IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/kap/pubcho/v176y2018i1d10.1007_s11127-017-0492-2.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Candidate ideology and electoral success in congressional elections

Author

Listed:
  • Jamie L. Carson

    (University of Georgia)

  • Ryan D. Williamson

    (American Political Science Association)

Abstract

In examining the factors that contribute to electoral success in congressional elections, legislative scholars often consider the actions of elected representatives; however, other research suggests that one must consider what challengers are (or are not) doing as well. For instance, inexperience and poor funding can significantly inhibit challenger success. We expand this list of potential shortcomings by arguing that ideological congruence with a constituency may be another factor in explaining challenger defeat. Using ideology measures derived from campaign contributions, we find that unsuccessful challengers in the U.S. House are generally more extreme than those who win, but ideological extremity is not a disadvantage to those seeking to represent an extreme constituency. More importantly, our existing political institutions may actually serve to mitigate the already high levels of partisan polarization in Congress.

Suggested Citation

  • Jamie L. Carson & Ryan D. Williamson, 2018. "Candidate ideology and electoral success in congressional elections," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 176(1), pages 175-192, July.
    • Handle: RePEc:kap:pubcho:v:176:y:2018:i:1:d:10.1007_s11127-017-0492-2
    DOI: 10.1007/s11127-017-0492-2
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s11127-017-0492-2
    File Function: Abstract
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1007/s11127-017-0492-2?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    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. Hall, Andrew B., 2015. "What Happens When Extremists Win Primaries?," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 109(1), pages 18-42, February.
    3. Bernhardt, M. Daniel & Ingerman, Daniel E., 1985. "Candidate reputations and the `incumbency effect'," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 27(1), pages 47-67, June.
    4. Canes-Wrone, Brandice & Brady, David W. & Cogan, John F., 2002. "Out of Step, Out of Office: Electoral Accountability and House Members' Voting," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 96(1), pages 127-140, March.
    5. Hinckley, Barbara, 1980. "House Re-elections and Senate Defeats: The Role of the Challenger," British Journal of Political Science, Cambridge University Press, vol. 10(4), pages 441-460, October.
    6. David S. Lee & Enrico Moretti & Matthew J. Butler, 2004. "Do Voters Affect or Elect Policies? Evidence from the U. S. House," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 119(3), pages 807-859.
    7. Anthony Downs, 1957. "An Economic Theory of Political Action in a Democracy," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 65(2), pages 135-135.
    8. Mann, Thomas E. & Wolfinger, Raymond E., 1980. "Candidates and Parties in Congressional Elections," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 74(3), pages 617-632, September.
    9. Kernell, Georgia, 2009. "Giving Order to Districts: Estimating Voter Distributions with National Election Returns," Political Analysis, Cambridge University Press, vol. 17(3), pages 215-235, July.
    10. Jacobson, Gary C., 1978. "The Effects of Campaign Spending in Congressional Elections," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 72(2), pages 469-491, June.
    11. Jacobson, Gary C., 1989. "Strategic Politicians and the Dynamics of U.S. House Elections, 1946–86," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 83(3), pages 773-793, September.
    12. Gerber, Alan, 1998. "Estimating the Effect of Campaign Spending on Senate Election Outcomes Using Instrumental Variables," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 92(2), pages 401-411, June.
    13. Enelow, James M. & Hinich, Melvin J., 1982. "Ideology, Issues, and the Spatial Theory of Elections," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 76(3), pages 493-501, September.
    14. Poole, Keith T & Romer, Thomas, 1993. "Ideology, "Shirking", and Representation," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 77(1), pages 185-196, September.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Douglas D. Roscoe & Shannon Jenkins, 2021. "Amateur hour: The dominance of purposive benefits among local political party chairs," Social Science Quarterly, Southwestern Social Science Association, vol. 102(4), pages 1602-1614, July.

    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. Michael J. Ensley & Michael W. Tofias & Scott De Marchi, 2009. "District Complexity as an Advantage in Congressional Elections," American Journal of Political Science, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 53(4), pages 990-1005, October.
    2. McMurray, Joseph, 2022. "Polarization and pandering in common-interest elections," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 133(C), pages 150-161.
    3. Robert E. Hogan, 2008. "Policy Responsiveness and Incumbent Reelection in State Legislatures," American Journal of Political Science, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 52(4), pages 858-873, October.
    4. Persson, Torsten & Tabellini, Guido, 2002. "Political economics and public finance," Handbook of Public Economics, in: A. J. Auerbach & M. Feldstein (ed.), Handbook of Public Economics, edition 1, volume 3, chapter 24, pages 1549-1659, Elsevier.
    5. Alan E. Wiseman, 2006. "A Theory of Partisan Support and Entry Deterrence in Electoral Competition," Journal of Theoretical Politics, , vol. 18(2), pages 123-158, April.
    6. Bekkouche, Yasmine & Cagé, Julia & Dewitte, Edgard, 2022. "The heterogeneous price of a vote: Evidence from multiparty systems, 1993–2017," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 206(C).
    7. Li, Cheng & Wang, Le & Zhang, Junsen, 2024. "Politician’s childhood experience and government policies: Evidence from the Chinese Great Famine," Journal of Comparative Economics, Elsevier, vol. 52(1), pages 76-92.
    8. Gerald Carlino & Thorsten Drautzburg & Robert Inman & Nicholas Zarra, 2023. "Partisanship and Fiscal Policy in Economic Unions: Evidence from US States," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 113(3), pages 701-737, March.
    9. Haifeng Huang, 2010. "Electoral Competition When Some Candidates Lie and Others Pander," Journal of Theoretical Politics, , vol. 22(3), pages 333-358, July.
    10. Bekkouche, Yasmine & Cagé, Julia & Dewitte, Edgard, 2022. "The heterogeneous price of a vote: Evidence from multiparty systems, 1993–2017," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 206(C).
    11. Yasmine Bekkouche & Julia Cage, 2019. "The Heterogeneous Price of a Vote: Evidence from France, 1993-2014," SciencePo Working papers Main hal-03393084, HAL.
    12. repec:spo:wpecon:info:hdl:2441/2ahul47tb09rvqfl9eelv7o5ca is not listed on IDEAS
    13. Eric Dunaway & Felix Munoz-Garcia, 2020. "Campaign contributions and policy convergence: asymmetric agents and donations constraints," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 184(3), pages 429-461, September.
    14. Lind, Jo Thori, 2020. "Rainy day politics. An instrumental variables approach to the effect of parties on political outcomes," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 61(C).
    15. Ben Lockwood & James Rockey, 2020. "Negative Voters? Electoral Competition with Loss-Aversion," The Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 130(632), pages 2619-2648.
    16. Aragones, Enriqueta & Palfrey, Thomas R., 2002. "The Effect of Candidate Quality on Electoral Equilibrium: An Experimental Study," Working Papers 1138, California Institute of Technology, Division of the Humanities and Social Sciences.
    17. Bonnet, Paolo & Olper, Alessandro, 2024. "Party affiliation, economic interests and U.S. governors’ renewable energy policies," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 130(C).
    18. Brandon Marshall & Michael Peress, 2018. "Dynamic estimation of ideal points for the US Congress," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 176(1), pages 153-174, July.
    19. Stratmann, Thomas, 2013. "The effects of earmarks on the likelihood of reelection," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 32(C), pages 341-355.
    20. Justin Buchler, 2011. "The proximity paradox: the legislative agenda and the electoral success of ideological extremists," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 148(1), pages 1-19, July.
    21. Fabio Padovano, 2013. "Are we witnessing a paradigm shift in the analysis of political competition?," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 156(3), pages 631-651, September.

    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:kap:pubcho:v:176:y:2018:i:1:d:10.1007_s11127-017-0492-2. 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: Sonal Shukla or Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.springer.com .

    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.