IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/bri/uobdis/25-803.html

Political Careers in Brazil: the effect of winning vs. being the runner-up

Author

Listed:
  • Leandro De Magalhães
  • Thomaz M. F. Gemignani
  • Salomo Hirvonen

Abstract

Political careers often include transitions between elected offices. Using complete electoral data for Brazil (1998-2014), we document office-to-office transitions and use a regression discontinuity design to estimate the advantage of winning office, both when re-running for the same office (incumbency advantage), and when contending for other offices as well (career advantage). We find a clear ranking. Winning a seat in the federal or state legislatures gives an incumbency advantage. Becoming a mayor gives no incumbency advantage. The career advantage is smaller across these three offices as runners-up outperform winners in other offices. For municipal councilors, results are reversed: an incumbency disadvantage, and a small but positive effect of winners outperforming runners-up in other offices. With an heterogeneity analysis, we show that sub-samples of candidates with no experience, less educated, with a lower share of the vote, and running in smaller municipalities explain the incumbency disadvantage for local councilors.

Suggested Citation

  • Leandro De Magalhães & Thomaz M. F. Gemignani & Salomo Hirvonen, 2025. "Political Careers in Brazil: the effect of winning vs. being the runner-up," Bristol Economics Discussion Papers 25/803, School of Economics, University of Bristol, UK.
    • Handle: RePEc:bri:uobdis:25/803
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.bristol.ac.uk/efm/media/workingpapers/working_papers/pdffiles/dp25803.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Fernando Ferreira & Joseph Gyourko, 2009. "Do Political Parties Matter? Evidence from U.S. Cities," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 124(1), pages 399-422.
    2. Fowler, Anthony & Hall, Andrew B., 2014. "Disentangling the Personal and Partisan Incumbency Advantages: Evidence from Close Elections and Term Limits," Quarterly Journal of Political Science, now publishers, vol. 9(4), pages 501-531, December.
    3. Leandro de Magalhaes & Salomo Hirvonen, 2019. "The Incumbent-Challenger Advantage and the Winner-Runner-up Advantage," Bristol Economics Discussion Papers 19/710, School of Economics, University of Bristol, UK.
    4. Sebastian Calonico & Matias D. Cattaneo & Rocio Titiunik, 2014. "Robust Nonparametric Confidence Intervals for Regression‐Discontinuity Designs," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 82, pages 2295-2326, November.
    5. Sebastian Calonico & Matias D Cattaneo & Max H Farrell, 2020. "Optimal bandwidth choice for robust bias-corrected inference in regression discontinuity designs," The Econometrics Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 23(2), pages 192-210.
    6. Kaisa Kotakorpi & Panu Poutvaara & Marko Terviö, 2017. "Returns to Office in National and Local Politics: A Bootstrap Method and Evidence from Finland," The Journal of Law, Economics, and Organization, Oxford University Press, vol. 33(3), pages 413-442.
    7. Novaes, Lucas M. & Schiumerini, Luis, 2022. "Commodity Shocks and Incumbency Effects," British Journal of Political Science, Cambridge University Press, vol. 52(4), pages 1689-1708, October.
    8. McCrain, Joshua & O'Connell, Stephen D., 2023. "Experience, institutions, and candidate emergence: the political career returns to state legislative service," Political Science Research and Methods, Cambridge University Press, vol. 11(4), pages 763-784, October.
    9. Freier, Ronny, 2015. "The mayor's advantage: Causal evidence on incumbency effects in German mayoral elections," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 40(PA), pages 16-30.
    10. Santosh Anagol & Thomas Fujiwara, 2016. "The Runner-Up Effect," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 124(4), pages 927-991.
    11. David S. Lee, 2001. "The Electoral Advantage to Incumbency and Voters' Valuation of Politicians' Experience: A Regression Discontinuity Analysis of Elections to the U.S..," NBER Working Papers 8441, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    12. Folke, Olle & Persson, Torsten & Rickne, Johanna, 2016. "The Primary Effect: Preference Votes and Political Promotions," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 110(3), pages 559-578, August.
    13. Galasso, Vincenzo & Nannicini, Tommaso, 2011. "Competing on Good Politicians," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 105(1), pages 79-99, February.
    14. Klašnja, Marko & Titiunik, Rocío, 2017. "The Incumbency Curse: Weak Parties, Term Limits, and Unfulfilled Accountability," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 111(1), pages 129-148, February.
    15. Stefano Gagliarducci & M. Daniele Paserman, 2012. "Gender Interactions within Hierarchies: Evidence from the Political Arena," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 79(3), pages 1021-1052.
    16. Daniel Diermeier & Michael Keane & Antonio Merlo, 2005. "A Political Economy Model of Congressional Careers," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 95(1), pages 347-373, March.
    17. Lee, David S., 2008. "Randomized experiments from non-random selection in U.S. House elections," Journal of Econometrics, Elsevier, vol. 142(2), pages 675-697, February.
    18. Folke, Olle & Rickne, Johanna, 2025. "The Class Ceiling in Politics," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 119(3), pages 1375-1392, August.
    19. Taylor C. Boas & F. Daniel Hidalgo, 2011. "Controlling the Airwaves: Incumbency Advantage and Community Radio in Brazil," American Journal of Political Science, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 55(4), pages 869-885, October.
    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. Leandro de Magalhaes & Salomo Hirvonen, 2019. "The Incumbent-Challenger Advantage and the Winner-Runner-up Advantage," Bristol Economics Discussion Papers 19/710, School of Economics, University of Bristol, UK.
    2. Fiva, Jon H. & Røhr, Helene Lie, 2018. "Climbing the ranks: incumbency effects in party-list systems," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 101(C), pages 142-156.
    3. Galasso, Vincenzo & Dano, Kevin & Ferlenga, Francesco & LePennec, Caroline & Pons, Vincent, 2022. "Coordination and Incumbency Advantage in Multi-Party Systems - Evidence from French Elections," CEPR Discussion Papers 17600, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    4. Davide Cipullo, 2021. "Gender Gaps in Political Careers: Evidence from Competitive Elections," CESifo Working Paper Series 9075, CESifo.
    5. Guastavino, Carlos & Miranda, Alvaro & Montero, Rodrigo, 2021. "Rank effect in bureaucrat recruitment," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 68(C).
    6. Ercio Andres Munoz, 2021. "Incumbency advantage, money, and campaigns: A note on some suggestive evidence from Chile," Economics Bulletin, AccessEcon, vol. 41(3), pages 1203-1211.
    7. Quaresima Federico & Santolini Raffaella & Fiorillo Fabio, 2020. "Political affiliation in post-parliamentary careers in Italian public enterprises," German Economic Review, De Gruyter, vol. 21(1), pages 35-64, April.
    8. Gutierrez, Emilio, 2015. "Fighting Crime with a Little Help from my Friends: Political Alignment, Inter-Jurisdictional Cooperation and Crime in Mexico," CEPR Discussion Papers 10769, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    9. Joaquín Artés & Ignacio Jurado, 2018. "Government fragmentation and fiscal deficits: a regression discontinuity approach," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 175(3), pages 367-391, June.
    10. Ari Hyytinen & Jaakko Meriläinen & Tuukka Saarimaa & Otto Toivanen & Janne Tukiainen, 2018. "When does regression discontinuity design work? Evidence from random election outcomes," Quantitative Economics, Econometric Society, vol. 9(2), pages 1019-1051, July.
    11. Mauricio Villamizar‐Villegas & Freddy A. Pinzon‐Puerto & Maria Alejandra Ruiz‐Sanchez, 2022. "A comprehensive history of regression discontinuity designs: An empirical survey of the last 60 years," Journal of Economic Surveys, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 36(4), pages 1130-1178, September.
    12. Luca Bellodi & Massimo Morelli & Matia Vannoni, 2021. "A Costly Commitment: Populism, Government Performance, and the Quality of Bureaucracy," CESifo Working Paper Series 9470, CESifo.
    13. Jeremy Bowles & Benjamin Marx, 2022. "Turnover and Accountability in Africa's Parliaments," Working Papers hal-03873800, HAL.
    14. Antony Mbithi & Yoko Kijima, 2026. "Rent Extraction and Political Accountability: Evidence From Audit Impact in Kenya," Review of Development Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 30(1), pages 255-287, February.
    15. Bracco, Emanuele & Porcelli, Francesco & Redoano, Michela, 2019. "Political competition, tax salience and accountability. Theory and evidence from Italy," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 58(C), pages 138-163.
    16. Ferreira, Fernando & Gyourko, Joseph, 2014. "Does gender matter for political leadership? The case of U.S. mayors," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 112(C), pages 24-39.
    17. Ortega, Alberto, 2020. "State partisanship and higher education," Economics of Education Review, Elsevier, vol. 76(C).
    18. Makkar, Karan, 2023. "Defector Politicians and Economic Growth: Evidence from India," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 79(C).
    19. Federico Quaresima & Fabio Fiorillo & Raffaella Santolini, 2018. "Does Political Affiliation Matter On Post-Parliamentary Careers In The Boards Of Public Enterprises?," Working Papers 429, Universita' Politecnica delle Marche (I), Dipartimento di Scienze Economiche e Sociali.
    20. Bernardo P. Schettini & Rafael Terra, 2020. "Electoral incentives and Public Employees’ Retirement Systems in Brazilian municipalities," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 184(1), pages 79-103, July.

    More about this item

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    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:bri:uobdis:25/803. 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: School of Economics Research Support Team (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/sebriuk.html .

    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.