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The sources of protectionist drift in representative democracies

In: International Trade Agreements and Political Economy

Author

Listed:
  • Didier Laussel

    (GREQAM, University of Aix-Marseille 2, Marseille, France)

  • Raymond Riezman

    (Department of Economics, University of Iowa, Iowa City, IA 52242, USA)

Abstract

We analyze a two country-two good model of international trade in which citizens in each country differ by their specific factor endowments. The trade policy in each country is set by the politician who has been elected by the citizens in a previous stage. Due to a delegation effect citizens generally favor candidates who are more protectionist than they are. The one-candidate-per-country equilibria exhibit a "protectionist drift" owing to this delegation effect. In addition, we find an additional source of protectionist drift that we call the "abstention effect". Not only do candidates wish to delegate to more protectionist colleagues, but these more protectionist colleagues who can win election, prefer still more protectionist candidates than themselves. Therefore, they have an incentive to abstain, that is, not run for election. We show that because of this abstention effect there exists a range of electable citizens all of whom are more protectionist than the median voter's most preferred candidate. We extend the analysis allowing two-candidate equilibria and the possibility that there are costs and benefits of holding office.

Suggested Citation

  • Didier Laussel & Raymond Riezman, 2013. "The sources of protectionist drift in representative democracies," World Scientific Book Chapters, in: Raymond Riezman (ed.), International Trade Agreements and Political Economy, chapter 14, pages 225-246, World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd..
    • Handle: RePEc:wsi:wschap:9789814390125_0014
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    Cited by:

    1. is not listed on IDEAS
    2. Keisuke Hattori, 2010. "Strategic Voting for Noncooperative Environmental Policies in Open Economies," Environmental & Resource Economics, Springer;European Association of Environmental and Resource Economists, vol. 46(4), pages 459-474, August.
    3. Facchini, Giovanni & Silva, Peri & Willmann, Gerald, 2013. "The customs union issue: Why do we observe so few of them?," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 90(1), pages 136-147.
    4. Grégoire Rota Graziosi, 2009. "On the Strategic Use of Representative Democracy in International Agreements," Journal of Public Economic Theory, Association for Public Economic Theory, vol. 11(2), pages 281-296, April.
    5. Roelfsema, Hein, 2007. "Strategic delegation of environmental policy making," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Elsevier, vol. 53(2), pages 270-275, March.

    More about this item

    Keywords

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    JEL classification:

    • P16 - Political Economy and Comparative Economic Systems - - Capitalist Economies - - - Capitalist Institutions; Welfare State
    • F13 - International Economics - - Trade - - - Trade Policy; International Trade Organizations

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