IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/pubeco/v94y2010i11-12p1020-1027.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Flip-flopping from primaries to general elections

Author

Listed:
  • Hummel, Patrick

Abstract

I consider a model in which candidates must win a primary election to compete in the general election. Candidates may choose different policies in the primary and the general election, but doing so results in accusations of flip-flopping. I show that candidates adopt extreme policies in the primaries but then try to move closer to the center for the general election even though primary voters are forward-looking and anticipate this policy moderation. The extent to which candidates move closer to the center is constrained by flip-flopping costs, and candidates choose divergent policies in the general election. I obtain comparative statics results on candidate policy choices in terms of voter preferences.

Suggested Citation

  • Hummel, Patrick, 2010. "Flip-flopping from primaries to general elections," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 94(11-12), pages 1020-1027, December.
  • Handle: RePEc:eee:pubeco:v:94:y:2010:i:11-12:p:1020-1027
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0047-2727(10)00112-X
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Wittman, Donald, 1983. "Candidate Motivation: A Synthesis of Alternative Theories," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 77(1), pages 142-157, March.
    2. Prat, Andrea, 2002. "Campaign Spending with Office-Seeking Politicians, Rational Voters, and Multiple Lobbies," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 103(1), pages 162-189, March.
    3. Andrea Prat, 2002. "Campaign Advertising and Voter Welfare," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 69(4), pages 999-1017.
    4. Jackson, Matthew O. & Mathevet, Laurent & Mattes, Kyle, 2007. "Nomination Processes and Policy Outcomes," Quarterly Journal of Political Science, now publishers, vol. 2(1), pages 67-92, March.
    5. Timothy Besley & Stephen Coate, 1997. "An Economic Model of Representative Democracy," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 112(1), pages 85-114.
    6. Alejandro Saporiti, 2008. "Existence and Uniqueness of Nash Equilibrium in Electoral Competition Games: The Hybrid Case," Journal of Public Economic Theory, Association for Public Economic Theory, vol. 10(5), pages 827-857, October.
    7. Juan D. Carrillo & Micael Castanheira, 2008. "Information and Strategic Political Polarisation," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 118(530), pages 845-874, July.
    8. Bernhardt, Dan & Duggan, John & Squintani, Francesco, 2009. "The Case for Responsible Parties," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 103(4), pages 570-587, November.
    9. Alberto F. Alesina & Richard T. Holden, 2008. "Ambiguity and Extremism in Elections," NBER Working Papers 14143, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    10. Guillermo Owen & Bernard Grofman, 2006. "Two-stage electoral competition in two-party contests: persistent divergence of party positions," Social Choice and Welfare, Springer;The Society for Social Choice and Welfare, vol. 26(3), pages 547-569, June.
    11. Martin J. Osborne & Al Slivinski, 1996. "A Model of Political Competition with Citizen-Candidates," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 111(1), pages 65-96.
    12. John Cadigan & Eckhard Janeba, 2002. "A Citizen-Candidate Model with Sequential Elections," Journal of Theoretical Politics, , vol. 14(4), pages 387-407, October.
    13. Duggan, John & Fey, Mark, 2005. "Electoral competition with policy-motivated candidates," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 51(2), pages 490-522, May.
    14. James Coleman, 1971. "Internal processes governing party positions in elections," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 11(1), pages 35-60, September.
    15. Steven Callander, 2008. "Political Motivations," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 75(3), pages 671-697.
    16. Stone, Walter J. & Abramowitz, Alan I., 1983. "Winning May Not Be Everything, But It's More than We Thought: Presidential Party Activists in 1980," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 77(4), pages 945-956, December.
    17. Navin Kartik & R. Preston McAfee, 2007. "Signaling Character in Electoral Competition," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 97(3), pages 852-870, June.
    18. Michael Peress, 2010. "The spatial model with non-policy factors: a theory of policy-motivated candidates," Social Choice and Welfare, Springer;The Society for Social Choice and Welfare, vol. 34(2), pages 265-294, February.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Drouvelis, Michalis & Saporiti, Alejandro & Vriend, Nicolaas J., 2014. "Political motivations and electoral competition: Equilibrium analysis and experimental evidence," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 83(C), pages 86-115.
    2. Hummel, Patrick, 2013. "Candidate strategies in primaries and general elections with candidates of heterogeneous quality," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 78(C), pages 85-102.
    3. Drouvelis, Michalis & Saporiti, Alejandro & Vriend, Nicolaas J., 2014. "Political motivations and electoral competition: Equilibrium analysis and experimental evidence," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 83(C), pages 86-115.
    4. Bracco, Emanuele, 2013. "Optimal districting with endogenous party platforms," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 104(C), pages 1-13.
    5. Akifumi Ishihara, 2020. "Strategic candidacy for political compromise in party politics," Journal of Theoretical Politics, , vol. 32(3), pages 389-408, July.
    6. Aytimur, Emre & Boukouras, Aris & Suen, Richard M. H., 2024. "How Does Political Uncertainty Affect the Optimal Degree of Policy Divergence?," MPRA Paper 122279, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    7. Nicolas Motz, 2019. "Who emerges from smoke-filled rooms? Political parties and candidate selection," Social Choice and Welfare, Springer;The Society for Social Choice and Welfare, vol. 52(1), pages 161-196, January.
    8. Per G. Fredriksson & Le Wang & Patrick L Warren, 2013. "Party Politics, Governors, and Economic Policy," Southern Economic Journal, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 80(1), pages 106-126, July.
    9. Paula González & Francesca Passarelli & M. Socorro Puy, 2019. "Discipline, party switching and policy divergence," Working Papers 19.05, Universidad Pablo de Olavide, Department of Economics.
    10. Roberti, Paolo, 2019. "Citizens or lobbies: Who controls policy?," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 113(C), pages 497-514.
    11. Prasenjit Banerjee & Vegard Iversen & Sandip Mitra & Antonio Nicolò & Kunal Sen, 2018. "Politicians and Their Promises in an Uncertain World: Evidence from a Lab-in-the-Field Experiment in India," Economics Discussion Paper Series 1806, Economics, The University of Manchester.
    12. Forand, Jean Guillaume, 2014. "Two-party competition with persistent policies," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 152(C), pages 64-91.
    13. Mihir Bhattacharya, 2024. "A citizen-candidate model of party formation," SERIEs: Journal of the Spanish Economic Association, Springer;Spanish Economic Association, vol. 15(3), pages 299-325, September.
    14. Martínez-Mora, Francisco & Puy, M. Socorro, 2014. "The determinants and electoral consequences of asymmetric preferences," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 33(C), pages 85-97.
    15. Raphael Boleslavsky & Christopher Cotton, 2015. "Information and Extremism in Elections," American Economic Journal: Microeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 7(1), pages 165-207, February.
    16. Krasa, Stefan & Polborn, Mattias, 2010. "Competition between Specialized Candidates," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 104(4), pages 745-765, November.
    17. Andrea Mattozzi & Matias Iaryczower, 2008. "Ideology and Competence in Alternative Electoral Systems," 2008 Meeting Papers 980, Society for Economic Dynamics.
    18. Panu Poutvaara & Tuomas Takalo, 2007. "Candidate quality," International Tax and Public Finance, Springer;International Institute of Public Finance, vol. 14(1), pages 7-27, February.
    19. Anja Prummer, 2016. "Spatial Advertisement in Political Campaigns," Working Papers 805, Queen Mary University of London, School of Economics and Finance.
    20. Agustin Casas, 2020. "Ideological extremism and primaries," Economic Theory, Springer;Society for the Advancement of Economic Theory (SAET), vol. 69(3), pages 829-860, April.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:pubeco:v:94:y:2010:i:11-12:p:1020-1027. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/inca/505578 .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.