Contract clientelism: How infrastructure contracts fund vote-buying

Where does the money come from to buy votes? We argue that an important source of funds for vote-buying comes ‘contract clientelism’, or provision public contracts private firms in exchange campaign donations. Using quantitative data on Colombian infrastructure contracts, we demonstrate municipalities exhibit ‘electoral contracting cycle’ which incumbents assign low-quality while trail. Contract manipulations are more common with higher reports clientelist activity. Qualitative evidence two cities, Barranquilla and Santa Marta, reinforce contractors provide a critical finance can create subnational political monopolies. The main contribution is question classic tension between clientelistic distribution goods provision. Politicians need secure handouts but, so doing, they often promote weaken local states.