Decentralization and Accountability : Are Voters More Vigilant in Local than in National Elections?
Defining vigilance as retrospective voting - where voters evaluate incumbents on their performance during their entire term in office - the author compares voter behavior in local and national elections to make inferences about whether voters are m...
| Main Author: | |
|---|---|
| Language: | English en_US |
| Published: |
World Bank, Washington, DC
2014
|
| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | http://documents.worldbank.org/curated/en/2001/02/1003165/decentralization-accountability-voters-more-vigilant-local-national-elections http://hdl.handle.net/10986/19702 |
| Summary: | Defining vigilance as retrospective
voting - where voters evaluate incumbents on their
performance during their entire term in office - the author
compares voter behavior in local and national elections to
make inferences about whether voters are more vigilant in
monitoring government at the local level. Using data from 14
major states in India over the period 1960-92, she contrasts
voters' behavior in state legislative assembly
elections with their behavior in national legislative
elections. In state assembly elections voter reward
incumbents for local income growth, and punish them for a
rise in inequality, over their entire term in office. But in
national elections voters behave myopically, rewarding
growth in national income and a fall in inflation and
inequality only in the year preceding the election. The
evidence is consistent with greater voter vigilance and
government accountability in local than in national elections. |
|---|