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Do candidates serve parties interests? Party Polarization as a discipline device

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Author Info
Cecilia Testa () (Department of Economics, Royal Holloway, University of London)

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Abstract

In this paper we model the interaction between parties and candidates to highlight the mechanisms by which parties selecting candidates may discipline legislators. The selection of candidates happens by majority voting of party members. We assume a multidimentional policy space comprising an ideological and a monetary dimension. Candidates are policy motivated on the ideological dimension only. Hence they care more about winning elections the bigger the ideological distance from the candidate of the opponent party. Therefore, parties can use strategically polarization to provide incentives to candidates. Because of this strategic use of candidate polarization, the polarization of the political race does not always reflect the polarization of voters’ preferences. In general, the polarization of the political race seems to be a compromise between policy preferences of party members and electoral goal as parties may use polarization strategically to provide incentives.

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Publisher Info
Paper provided by Department of Economics, Royal Holloway University of London in its series Royal Holloway, University of London: Discussion Papers in Economics with number 03/13.

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Length: 43 pages
Date of creation: Dec 2003
Date of revision: Dec 2003
Handle: RePEc:hol:holodi:0313

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Related research
Keywords: Rent-Seeking; Elections; Legislatures; Voting Behavior ; Political Parties; Polarization;

Find related papers by JEL classification:
D72 - Microeconomics - - Analysis of Collective Decision-Making - - - Models of Political Processes: Rent-seeking, Elections, Legislatures, and Voting Behavior
D74 - Microeconomics - - Analysis of Collective Decision-Making - - - Conflict; Conflict Resolution; Alliances
C72 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Game Theory and Bargaining Theory - - - Noncooperative Games

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References listed on IDEAS
Please report citation or reference errors to , or , if you are the registered author of the cited work, log in to your RePEc Author Service profile, click on "citations" and make appropriate adjustments.:
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Cited by:
(explanations, Please report citation or reference errors to , or , if you are the registered author of the cited work, log in to your RePEc Author Service profile, click on "citations" and make appropriate adjustments.)

  1. Giovanni Facchini & Cecilia Testa, 2005. "A Theory of Bicameralism," Royal Holloway, University of London: Discussion Papers in Economics 05/04, Department of Economics, Royal Holloway University of London, revised Mar 2005. [Downloadable!]
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