Electoral Strategy under OpenList PR

1
Electoral Strategy under Open-List PR

• Why has Brazil failed ?
• Inflation
• Income distribution
• Legislative inactivity
• Corruption
• Patronage and Pork-Barrel

2
Causes

• Three plausible explanations
• Too many parties 12 legislative parties
• Legislative procedural rules
• Deputies are not concerned with public policy
  making for some reason

3
Câmara dos Deputados 4 october 1998 (78.5 )
513 Partido da Frente Liberal (Party of the
Liberal Front, conservative-liberal) PFL .
106 Partido da Social Democracia Brasileiro
(Party of the Brazil Social-Democracy) PSDB .
99 Partido do Movimento Democrático Brasileiro
PMDB . 82 Partido Progressista Brasileiro
(Brazilian Progressive Party) PPB . 60 Partido
dos Trabalhadores (Workers' Party, socialist) PT
. 58 Partido Trabalhista Brasileiro
(Brazilian Labour Party, centrist) PTB .
31 Partido Democrático Trabalhista (Democratic
Labour Party, left-wing populist) PDT .
25 Partido Socialista Brasileiro (Brazilian
Socialist Party, socialist) PSB . 19 Partido
Liberal (Liberal Party, conservative) PL .
12 Partido Comunista do Brasil (Communist
Party of Brazil, communist) PCdoB . 7 Partido
Popular Socialista (Socialist People's Party,
socialist) PPS . 3 Partido Social-Democrata
(Social-Democratic Party) PSD . 3 Partido da
Mobilização Nacional (Party of National
Mobilization) PMN . 2 Partido Social Cristão
(Christian Socialist Party, christian-democratic)
PSC . 2 Partido Verde (Green Party, ecologist)
PV . 1 Partido de Reedificação da Ordem
Nacional PRONA . 1 Partido Social Liberal
(Social Liberal Party) PSL . 1 Partido Social
Trabalhista (Social Labour Party) PST .
1 Source A Classe Operaria (PCdoB)
4
Political Institutions

• Presidential System
• President Elected for a term of 5 years
• Electoral System
• Proportional Representation (dHondt)
• State District (multimember 8-70 seats)
• Small states over-represented
• Open lists (candidates selected by state)
• Candidate can either vote for party or candidate
  on the partys list

5
Political Institutions

• Electoral Systems (cont.)
• Incumbents can not be denied re-nomination
• Party System
• Multi-party
• Parties are generally weak
• Vote shares are volatile
• Pork-barrel politics
• Little concern with national issues

6
Political Institutions

• Presidents
• Face an unstable legislature
• Independent governors
• Electoral calendar
• Motivations of legislators
• Coalitions Party and region both important -gt
  Inclusive cabinets

7
Political Institutions

• Campaign Regulations
• Doubling up
• Federal and State candidates
• How do we expect these institutions to influence
  politics ?
• What sort of strategies will candidates and/or
  parties adopt ?
• What are the consequences of these strategies ?

8
Electoral Competition

• Electoral Laws guide/influence political
  competition
• At minimum, defines the types of strategies
  available
• Can provide strong incentives to adopt certain
  strategies.
• Example, U.S. and U.K. elections ?
• What about Brazilian politicians ?

9
Electoral Competition

• Empirically we observe different patterns in
  candidate support
• Municipal Dominance A candidates support comes
  mostly from a few municipalities
• Spatial Distribution The municipalities can be
  clustered or scattered together

10
Electoral Competition

• Four types
• Concentrated-dominated the reduto. A
  candidates support comes from a few adjacent
  municipalities. Connections.
• Concentrated-shared. Generally metropolitan areas
  populous enough to elect more than one candidate

11
Electoral Competition

• Four types
• Scattered-shared. Candidates appeal to voters
  scattered around the state. E.g.,
  Japanese-Brazilians and evangelicos.
• Scattered-dominant. Candidates with state-level
  connections. Makes deals with local bosses

12
Electoral Competition

• All four patterns are observed in Brazil.
• Why is this possible ? What does a candidate
  have to do to win ?
• Candidates can win by using different
  strategies, as they simply need to secure a
  certain number of votes.
• Previous elections are an indication of how many
  votes are needed
• Many ways to achieve that goal

13
Cost Benefits of Appeals to Voters

• The number of votes needed to get elected
  depends on
• Distribution of votes
• Turnout
• Politicized groups
• Japanese-Brazils
• Evangelicals
• Occupational groups (industrial, smaller
  factories)
• Communities (role of local politicians)

14
Cost Benefits of Appeals to Voters

• Local Politics -gt favors provision of local
  goods over general policy
• Barriers to enter for political competition
• Credit claiming
• Ethnicity
• Small localities
• Brokers

15
Cost Benefits of Appeals to Voters

• Communicating with voters
• Radio/TV adds banned
• Campaigning personal
• Local campaigning
• Cheaper
• Community identification

16
Cost Benefits of Appeals to Voters

• The supply of politicians
• Career trajectories matter
• Candidate viability
• Transportation costs
• Low name recognition
• Weak ethnic/class base
• -gt Local types of candidates
• Locals Concentrated
• Bureaucrat Scattered (dominate/share)
• Business - Scattered

17
Cost Benefits of Appeals to Voters

• Challengers Incumbents
• Incumbents have a strong position
• The effects of a challenge
• Incumbents secure
• Incumbent Strategy
• Vulnerability tied to partys fortune
• Attempts to expand vote base
• Providing pork increases concentration
• Businessmen more flexibility/less stability

18
Testing the Theory

• Budgetary amendments
• 72,000 in 1992, 90 targeting specific
  municipalities
• We use the theory to make predictions about
  whether a given deputy makes an amendment
  benefiting a municipality

19
The Hypothesis

• Distance from Vote Center 1986
• Candidates mainly try to retain support
• The further away a municipality is the less
  likely an amendment is (unless non-dominant)
• Dominance and Concentration
• Higher dominance, easier to claim credit
• Higher concentration, vulnerable to bureaucrats
  and businessmen

20
The Hypothesis

• Municipal vulnerability
• Retiring incumbent -gt votes up for grabs
• Social Match
• Deputies with ties should offer amendments to
  similar municipalities
• Size of electorate, per capita income, percentage
  employed by government, (ethnicity)

21
The Hypothesis

• Electoral insecurity
• Career trajectory
• Locals close to home
• Bureaucrats and Business scattered
• Traditional political families close to home

22
Results

• Support for
• Local dominance
• Vulnerability of challenge
• Electoral weakness
• Previous Careers (?)
• Lack of support for
• Social Matching

23
Does Pork Pay ?

• Benefit from making amendments.
• Suffer when others target same municipalities.
• Consequently, dominant more successful than
  shared.
• Ideology pays little, and career does not
  influence electoral fortunes.