, in addition to the contract designed by the government. We prove that the inflation bias can be eliminated when principals do not cooperate and have different output or inflation objectives. These conclusions contrast with those of Chortareas and Miller (Public Choice 121:131–155, 2004). The reason is that our analysis takes into account the participation constraints of the central bank. We also show that, if principals cooperate, the inflation bias is eliminated when their output target is different but not when they disagree over the inflation objective.     

Privatising war: assessing the decision to hire private military contractors

There has been a huge growth in the size and number of Private Military and Security Companies (PMSCs) in the last decade or so. In this context, the question of when, if ever, states should hire PMSCs to carry out military operations has gained particular urgency. In this paper, I defend the answer that states should do so whenever PMSCs will be the most effective agents available against a number of recent objections. All of these objections claim that considerations aside from the relative effectiveness of PMSCs should bear on the question. Some argue that there is something inherently morally problematic with hiring PMSCs, and thus infer that they should sometimes not be hired even when they are the most effective agents available. Others point to undesirable side-effects that hiring PMSCs is thought to cause, and claim that these should be taken into account when deciding whether to hire them. I argue, however, that all of these further considerations are either irrelevant to the decision or reducible to effectiveness.     

Governmental failures in evaluating programs

Consider a government that adopts a program, sees a noisy signal about its success, and decides whether to continue the program. Suppose further that the success of a program is greater if people think it will be continued. This paper considers outcomes when government cannot commit. We find that welfare can be higher when information is poor, that government should at times commit to continuing a program it believes had failed, and that a government which fears losing power may acquire either too much or too little information.     

An Experiment Testing the Relative Effectiveness of Encouraging Voter Participation by Inducing Feelings of Pride or Shame

Prior experimental research has demonstrated that voter turnout rises substantially when people receive mailings that indicate whether they voted in previous elections. This effect suggests that voters are sensitive to whether their compliance with the norm of voting is being monitored. The present study extends this line of research by investigating whether disclosure of past participation has a stronger effect on turnout when it calls attention to a past abstention or a past vote. A sample of 369,211 registered voters who voted in just one of two recent elections were randomly assigned to receive no mail, mail that encouraged them to vote, and mail that both encouraged them to vote and indicated their turnout in one previous election. The latter type of mailing randomly reported either the election in which they voted or the one in which they abstained. Results suggest that mailings disclosing past voting behavior had strong effects on voter turnout and that these effects were significantly enhanced when it disclosed an abstention in a recent election.     

Organizational Reputation and Jurisdictional Claims: The Case of the U.S. Food and Drug Administration

When do regulatory agencies expand, following the emergence of novel technologies? This article presents a verbal model that suggests that a regulator is most likely to announce that it has statutory authority to regulate a novel technology when its reputation is at stake. This is most likely to occur when (1) new information becomes available to the regulator regarding the seriousness of the anticipated harm of a novel technology, or (2) a rival regulator attempts to formalize its regulatory authority or fails to do so although officially required to. A historical–institutional analysis of the temporal process leading to jurisdictional claims by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration over gene therapy, laboratory‐developed complex diagnostic tests, human tissue transplants, and human cloning supports the model's prediction.     

Costly,Regressive, and Ineffective: How Sensitive Is Public Support for the Mortgage Interest Deduction in the United States?

ABSTRACT

Although the mortgage interest deduction enjoys broad public support, critics argue that the policy disproportionately benefits wealthy households, fails to expand homeownership opportunities to households on the margins, and costs the federal government an extraordinary amount of money in foregone tax revenue. Drawing on data collected through an online experiment, this analysis tests the sensitivity of public support to these critiques. The findings reveal that support for the mortgage interest deduction declines when respondents are presented with information about the cost, effectiveness, or distribution of benefits associated with the deduction. Support among renters is more sensitive to framing effects than that among homeowners. Republicans are less sensitive to framing effects than Democrats when the deduction is framed as distributing benefits unequally, but more sensitive to these effects when the issue is framed as costly. However, all groups register their lowest level of support when told that the mortgage interest deduction is not an effective tool for expanding ownership opportunities.     

Selfish and Cooperative Voting: Can the Majority Restrain Themselves?

At every scale from small committees to national elections, voters face tradeoffs between self-interest and the common good. We report three experiments in which participants vote for policies with real payoffs at stake. We manipulate self-interest by randomly assigning participants to two groups in society with different policy payoffs. Participants in the majority group are confronted by a simple choice between a policy that is better for themselves or a policy that is best for society. Overall, we find a clear effect of self-interest: Participants are more likely to choose the policy that earns them more money, compared to participants in the other group, even when the policy is detrimental to the common good. Simultaneously, we observe considerable levels of cooperative voting among participants in the majority, ranging from 47% to 79% across different payoff regimes. Finally, participants were not more cooperative when voting compared to when they chose between the same policies with a lottery or leader institution, departing from the hypothesis that voting institutions promote cooperative motives. We discuss implications for multiple literatures about voting behavior.

     

Human Rights as Reputation Builder: Compliance with the Convention Against Torture

A strong record of human rights protections is an important factor for a state to maintain a positive international reputation. In this article, we suggest that states will use compliance with human rights treaties as a mechanism by which to improve their reputations to help achieve their foreign policy goals. We hypothesize that international human rights compliance is a means to improve a state’s reputation in three specific situations: when the state is facing regional pressures as the result of a desire to join a regional organization; when the state is facing regional pressures not to run afoul of a court within a regional organization; or when a state seeks foreign assistance from an entity with human rights requirements for the receipt of such assistance. We examine our theory by analyzing human rights reports regarding state compliance with specific treaty obligations outlined in the Convention Against Torture (CAT). While the evidence for our hypotheses is mixed, we do find some support for our assertion that state compliance is linked to reputational concerns. In particular, states comply with the CAT when they are part of a regional organization that has a human rights court, and when they are receiving conditional aid from the European Union.     

Foreign Aid and Undeserved Credit Claiming

Politicians in developing countries misuse foreign aid to get reelected by fiscally manipulating foreign aid resources or domestic budgets. Our article suggests another mechanism that does not require politicians to have any control over foreign aid in order to make use of it for electoral purposes: undeserved credit claiming. We analyze the conditions under which local politicians can undeservedly take credit for the receipt of foreign aid and thereby boost their chances of reelection. We theorize that politicians can employ a variety of techniques to claim credit for development aid even when they have little or no influence on its actual allocation. Using a subnational World Bank development program in the Philippines, we demonstrate that credit claiming is an important strategy to exploit foreign aid inflows and that the political effects of aid can persist even when projects are designed to minimize the diversion or misuse of funds.     

Women Don't Run? Election Aversion and Candidate Entry

To study gender differences in candidate emergence, we conduct a laboratory experiment in which we control the incentives potential candidates face, manipulate features of the electoral environment, and measure beliefs and preferences. We find that men and women are equally likely to volunteer when the representative is chosen randomly, but that women are less likely to become candidates when the representative is chosen by an election. This difference does not arise from disparities in abilities, risk aversion, or beliefs, but rather from the specific competitive and strategic context of campaigns and elections. Thus, we find evidence that women are election averse, whereas men are not. Election aversion persists with variations in the electoral environment, disappearing only when campaigns are both costless and completely truthful.     

Local Government Reserve Funds: Policy Alternatives and Political Strategies

Local government officials are operating in a policy void when it comes to the establishment and use of reserve funds. In part, this is due to confusion about the distinction between reserve and contingency funds. The limited research that has been conducted shows that relatively large sums of money are maintained in reserve by many local governments. Some governments refer to these sums as reserve funds and their intended use is clearly indicated in one or more local documents, such as a budget or audit/financial report. Others simply maintain an unreserved fund balance. This article identifies rationales for using reserve funds, discusses the alternative ways reserves are accumulated, and outlines key issues a local government financial plan should address when reserve funds are utilized.     

Government turnover: Concepts, measures and applications

Abstract.  While government turnover is often thought of as an adverse source of instability, it may also be viewed as a favourable source of competition and institution-building. To articulate and test such hypotheses, this article describes two main concepts of government turnover: leadership turnover , or change in rulers, and ideological turnover , or change in the rulers' ideology. Refinements involve the mode, outcome and timing of turnover. The article discusses measurement issues that arise when there are multiple power institutions and when parliaments are controlled by changing majority coalitions. The measures of turnover are illustrated by examining the post-communist world. The article considers the possibility that higher cumulative post-transition turnover – in terms of leaderships or ideologies – has assisted in establishing the rule of law.     

Understanding unequal turnout: Education and voting in comparative perspective

Well-educated citizens vote more frequently than the poorly educated in some countries, including the USA. However, in many countries, no such differences are observed. One classical explanation of the presence or absence of this inequality in voting is that the strength of left-wing forces sharpens or reduces it. An alternative explanation is that some institutional arrangements and contextual features disproportionately affect the voter participation of some individuals depending on their resources, thus shaping turnout inequality. These theories are tested using multilevel modeling with data from 28 advanced industrial democracies. Compulsory voting reduces inequalities because under this system quasi-universal turnout is achieved. In addition, the poorly educated vote more frequently when the voting procedure is easy and when there are few political parties, thus reducing turnout inequality. However, strong left-wing parties and trade unions are not associated with more equal turnout.