Rough Elections
Does Anger Drive Populism?
Omer Ali, Klaus Desmet & Romain Wacziarg
NBER Working Paper, June 2023
Abstract:
We study whether anger fuels the rise of populism. Anger as an emotion tends to act as a call to action against individuals or groups that are blamed for negative situations, making it conducive to voting for populist politicians. Using a unique dataset tracking emotions for a large sample of respondents from 2008 to 2017, we explore the relationship between anger and the populist vote share across U.S. counties. More angry counties displayed stronger preferences for populist candidates during the 2016 presidential primaries and elections. However, once we control for other negative emotions and life satisfaction, anger no longer operates as a separate channel in driving the populist vote share. Instead, our results indicate that a more complex sense of malaise and gloom, rather than anger per se, drives the rise in populism.
Quantifying the potential persuasive returns to political microtargeting
Ben Tappin et al.
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 20 June 2023
Abstract:
Much concern has been raised about the power of political microtargeting to sway voters' opinions, influence elections, and undermine democracy. Yet little research has directly estimated the persuasive advantage of microtargeting over alternative campaign strategies. Here, we do so using two studies focused on U.S. policy issue advertising. To implement a microtargeting strategy, we combined machine learning with message pretesting to determine which advertisements to show to which individuals to maximize persuasive impact. Using survey experiments, we then compared the performance of this microtargeting strategy against two other messaging strategies. Overall, we estimate that our microtargeting strategy outperformed these strategies by an average of 70% or more in a context where all of the messages aimed to influence the same policy attitude (Study 1). Notably, however, we found no evidence that targeting messages by more than one covariate yielded additional persuasive gains, and the performance advantage of microtargeting was primarily visible for one of the two policy issues under study. Moreover, when microtargeting was used instead to identify which policy attitudes to target with messaging (Study 2), its advantage was more limited. Taken together, these results suggest that the use of microtargeting -- combining message pretesting with machine learning -- can potentially increase campaigns' persuasive influence and may not require the collection of vast amounts of personal data to uncover complex interactions between audience characteristics and political messaging. However, the extent to which this approach confers a persuasive advantage over alternative strategies likely depends heavily on context.
Come-from-behind victories under ranked-choice voting and runoff: The impact on voter satisfaction
Joseph Cerrone & Cynthia McClintock
Politics & Policy, forthcoming
Abstract:
Both ranked-choice voting (RCV) and runoff seek to prevent the election of candidates with only minority support by enabling more broadly approved rivals to win through come-from-behind victories (CFBVs). Although CFBVs are intrinsic to RCV and runoff, they have received little scholarly attention. This study suggests that, amid voters' status quo bias, CFBVs provoke dissatisfaction. In a survey experiment fielded on U.S. voters, CFBVs under RCV significantly reduced satisfaction, while there was a weaker negative effect under runoff. Similarly, RCV was repealed or faced a visible repeal attempt in the vast majority of U.S. jurisdictions that experienced a CFBV in the first or second use of the rule. This was not the case for runoff. We encourage greater voter education, including regarding the rationale for and mechanics of CFBVs under RCV as well as consideration of runoff and other rules that encourage the election of candidates with majority support.
The Effect of Counterstereotypic Gender Strategies on Candidate Evaluations in American Elections
Ding Wang, Jennifer Merolla & Arielle Manganiello
Politics & Gender, forthcoming
Abstract:
Women who ran for office in 2018 used a variety of strategies on the campaign trail, with some highlighting more masculine traits and others more feminine traits, but the latter was more common than in prior years. We ask how effective these strategies are for trait evaluations, perceptions of leadership and competence, likeability, and vote choice and how this effect varies based on respondent's views about the role of women in society. To explore these relationships, we use data from a two-wave panel conducted in the winter of 2019. Results from our experiment show that female candidates who highlight more masculine traits are perceived as more agentic, less communal, and more competent, and, importantly, they do not appear to suffer from a backlash effect. Those higher in sexism also evaluate women who display these qualities as more competent, though as less warm and likable.
Do Early Voters Try to Mobilize Others?
Jacob Neiheisel & Sarah Niebler
Election Law Journal, forthcoming
Abstract:
Early voting has been pitched as a way to help boost voter turnout in the United States. The evidence pointing to a positive association between the availability of early voting and electoral participation is decidedly mixed, however. Some studies have even found that provisions for early voting are negatively correlated with aggregate voter turnout. The explanations that have been offered for this surprising, negative relationship vary to some degree. One popular theory centers on declines in social pressure that might be expected to accompany large numbers of highly-engaged voters casting their ballots well in advance of Election Day. Equally as surprising as these negative findings is the fact that the mechanisms that have been proposed by way of an explanation for their existence have yet to see a direct test in the literature. In this article, we remedy this lacuna by exploring the relationship between early voting and political talk and mobilization efforts at the individual level using several years of ANES and CES data. Our results exhibit a great deal of nuance. However, after focusing on the set of cases that are the most likely to exhibit the theorized (negative) effects of having voted early, we do find consistent evidence that those who cast their ballots in advance of the day of the election engaged in lower levels of political talk. Our study thereby lends some credence to the idea that early voting may be associated with declines in the peer-to-peer transmission of electorally relevant social pressures.
Pack-Crack-Pack: Gerrymandering with Differential Turnout
Laurent Bouton et al.
NBER Working Paper, July 2023
Abstract:
This paper studies the manipulation of electoral maps by political parties, known as gerrymandering. At the core of our analysis is the recognition that districts must have the same population size but only voters matter for electoral incentives. Using a novel model of gerrymandering that allows for heterogeneity in turnout rates, we show that parties adopt different gerrymandering strategies depending on the turnout rates of their supporters relative to those of their opponents. The broad pattern is to "pack-crack-pack" along the turnout dimension. That is, parties benefit from packing both supporters with a low turnout rate and opponents with a high turnout rate in some districts, while creating districts that mix supporters and opponents with intermediate turnout rates. This framework allows us to derive a number of empirical implications about the link between partisan support, turnout rates, and electoral maps. Using a novel empirical strategy that relies on the comparison of maps proposed by Democrats and Republicans during the 2020 redistricting cycle in the US, we then bring such empirical implications to the data and find support for them.
How Trump triumphed: Multi-candidate primaries with buffoons
Micael Castanheira et al.
European Economic Review, forthcoming
Abstract:
While people on all sides of the political spectrum were amazed that Donald Trump won the Republican nomination this paper theorizes that Trump's victory was not a crazy event but rather the equilibrium outcome of a multi-candidate race where one candidate, the buffoon, is viewed as likely to self-destruct and hence unworthy of attack. Our model conceptualizes primaries as a truel (a three-way duel); we solve for its equilibrium, and test its implications in a laboratory experiment. We find that people recognize a buffoon when they see one and aim their attacks elsewhere with the unfortunate consequence that the buffoon has an enhanced probability of winning. This result is strongest amongst those subjects who demonstrate an ability to best respond, suggesting that our results would only be stronger when the game is played by experts and for higher stakes.
Part of the gender gap in voting for Democrats arises because a higher proportion of women than men voters are Black
Paula England et al.
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 20 June 2023
Abstract:
Women voted for the Democratic candidate more than men did in each US presidential election since 1980. We show that part of the gender gap stems from the fact that a higher proportion of women than men voters are Black, and Black voters overwhelmingly choose Democratic candidates. Past research shows that Black men have especially high rates of death, incarceration, and disenfranchisement due to criminal convictions. These disparities reduce the share of men voters who are Black. We show that the gender difference in racial composition explains 24% of the gender gap in voting Democratic. The gender gap in voting Democratic is especially large among those who are never-married, and, among them, the differing racial composition of men and women voters is more impactful than in the population at large, explaining 43% of the gender gap. We consider an alternative hypothesis that income differences between single men and women explain the gender gap in voting, but our analysis leads us to reject it. Although unmarried women are poorer than unmarried men, and lower-income voters vote slightly more Democratic, the latter difference is too small for income to explain much of the gender gap in voting. In short, the large gender gap among unmarried voters is not a reflection of the lower incomes of women's households but does reflect the fact that women voters are disproportionately Black. We used the General Social Survey as the data source for the analysis, then replicated results with the American National Election Survey data.
Encouraging Black and Latinx Radio Audiences to Register to Vote: A Field Experiment
Hayley Cohen et al.
American Politics Research, forthcoming
Abstract:
Traditional in-person voter registration drives increase voter registration rates in minority communities but became infeasible during the 2020 COVID-19 epidemic. An alternative approach is to promote registration through mass media, such as local radio. We present results from a large-scale experiment testing the effects of radio ads on voter registration. During the run up to the November 2020 election, we identified 186 radio stations with predominantly Latinx or African American audiences; 50 randomly selected stations were assigned to a week-long advertising campaign each week for 3 weeks. Nonpartisan messages encouraged voter registration by stressing the importance of the election and featured celebrity voices. The number of new registrants rose slightly in treated areas during the week when the ads aired. No further gains were apparent one or 2 weeks later.
Widespread partisan gerrymandering mostly cancels nationally, but reduces electoral competition
Christopher Kenny et al.
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 20 June 2023
Abstract:
Congressional district lines in many US states are drawn by partisan actors, raising concerns about gerrymandering. To separate the partisan effects of redistricting from the effects of other factors including geography and redistricting rules, we compare possible party compositions of the US House under the enacted plan to those under a set of alternative simulated plans that serve as a nonpartisan baseline. We find that partisan gerrymandering is widespread in the 2020 redistricting cycle, but most of the electoral bias it creates cancels at the national level, giving Republicans two additional seats on average. Geography and redistricting rules separately contribute a moderate pro-Republican bias. Finally, we find that partisan gerrymandering reduces electoral competition and makes the partisan composition of the US House less responsive to shifts in the national vote.
Mail Voting and Voter Turnout
Michael McDonald et al.
Election Law Journal, forthcoming
Abstract:
Does the expansion of voting by mail lead to higher turnout rates? Our thesis challenges the theoretical motivation underlying existing studies that expect merely a substitution effect, or worse, a decrease in turnout, in states that have more expansive convenience voting mechanisms in place, in particular, mail voting. The COVID-19 pandemic reshaped how we usually conceive of convenience voting, from the timing of the vote to the modality. But even before the 2020 election, we show voter turnout across the states is consistently higher in every general election over the past decade in states with greater shares of overall ballots cast by mail. Drawing on turnout data from the 2012-2020 Current Population Survey (CPS) and the Cooperative Election Study (CES), we find states with greater usage of mail voting experience higher overall voter turnout.
Campaigning Through Cable: Examining the Relationship Between Cable News Appearances and House Candidate Fundraising
Seth Benson & Scott Limbocker
American Politics Research, forthcoming
Abstract:
Appearances of elected officials on cable news have become a regular feature of American politics. Do candidates going on cable news see a subsequent bump in fundraising? We evaluate all television appearances for every major party candidate running for the House from 2009-2020 on CNN, MSNBC, and Fox News. We match these with FEC records of every individual campaign contribution made during the same period. We find evidence that candidates who appear on cable news do see a spike in fundraising on the day of the appearance. We find incumbents raise more money from in-state donors while nonincumbents see a bump from out-of-state donors. Also, this money comes more from appearances in primetime slots, not daytime appearances. Given that candidates see a bump in fundraising for TV appearances, it remains likely that this facet of American politics will persist.