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Public law enforcers and political competition

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  • Eric Langlais

    (EconomiX - EconomiX - UPN - Université Paris Nanterre - CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique)

  • Marie Obidzinski

Abstract

In this paper, we analyze how political competition affects the designof public law enforcement policies. Assuming that the cost of enforcement is linear, criminals'type is uniformally distributed, and society's wealth is large enough, the article arrives at two main conclusions: 1) electoral competition entails no loss of efficiency at equilibrium for both minor and major offenses (e.g. minor offenses are not enforced, while major ones are fully deterred); 2) different distortions arises at equilibrium for the intermediate offenses: enforcement expenditures for small offenses are lower than the optimal level, such that the issue of under-deterrence is exacerbated; in contrast, for larger offenses, enforcement measures are higher, and there is more deterrence than what efficiency requires. We show that these results also holds under more general assumptions (convex costs of enforcement, a general cdf of illegal bene.ts, a lower society's wealth), excepted that full deterrence of major offenses is not achievable.

Suggested Citation

  • Eric Langlais & Marie Obidzinski, 2015. "Public law enforcers and political competition," Working Papers hal-04141377, HAL.
    • Handle: RePEc:hal:wpaper:hal-04141377
    Note: View the original document on HAL open archive server: https://hal.science/hal-04141377
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    Cited by:

    1. Éric Langlais & Marie Obidzinski, 2015. "The Structure of Fines in the Light of Political Competition," Revue d'économie politique, Dalloz, vol. 125(5), pages 717-729.

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Public law enforcement; deterrence; monetary sanctions; electoral competition.;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • D72 - Microeconomics - - Analysis of Collective Decision-Making - - - Political Processes: Rent-seeking, Lobbying, Elections, Legislatures, and Voting Behavior
    • D73 - Microeconomics - - Analysis of Collective Decision-Making - - - Bureaucracy; Administrative Processes in Public Organizations; Corruption
    • H1 - Public Economics - - Structure and Scope of Government
    • K14 - Law and Economics - - Basic Areas of Law - - - Criminal Law
    • K23 - Law and Economics - - Regulation and Business Law - - - Regulated Industries and Administrative Law
    • K4 - Law and Economics - - Legal Procedure, the Legal System, and Illegal Behavior

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