Decentralization and Accountability: Are Voters More Vigilant in Local than in National Elections?
نویسندگان
چکیده
This paper compares voter behavior in local and national elections to make inferences about whether voters are more vigilant in monitoring the more local level of government. Vigilance is defined as retrospective voting where voters evaluate incumbents based on their overall performance during the entire term in office. We contrast voter behavior in state legislative assembly elections in India and elections to the national legislature, over the period 1960−92, for 14 major states in the country. We find that in state assembly elections, voters reward incumbents for local income growth, and punish then for growth in inequality, over the entire term in office. However, in national elections voters behave myopically by rewarding growth in national income and fall in inflation and inequality only in the year just before elections. We argue that the evidence is consistent with greater voter vigilance and government accountability in more local elections.
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