Elections and selfishness

Elections affect the division of resources in society and are occasions for political elites to make appeals rooted voters' self-interest. Hence, elections may erode altruistic norms cause people behave more selfishly. We test this intuition using Dictator Games a lab-in-the-field experiment involving sample than 1000 individuals Kenya Tanzania. adopt two approaches. First, we experimentally prime participants think about upcoming or most recent find that priming treatment reduces how much money willing give other players. Second, compare results obtained across lab rounds taking place right before country's 2013 national eight months prior, selfishness is greater round proximate election. Our suggest social behavior important—and previously unrecognized—ways.