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Voting Costs and Voter Turnout in Competitive Elections
Bernard Fraga & Eitan Hersh
Quarterly Journal of Political Science, July 2011, Pages 339-356
Abstract:
In the United States, competitive elections are often concentrated in particular places. These places attract disproportionate attention from news media and election campaigns. Yet many voting studies only test stimuli in uncompetitive environments, or only test for average effects, and simply assume the results are relevant to competitive contexts. This article questions that assumption by utilizing Election Day inclement weather as an exogenous and random cost imposed on voters. We test how voters in competitive and uncompetitive environments respond to this random cost and find that while rain decreases turnout on average, it does not do so in competitive elections. If voters in different electoral contexts do not react the same way even to rain, then serious doubt should meet claims that voters will react the same way to campaign appeals, economic factors, or other treatments tested in the literature. Careful consideration of effects that are heterogeneous with respect to electoral context can make the difference between a result that calls democracy into question and one that is politically irrelevant.
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Employment, Wages and Voter Turnout
Kerwin Kofi Charles & Melvin Stephens
NBER Working Paper, August 2011
Abstract:
This paper argues that, since activities that provide political information are complementary with leisure, increased labor market activity should lower turnout, but should do so least in prominent elections where information is ubiquitous. Using official county-level voting data and a variety of OLS and TSLS models, we find that increases in wages and employment: reduce voter turnout in gubernatorial elections by a significant amount; have no effect on Presidential turnout; and raise the share of persons voting in a Presidential election who do not vote on a House of Representative election on the same ballot. We argue that this pattern (which contradicts some previous findings in the literature) can be fully accounted for by an information argument, and is either inconsistent with or not fully explicable by arguments based on citizens' psychological motivations to vote in good or bad times; changes in logistical voting costs; or transitory migration. Using individual-level panel data methods and multiple years' data from the American National Election Study (ANES) we confirm that increases in employment lead to less use of the media and reduced political knowledge, and present associational individual evidence that corroborates our main argument.
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Thank You for Voting: Gratitude Expression and Voter Mobilization
Costas Panagopoulos
Journal of Politics, July 2011, Pages 707-717
Abstract:
Political scientists are increasingly exploring the psychological underpinnings of voting behavior using field experimental techniques. Research in psychology demonstrates that gratitude expression reinforces prosocial behavior. This article reports the results of the three randomized field experiments designed to investigate the impact of gratitude expression on voter turnout. The experiments were conducted in a range of electoral settings, and the results suggest thanking voters for voting in a previous election boosts participation levels in subsequent elections. Moreover, the gratitude expression effect I observe appears to be distinct from social pressure and is robust across subgroups of voters, including minorities and women, and both low- and high-propensity voters.
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Turnout and Party Registration among Criminal Offenders in the 2008 General Election
Traci Burch
Law & Society Review, September 2011, Pages 699-730
Abstract:
This paper estimates the voter registration, turnout, and party registration in the 2008 general election for men with felony convictions in Florida, Georgia, Michigan, Missouri, and North Carolina. The findings indicate that turnout among felons is much lower than previous research has shown. Ex-felon turnout in 2008 varied by state, averaging 22.2 percent. People captured and convicted for their first offense after the election voted at similarly low rates. Also contrary to the expectations of previous literature, the ex-felon population does not seem overwhelmingly Democratic. In North Carolina and Florida, two states for which the data are available, party registration varies by race. Among registered black male ex-felons, 71.7 percent in North Carolina and 84.2 percent in Florida are registered Democrats. Among whites, however, only 35.3 percent and 36.4 percent of ex-felons are registered Democrats in North Carolina and Florida, respectively.
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Flooding the Vote: Hurricane Katrina and Voter Participation in New Orleans
Betsy Sinclair, Thad Hall & Michael Alvarez
American Politics Research, September 2011, Pages 921-957
Abstract:
To what extent did the extensive flooding caused by Hurricane Katrina affect voter participation in the 2006 mayoral election? This article uses voting record data from 20 election cycles, GIS-coded flood-depth data, and census data to examine the voting behavior of registered voters in New Orleans before and after Hurricane Katrina. We use a variety of statistical techniques, primarily propensity score matching methods, to examine how flooding affected mayoral turnout. We find that flooding decreased participation, but registered voters who experienced more than 6 ft of flooding were more likely to participate in the election than those who experienced less flooding. This finding confirms that increasing the cost of voting decreases turnout and suggests several mechanisms motivating an expressive component of voting behavior. Our results indicate there is a complex relationship between participation and the costs and benefits of turnout. Our findings about the characteristics of the voters who participated in the mayoral election provide insights into the scope of change for the political landscape of New Orleans.
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Translating into Votes: The Electoral Impacts of Spanish-Language Ballots
Daniel Hopkins
American Journal of Political Science, October 2011, Pages 814-830
Abstract:
This article investigates the impact of one election procedure designed to enfranchise immigrants: foreign-language election materials. Specifically, it uses regression discontinuity design to estimate the turnout and election impacts of Spanish-language assistance provided under Section 203 of the Voting Rights Act. Analyses of two different data sets - the Latino National Survey and California 1998 primary election returns - show that Spanish-language assistance increased turnout for citizens who speak little English. The California results also demonstrate that election procedures can influence outcomes, as support for ending bilingual education dropped markedly in heavily Spanish-speaking neighborhoods with Spanish-language assistance. Small changes in election procedures can influence who votes as well as what wins.
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Judging political affiliation from faces of UK MPs
Tom Roberts et al.
Perception, August 2011, Pages 949-952
Abstract:
Subjects were shown photographs of UK MPs' faces and asked to judge their political affiliations. Participants were unable to correctly distinguish between Conservative and Labour politicians. However, their responses were used to create computer-generated idealised faces representative of each party, which independent evaluators could correctly identify. These faces give an indication of the mental images we might reference when imagining MPs from the two main UK political parties.
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Kevin Arceneaux, Thad Kousser & Megan Mullin
Political Research Quarterly, forthcoming
Abstract:
This study extends previous field experimental research on turnout by considering how institutional context moderates the effect of mobilization. Taking advantage of a setting in which some registrants are assigned to vote by mail, the authors find that a door-to-door mobilization campaign has a larger effect on the participation of those who vote at polling places than on registrants assigned to cast mail ballots, but only among individuals whose voting behavior is most likely to be shaped by extrinsic social rewards. The authors conclude that there may be payoff for election reform strategies that tap into voting's social rewards.
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The Very Partisan Nonpartisan Top-Two Primary: Understanding What Voters Don't Understand
Mathew Manweller
Election Law Journal, September 2011, Pages 255-271
Abstract:
In 2008, following a series of legal battles, Washington State adopted an open nonpartisan "Top-Two" primary system in which only the top two vote earners, regardless of party affiliation, advance to the general election - the same system California adopted via a 2010 ballot measure. The new primary system is described as a nonpartisan primary but allows candidates to describe their "political party preference." The state allows candidates to place on the ballot "Prefers Republican Party" or "Prefers Democratic Party" next to their name while arguing that the primary is nonpartisan. Upon adoption, both political parties objected, arguing that they were being forced to associate with candidates they did not select. The state countered that the winners of the Top-Two primary are not "nominees" because the new election is not a primary but a "winnowing election" for the purposes of producing a general election ballot. After the Top-Two primary was struck down on its face by the U.S. Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, the U.S. Supreme Court, in Grange v. Republican Party (2008), reversed the decision arguing that the new system may be unconstitutional as applied but only if the parties could demonstrate the new primary caused "voter confusion." This article measures the extent of voter confusion caused by the Top-Two primary system. The findings are based on a series of cognitive experiments run on Washington State voters. Participants were asked to read and answer questions about one of three mock ballots modeled off of Washington State's traditional partisan ballots and newer Top-Two ballots. The questions were designed to determine if voters could distinguish between the older partisan primary where the winning candidate was the "nominee" of the party and the newer Top-Two system in which the winner is not the "nominee" of the party. Results indicate that voters are highly confused in terms of a perceived relationship between parties and candidates, but less confused about their status as an official nominee of the party.
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The Effect of Compulsory Voting on Turnout Stratification Patterns: A Cross-national Analysis
Ellen Quintelier, Marc Hooghe & Sofie Marien
International Political Science Review, September 2011, Pages 396-416
Abstract:
As voter turnout is steadily declining in western democracies, various authors have expressed concern about the stratification in electoral participation that this trend might entail. Some research suggests that specific categories of potential voters refrain from voting, leading to the electoral dominance of more privileged groups within the population. In this article, we investigate whether systems of compulsory voting are associated with more equal participation in elections. We study 36 countries that participated in the 2004 International Social Survey Programme. The analysis shows that compulsory voting is associated with higher turnout rates, but we do not observe any significant differences in electoral participation based on gender or educational level. However, we find a significant interaction effect between age and compulsory voting, suggesting that young age cohorts are unlikely to be affected by the dynamics of the civic duty argument that is inherent in systems of compulsory voting.
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Frederico Finan & Laura Schechter
NBER Working Paper, September 2011
Abstract:
While vote-buying is common, little is known about how politicians determine who to target. We argue that vote-buying can be sustained by an internalized norm of reciprocity. Receiving money engenders feelings of obligation. Combining survey data on vote-buying with an experiment-based measure of reciprocity, we show that politicians target reciprocal individuals. Overall, our findings highlight the importance of social preferences in determining political behavior.