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Incumbents' Performance and Political Polarization

Author

Listed:
  • Marina Dodlova
  • Galina Zudenkova
Abstract
This paper studies the relationship between incumbents’ performance and political polarization, both with theory and data. The theory is based on a spatial model of political competition in which the voters use the incumbent’s performance in office to update their beliefs about his competence. A better performance leads to the incumbent’s electoral advantage and so allows him to announce a more extreme platform closer to his bliss point. Therefore, conditioned on reelection, a better incumbent’s performance leads to higher political polarization. We use the data on the incumbents’ performance in natural disaster relief and the ideological positions they take in the U.S. House of representatives in 1953-2010. The empirical evidence shows that a better performance in post-disaster recovery is associated with more extreme ideological positions of the corresponding incumbents. These and other empirical results are in line with the model predictions.

Suggested Citation

  • Marina Dodlova & Galina Zudenkova, 2016. "Incumbents' Performance and Political Polarization," CESifo Working Paper Series 5728, CESifo.
    • Handle: RePEc:ces:ceswps:_5728
    as

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    File URL: https://www.cesifo.org/DocDL/cesifo1_wp5728.pdf
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    political polarization; incumbents' performance; spatial competition; natural disasters;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • D72 - Microeconomics - - Analysis of Collective Decision-Making - - - Political Processes: Rent-seeking, Lobbying, Elections, Legislatures, and Voting Behavior
    • H84 - Public Economics - - Miscellaneous Issues - - - Disaster Aid
    • Q54 - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics; Environmental and Ecological Economics - - Environmental Economics - - - Climate; Natural Disasters and their Management; Global Warming

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