Clientelist politics in Nigeria: Core voters, control and compliance

Clientelismis a defining feature of electoral politics in Nigeria, where political parties prioritize clientelist transfers to core supporters over transfers to swing voters or public goods appeals.What sustains these clientelist partisan pacts?Why are core voters more intensively targeted by clientelist transfers? Drawing on original survey data and key informant interviews, this article shows that core voters possess attributes that make them especially attractive to clientelist parties seeking to reduce defection risks. First, they are more deeply embedded in social networks on which parties can rely to gather information on their preferences and electoral behavior. Second, they are more likely to rely on their networks for voting advice or information. Third, they are more likely toperceivethat the party can monitor their votes. And finally, they are more likely to comply with the clientelist bargain. This makes them in effect a safer bet for clientelist investments. In that context, clientelist targeting leads parties to sustain a core-support group of reliable votes delivery, rather than expand distributive promises to non-core voters. The findings highlight the impotance of voter-level attributes – particularly social network embeddedness – in shaping clientelist targeting and sustaining clientelist partisan pacts.