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Defying the 'Juncker Curse': Can Reformist Governments Be Re-elected?

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  • Marco Buti
  • Alessandro Turrini
  • Paul Van den Noord
  • Pietro Biroli

Abstract

European policy makers, notably in the euro area, seem to take for granted that the electorate will punish them for bold reform in product and labour markets. This may explain why progress in the euro area has been comparatively limited. This paper posits and, using a dataset for 21 OECD countries, shows that this fear of electoral backlashes is unfounded, provided that financial markets work well. The mechanisms involved are relatively straightforward: well functioning financial markets "bring forward" future yields of structural reform to the present, thus permitting to overcome possible short-run costs. As a result, the electorate tend to reward, not punish, reformist governments. This has important implications for the design of structural reform packages, with financial market reforms being an essential ingredient beside product and labour market reforms.

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Bibliographic Info

Paper provided by Directorate General Economic and Monetary Affairs (DG ECFIN), European Commission in its series European Economy - Economic Papers with number 324.

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Length: 37 pages
Date of creation: May 2008
Date of revision:
Handle: RePEc:euf:ecopap:0324

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Keywords: Economic and Monetary Union; structural reforms; electoral cycle; financial markets; Buti; Turrini; Van den Noord; Biroli;

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  1. Xavier Debrun & Jean Pisani-Ferry & André Sapir, 2008. "Government size and output volatility: should we forsake automatic stabilisation?," Working Papers 47, Bruegel.
  2. Beck, T.H.L. & Clarke, G. & Groff, A. & Keefer , P. & Walsh, P., 2001. "New tools in comparative political economy: The database of political institutions," Open Access publications from Tilburg University urn:nbn:nl:ui:12-3125517, Tilburg University.
  3. Brender, Adi & Drazen, Allan, 2005. "Political budget cycles in new versus established democracies," Journal of Monetary Economics, Elsevier, vol. 52(7), pages 1271-1295, October.
  4. Tabellini, Guido & Alesina, Alberto, 1990. "Voting on the Budget Deficit," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 80(1), pages 37-49, March.
  5. Bertola, Giuseppe, 2007. "Finance and Welfare States in Globalizing Markets," CEPR Discussion Papers 6480, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
  6. Fernandez, Raquel & Rodrik, Dani, 1991. "Resistance to Reform: Status Quo Bias in the Presence of Individual-Specific Uncertainty," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 81(5), pages 1146-55, December.
  7. Drazen, Allan & Eslava, Marcela, 2010. "Electoral manipulation via voter-friendly spending: Theory and evidence," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 92(1), pages 39-52, May.
  8. Tabellini, Guido & Alesina, Alberto, 1990. "Voting on the Budget Deficit," Scholarly Articles 4553030, Harvard University Department of Economics.
  9. Peltzman, Sam, 1992. "Voters as Fiscal Conservatives," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, MIT Press, vol. 107(2), pages 327-61, May.
  10. Brender, Adi, 2003. "The effect of fiscal performance on local government election results in Israel: 1989-1998," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 87(9-10), pages 2187-2205, September.
  11. Buti, Marco & Röger, Werner & Turrini, Alessandro Antonio, 2007. "Is Lisbon far from Maastricht? Trade-offs and Complementarities between Fiscal Discipline and Structural Reforms," CEPR Discussion Papers 6204, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
  12. Romain Duval & Jørgen Elmeskov, 2005. "The Effects of EMU on Structural Reforms in Labour and Product Markets," OECD Economics Department Working Papers 438, OECD Publishing.
  13. Poplawski Ribeiro, Marcos & Beetsma, Roel, 2008. "The political economy of structural reforms under a deficit restriction," Journal of Macroeconomics, Elsevier, vol. 30(1), pages 179-198, March.
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Cited by:
  1. Martin Larch & Paul van den Noord & Lars Jonung, 2010. "The Stability and Growth Pact: Lessons from the Great Recession," European Economy - Economic Papers 429, Directorate General Economic and Monetary Affairs (DG ECFIN), European Commission.
  2. Alberto Alesina & Dorian Carloni & Giampaolo Lecce, 2012. "The Electoral Consequences of Large Fiscal Adjustments," NBER Chapters, in: Fiscal Policy after the Financial Crisis National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
  3. Jacques Pelkmans & Lourdes Acedo Montoya & Alessandro Maravalle, 2008. "How product market reforms lubricate shock adjustment in the euro area," European Economy - Economic Papers 341, Directorate General Economic and Monetary Affairs (DG ECFIN), European Commission.
  4. Paul den Noord, 2011. "Turning the page? EU fiscal consolidation in the wake of the crisis," Empirica, Springer, vol. 38(1), pages 19-51, February.

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