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Policies and prizes

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  • Hillman, Arye L.
  • Long, Ngo V.

Abstract

The political-economy view of public policy is that policies that do not have majority support among voters arise because of a principal-agent problem that impedes voter disciplining of policy decisions of political representatives. We study a case in which voter disciplining could take place and the policy decision was a choice between electoral popularity and the prospect of winning the Nobel Peace Prize. The background for our model is the electorally-unpopular open-door refugee policy of German chancellor Angela Merkel. Our study motivates the question whether, because of the compromise of democratic accountability, it should be permissible for the Nobel Peace Prize to be awarded to politicians, either as incumbents or after they have left political office.

Suggested Citation

  • Hillman, Arye L. & Long, Ngo V., 2018. "Policies and prizes," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 54(C), pages 99-109.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:poleco:v:54:y:2018:i:c:p:99-109
    DOI: 10.1016/j.ejpoleco.2018.03.008
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    Cited by:

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    3. Didier Laussel & Ngo Van Long, 2020. "Tying the politicians’ hands: The optimal limits to representative democracy," Journal of Public Economic Theory, Association for Public Economic Theory, vol. 22(1), pages 25-48, February.
    4. Tomberg, Lukas & Smith Stegen, Karen & Vance, Colin, 2021. "“The mother of all political problems”? On asylum seekers and elections," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 67(C).

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Immigration; Refugees; Asylum seekers; Nobel peace prize; Democratic accountability; Angela Merkel;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • J18 - Labor and Demographic Economics - - Demographic Economics - - - Public Policy

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