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Electoral Institutions and the Politics of Coalitions: Why Some Democracies Redistribute More Than Others

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  19 May 2006

TORBEN IVERSEN  and
DAVID SOSKICE
TORBEN IVERSEN
Affiliation:
Harvard University
DAVID SOSKICE
Affiliation:
Duke University, London School of Economics and Wissenschaftszentrum Berlin
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Abstract

Standard political economy models of redistribution, notably that of Meltzer and Richard (1981), fail to account for the remarkable variance in government redistribution across democracies. We develop a general model of redistribution that explains why some democratic governments are more prone to redistribute than others. We show that the electoral system plays a key role because it shapes the nature of political parties and the composition of governing coalitions, hence redistribution. Our argument implies (1) that center-left governments dominate under PR systems, whereas center-right governments dominate under majoritarian systems; and (2) that PR systems redistribute more than majoritarian systems. We test our argument on panel data for redistribution, government partisanship, and electoral system in advanced democracies.

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ARTICLES
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American Political Science Review , Volume 100 , Issue 2 , May 2006 , pp. 165 - 181
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© 2006 by the American Political Science Association

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