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  • 2022
  • Working Paper

Electoral Turnovers

By: Benjamin Marx, Vincent Pons and Vincent Rollet
  • Format:Print
  • | Language:English
  • | Pages:122
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Abstract

In most national elections, voters face a key choice between continuity and change. Electoral turnovers occur when the incumbent candidate or party fails to win reelection. To understand how turnovers affect national outcomes, we study the universe of presidential and parliamentary elections held since 1945. We document the prevalence of turnovers over time and we estimate their effects on economic performance, trade, human development, conflict, and democracy. Using a close-elections regression discontinuity design (RDD) across countries, we show that turnovers improve country performance. These effects are not driven by differences in the characteristics of challengers, or by the fact that challengers systematically increase the level of government intervention in the economy. Electing new leaders leads to more policy change, it improves governance, and it reduces perceived corruption, consistent with the expectation that recently elected leaders exert more effort due to stronger reputation concerns.

Keywords

Election Outcomes; Regression Discontinuity Design; Political Elections; Change; Global Range; Outcome or Result; Economy; Governance; Performance Improvement

Citation

Marx, Benjamin, Vincent Pons, and Vincent Rollet. "Electoral Turnovers." NBER Working Paper Series, No. 29766, February 2022. (Revise and resubmit requested, Review of Economic Studies.)
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About The Author

Vincent Pons

Business, Government and the International Economy
→More Publications

More from the Authors

    • 2023
    • Faculty Research

    The Effect of Childhood Environment on Political Behavior: Evidence from Young U.S. Movers, 1992–2021

    By: Jacob R. Brown, Enrico Cantoni, Sahil Chinoy, Martin Koenen and Vincent Pons
    • October 2023
    • American Economic Journal: Applied Economics

    Coordination and Bandwagon Effects: How Past Rankings Shape the Behavior of Voters and Candidates

    By: Riako Granzier, Vincent Pons and Clémence Tricaud
    • September 2023
    • BMJ Global Health

    Addressing Vaccine Hesitancy: Experimental Evidence from Nine Countries during the COVID-19 Pandemic

    By: Vincenzo Galasso, Vincent Pons, Paola Profeta, Martin McKee, David Stuckler, Michael Becher, Sylvain Brouard and Martial Foucault
More from the Authors
  • The Effect of Childhood Environment on Political Behavior: Evidence from Young U.S. Movers, 1992–2021 By: Jacob R. Brown, Enrico Cantoni, Sahil Chinoy, Martin Koenen and Vincent Pons
  • Coordination and Bandwagon Effects: How Past Rankings Shape the Behavior of Voters and Candidates By: Riako Granzier, Vincent Pons and Clémence Tricaud
  • Addressing Vaccine Hesitancy: Experimental Evidence from Nine Countries during the COVID-19 Pandemic By: Vincenzo Galasso, Vincent Pons, Paola Profeta, Martin McKee, David Stuckler, Michael Becher, Sylvain Brouard and Martial Foucault
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