IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/spr/jopoec/v38y2025i4d10.1007_s00148-025-01125-z.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

The political economy of group domination and pre-electoral violence

Author

Listed:
  • Sugata Ghosh

    (Brunel University of London)

  • Petros G. Sekeris

    (TBS Business School)

  • Shikha Silwal

    (Washington and Lee University)

Abstract

We construct a theoretical model to study the effects of pre-electoral violence in a political economy set-up. In an environment pervaded by ethnic cleavages, we model violence in terms of a group destroying the rival group’s production potential, which impairs that group’s productivity not only in material terms but also by breaking the targeted group’s cohesion and morale through fear and intimidation. We show that the destruction perpetrated by either group is increasing in their rival’s productivity, and is decreasing in the potential uncertainty surrounding the political process, in their own group’s share of the population, and in the degree of authoritarianism of the studied society. Our case studies on Zimbabwe, Kenya, and Nigeria provide support to our theory.

Suggested Citation

  • Sugata Ghosh & Petros G. Sekeris & Shikha Silwal, 2025. "The political economy of group domination and pre-electoral violence," Journal of Population Economics, Springer;European Society for Population Economics, vol. 38(4), pages 1-31, December.
    • Handle: RePEc:spr:jopoec:v:38:y:2025:i:4:d:10.1007_s00148-025-01125-z
    DOI: 10.1007/s00148-025-01125-z
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s00148-025-01125-z
    File Function: Abstract
    Download Restriction: Access to the full text of the articles in this series is restricted.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1007/s00148-025-01125-z?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

    for a different version of it.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    ;
    ;
    ;

    JEL classification:

    • D72 - Microeconomics - - Analysis of Collective Decision-Making - - - Political Processes: Rent-seeking, Lobbying, Elections, Legislatures, and Voting Behavior
    • D74 - Microeconomics - - Analysis of Collective Decision-Making - - - Conflict; Conflict Resolution; Alliances; Revolutions
    • F50 - International Economics - - International Relations, National Security, and International Political Economy - - - General

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    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:spr:jopoec:v:38:y:2025:i:4:d:10.1007_s00148-025-01125-z. 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.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using 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.