Does a district mandate matter for the behavior of politicians? An analysis of roll-call votes and parliamentary speeches

In most democracies, members of parliament (MPs) are elected either through a party list or by a district. We use a discontinuity in the German electoral system to investigate the causal effect of a district election on an MP’s conformity with the party line. A district election does not affect roll...

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Main Authors: BORN, Andreas, JANSSEN, Aljoscha
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Language:English
Published: Institutional Knowledge at Singapore Management University 2022
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Online Access:https://ink.library.smu.edu.sg/soe_research/2532
https://ink.library.smu.edu.sg/context/soe_research/article/3531/viewcontent/1_s2.0_S017626802100063X_main.pdf
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spelling sg-smu-ink.soe_research-35312022-05-19T01:12:21Z Does a district mandate matter for the behavior of politicians? An analysis of roll-call votes and parliamentary speeches BORN, Andreas JANSSEN, Aljoscha In most democracies, members of parliament (MPs) are elected either through a party list or by a district. We use a discontinuity in the German electoral system to investigate the causal effect of a district election on an MP’s conformity with the party line. A district election does not affect roll-call voting behavior causally, possibly due to overall high adherence to party-line voting. Analyzing the parliamentary speeches of each MP allows us to overcome the high party-line discipline with regard to parliamentary voting. Using textual analysis and machine learning techniques, we create two measures of closeness of an MP’s speeches to the party line. We find that district-elected members of parliament do not differ, in terms of speeches, from those of their party peers who have been elected through closed party lists. However, both speeches and voting correlate with district characteristics, suggesting that district elections allow districts to select more similar candidates rather than changing MPs’ behavior. 2022-01-01T08:00:00Z text application/pdf https://ink.library.smu.edu.sg/soe_research/2532 info:doi/10.1016/j.ejpoleco.2021.102070 https://ink.library.smu.edu.sg/context/soe_research/article/3531/viewcontent/1_s2.0_S017626802100063X_main.pdf http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ Research Collection School Of Economics eng Institutional Knowledge at Singapore Management University Party line Textual analysis Regression discontinuity Parliamentary speeches Voting Political Economy
institution Singapore Management University
building SMU Libraries
continent Asia
country Singapore
Singapore
content_provider SMU Libraries
collection InK@SMU
language English
topic Party line
Textual analysis
Regression discontinuity
Parliamentary speeches
Voting
Political Economy
spellingShingle Party line
Textual analysis
Regression discontinuity
Parliamentary speeches
Voting
Political Economy
BORN, Andreas
JANSSEN, Aljoscha
Does a district mandate matter for the behavior of politicians? An analysis of roll-call votes and parliamentary speeches
description In most democracies, members of parliament (MPs) are elected either through a party list or by a district. We use a discontinuity in the German electoral system to investigate the causal effect of a district election on an MP’s conformity with the party line. A district election does not affect roll-call voting behavior causally, possibly due to overall high adherence to party-line voting. Analyzing the parliamentary speeches of each MP allows us to overcome the high party-line discipline with regard to parliamentary voting. Using textual analysis and machine learning techniques, we create two measures of closeness of an MP’s speeches to the party line. We find that district-elected members of parliament do not differ, in terms of speeches, from those of their party peers who have been elected through closed party lists. However, both speeches and voting correlate with district characteristics, suggesting that district elections allow districts to select more similar candidates rather than changing MPs’ behavior.
format text
author BORN, Andreas
JANSSEN, Aljoscha
author_facet BORN, Andreas
JANSSEN, Aljoscha
author_sort BORN, Andreas
title Does a district mandate matter for the behavior of politicians? An analysis of roll-call votes and parliamentary speeches
title_short Does a district mandate matter for the behavior of politicians? An analysis of roll-call votes and parliamentary speeches
title_full Does a district mandate matter for the behavior of politicians? An analysis of roll-call votes and parliamentary speeches
title_fullStr Does a district mandate matter for the behavior of politicians? An analysis of roll-call votes and parliamentary speeches
title_full_unstemmed Does a district mandate matter for the behavior of politicians? An analysis of roll-call votes and parliamentary speeches
title_sort does a district mandate matter for the behavior of politicians? an analysis of roll-call votes and parliamentary speeches
publisher Institutional Knowledge at Singapore Management University
publishDate 2022
url https://ink.library.smu.edu.sg/soe_research/2532
https://ink.library.smu.edu.sg/context/soe_research/article/3531/viewcontent/1_s2.0_S017626802100063X_main.pdf
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