Hostname: page-component-8448b6f56d-c47g7 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-04-19T03:48:23.481Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

The Impact of Campaign Finance Laws on Party Competition

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 July 2013

Joshua D. Potter  and
Margit Tavits
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

The comparative literature on party systems has convincingly demonstrated that electoral rules, social cleavages and their interaction can explain much of the cross-national variation in the size of party systems. This literature, however, has thus far ignored campaign finance laws. This article argues that various campaign finance laws exert more or less restrictive pressures on party competition. It develops a new theoretical concept, fund parity. The study demonstrates the positive relationship between fund parity and party system size and employs additional tests to supplement the regression analysis in order to account for potential endogeneity issues. The findings underscore an intuitive – but heretofore untested – relationship: increasing parity makes party competition more permissive and increases the size of the party system.

Type
Articles
Information
British Journal of Political Science , Volume 45 , Issue 1 , January 2015 , pp. 73 - 95
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2013 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Footnotes

*

Post-Doctoral Research Fellow, Department of Political Science, Washington University in St. Louis (email: jdpotter@wustl.edu); Associate Professor, Department of Political Science, Washington University in St. Louis (email: tavits@wustl.edu). Previous versions of this article were presented at The Effects of District Magnitude Conference in Lisbon, Portugal, 2012; The Pathologies of Elections Workshop in St. Louis, USA, 2013; and the Annual Meeting of the Midwest Political Science Association in Chicago, USA, 2013. The authors would like to thank Leonardo Arriola, André Blais, Dawn Brancati, Randy Calvert, Brian Crisp, Bernard Grofman, Thomas Gschwend, Timothy Hellwig, Ignacio Lago, Dante Scala, Richard Skinner, Jonathan Slapin, Guillermo Rosas and the anonymous reviewers for their helpful insights. Joshua D. Potter acknowledges financial support from the National Science Foundation (Grant SES-1124469) and Margit Tavits acknowledges financial support from the Weidenbaum Center on the Economy, Government, and Public Policy at Washington University in St. Louis. Replication materials can be found online at jdpotter.wustl.edu/Research. Data replication sets are available at http://dx.doi.org/doi:10.1017/S0007123413000227.

References

Abramowitz, Alan I. 1988. Explaining Senate Election Outcomes. American Political Science Review 82 (2):385–403.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Adams, James. 2012. The Causes and the Electoral Consequences of Party Policy Shifts in Multiparty Elections: Theoretical Results and Empirical Evidence. Annual Review of Political Science 15:401–419.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Aldrich, John. 1983. A Downsian Spatial Model with Party Activism. American Political Science Review 77 (4):974–990.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Alexander, Herbert E., ed. 1989. Comparative Political Finance in the 1980s. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Amorim Neto, Octavio Cox, Gary W.. 1997. Electoral Institutions, Cleavage Structures, and the Number of Parties. American Journal of Political Science 41 (1):149–174.Google Scholar
Ansolabehere, Stephen Snyder, James M.. 2000. Campaign War Chests in Congressional Elections. Business and Politics 2:9–33.Google Scholar
Austin, Reginald Tjernstrom, Maja, eds. 2003. IDEA Handbook Series: Funding of Political Parties and Election Campaigns. Stockholm: International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance.Google Scholar
Beange, Pauline. 2009. Canadian Campaign Finance Reform Since 2000: Path Dependent or Dynamic? Paper Presented at the Annual Meeting of the Canadian Political Science Association, Ottawa, Canada, 27–30 May.Google Scholar
Beck, Thorsten, Clark, George, Groff, Alberto, Keefer, Philip Walsh, Patrick. 2001. New Tools in Comparative Political Economy: The Database of Political Institutions. World Bank Economic Review 15:165–176.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Benoit, Kenneth. 2000. Which Electoral Formula is the Most Proportional? A New Look with New Evidence. Political Analysis 8 (4):381–388.Google Scholar
Benoit, Kenneth Marsh, Michael. 2003. For a Few Euros More: Campaign Spending Effects in the Irish Local Elections of 1999. Party Politics 9 (5):561–582.Google Scholar
Binder, Sarah A. 2003. Stalemate: Causes and Consequences of Legislative Gridlock. Washington, DC: Brookings Institution.Google Scholar
Boatright, Robert. 2011a. Interest Groups and Campaign Finance Reform in the United States and Canada. Ann Arbor: Michigan University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Boatright, Robert. 2011b. The End of the Campaign Finance Reform Era? Paper Presented at the Annual Meeting of the European Political Science Association, Dublin, Ireland, 16–18 June.Google Scholar
Box-Steffensmeier, and Janet M. 1996. A Dynamic Analysis of the Role of War Chests in Campaign Strategy. American Journal of Political Science 40 (2):352–371.Google Scholar
Brancati, Dawn. 2008. The Origins and Strengths of Regional Parties. British Journal of Political Science 38 (1):135–159.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Carson, Jamie L. 2005. Strategy, Selection, and Candidate Competition in U.S. House and Senate Elections. The Journal of Politics 67 (1):1–28.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Casas-Zamora, K. 2005. Paying for Democracy: Political Finance and Stable Funding for Parties. Colchester, UK: ECPR Press.Google Scholar
Clark, William Roberts Golder, Matt. 2006. Rehabilitating Duverger's Theory: Testing the Mechanical and Strategic Modifying Effects of Electoral Laws. Comparative Political Studies 39 (6):679–708.Google Scholar
Cortina, Jose M. 1993. What is Coefficient Alpha? An Examination of Theory and Applications. Journal of Applied Psychology 78 (1):98–104.Google Scholar
Cox, Gary W. 1997. Making Votes Count: Strategic Coordination in the World's Electoral Systems. Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cox, Gary W. 1999. Electoral Rules and Electoral Coordination. Annual Review of Political Science 2:145–161.Google Scholar
Cox, Gary W. Shugart, Matthew Soberg. 1996. Stategic Voting Under Proportional Representation. Journal of Law, Economics, & Organization 12 (2):299–324.Google Scholar
Cox, Gary F. Thies, Michael F.. 2000. How Much Does Money Matter?: ‘Buying’ Votes in Japan, 1967–1990. Comparative Political Studies 33 (1):37–57.Google Scholar
Crisp, Brian F., Olivella, Santiago Potter, Joshua D.. 2012. Electoral Contexts that Impede Voter Coordination. Electoral Studies 31 (1):143–158.Google Scholar
Duch, Raymond M. Palmer, Harvey D.. 2002. Strategic Voting in Post-Communist Democracy? British Journal of Political Science 32:63–91.Google Scholar
Duverger, Maurice. 1954. Political Parties: Their Organization and Activity in the Modern State. New York: Wiley & Songs.Google Scholar
The Elections Canada. 2012. Political Financing. The Electoral System of Canada. Available from www.elections.ca/content.aspx?section=res&lang=e, accessed 15 June 2012.Google Scholar
Epstein, David Zemsky, Peter. 1995. Money Talks: Deterring Quality Challengers in Congressional Elections. American Political Science Review 89 (2):295–308.Google Scholar
Fearon, James D. 2003. Ethnic and Cultural Diversity by Country. Journal of Economic Growth 8:195–222.Google Scholar
Fiorina, Morris P., Abrams, Samuel J. Pope, Jeremy C.. 2005. Culture War? The Myth of a Polarized America. London: Longman.Google Scholar
Franklin, Mark N. 1999. Electoral Engineering and Cross-National Turnout Differences: What Role for Compulsory Voting? British Journal of Political Science 29:205–216.Google Scholar
Frye, Timothy. 2010. Building States and Markets After Communism: The Perils of Polarized Democracy. New York: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Gallagher, Michael. 1992. Comparing Proportional Representation Electoral Systems: Quotas, Thresholds, Paradoxes, and Majorities. British Journal of Political Science 22:469–496.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gallagher, Michael Mitchell, Paul, eds. 2008. The Politics of Electoral Systems. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
Gerber, Alan S. 1998. Estimating the Effect of Campaign Spending on Senate Election Outcomes Using Instrumental Variables. American Political Science Review 92:401–412.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Goidel, Robert K. Gross, Donald A.. 1994. A Systems Approach to Campaign Finance in U.S. House Elections. American Politics Quarterly 22:125–153.Google Scholar
Golder, Matt. 2005. Democratic Electoral Systems Around the World, 1946–2000. Electoral Studies 24:103–121.Google Scholar
Goodliffe, Jay. 2001. The Effects of War Chests on Challenger Entry in U.S. House Elections. American Journal of Political Science 45 (4):830–844.Google Scholar
Goodliffe, Jay. 2005. When Do War Chests Deter? The Journal of Theoretical Politics 17 (2):249–277.Google Scholar
Goodliffe, Jay. 2007. Campaign War Chests and Challenger Quality in Senate Elections. Legislative Studies Quarterly XXXII (1):135–156.Google Scholar
Goodliffe, Jay. 2009. War Chests for Deterrence and Savings. Quarterly Journal of Political Science 4:129–150.Google Scholar
Green, Donald P. Krasno, Jonathan S.. 1988. Salvation for the Spendthrift Incumbent: Reestimating the Effects of Campaign Spending in House Elections. American Journal of Political Science 32:884–907.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Green, Donald P. Krasno, Jonathan S.. 1990. Rebuttal to Jacobson ‘New Evidence for Old Arguments’. American Journal of Political Science 34:363–372.Google Scholar
Gross, Donald A. Goidel, Robert K.. 2003. The States of Campaign Finance Reform. Columbus: Ohio State University Press.Google Scholar
Guertin, Wilson H. Bailey, John P.. 1970. Introduction to Modern Factor Analysis. Ann Arbor: Edwards Brothers Inc.Google Scholar
Heidenheimer, Arnold J. 1963. Comparative Party Finance: Notes on Practices and Toward a Theory. The Journal of Politics 25 (4):790–811.Google Scholar
Hogan, Robert E. 2001. Campaign War Chests and Challenger Emergence in State Legislative Elections. Political Research Quarterly 54 (4):815–830.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hooghe, Marc, Maddens, Bart Noppe, Jo. 2006. Why Parties Adapt: Electoral Reform, Party Finance, and Party Strategy in Belgium. Electoral Studies 25:351–368.Google Scholar
Hopkin, Jonathan. 2004. The Problem with Party Finance: Theoretical Perspectives on the Funding of Party Politics. Party Politics 10 (6):627–651.Google Scholar
Huber, John D. Powell, G. Bingham. 1994. Congruence Between Citizens and Policymakers in Two Visions of Democracy. World Politics 46:291–326.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Jacobson, Gary C. 1978. The Effects of Campaign Spending in Congressional Elections. American Political Science Review 72 (2):469–491.Google Scholar
Jacobson, Gary C. 1980. Money in Congressional Elections. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.Google Scholar
Jacobson, Gary C. 1985. Money and Votes Reconsidered: Congressional Elections, 1972–1982. Public Choice 47 (1):7–62.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Jacobson, Gary C. 1990. The Effects of Campaign Spending in House Elections: New Evidence for Old Arguments. American Journal of Political Science 34 (2):334–362.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Katz, Richard Mair, Peter. 1995. Changing Models of Party Organization and Party Democracy: The Emergence of the Cartel Party. Party Politics 1:5–28.Google Scholar
Kennedy, Fiachra, Lyons, Pat Fitzgerald, Peter. 2006. Pragmatists, Ideologues and the General Law of Curvilinear Disparity: The Case of the Irish Labour Party. Political Studies 54:786–805.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
King, Gary, Tomz, Michael Wittenberg, Jason. 2000. Making the Most of Statistical Analyses: Improving Interpretation and Presentation. American Journal of Political Science 44 (2):347–361.Google Scholar
Knapp, Andrew. 2004. Ephemeral Victories? France's Governing Parties, the Ecologists, and the Far Right. In Political Parties and Electoral Change, 49–85, edited by Peter Mair, Wolfgang Muller Fritz Plasser. London: Sage.Google Scholar
Kuder, G. F. Richardson, M. W.. 1937. The Theory of the Estimation of Test Reliability. Psychometrika 2 (3):151–160.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Laakso, Markku Taagepera, Rein. 1979. Effective Number of Parties: A Measure with Application to West Europe. Comparative Political Studies 12 (1):3–27.Google Scholar
Layman, Geoffrey C., Carsey, Thomas M. Horowitz, Juliana Menasce. 2006. Party Polarization in American Politics: Characteristics, Causes, and Consequences. Annual Review of Political Science 9:83–110.Google Scholar
Layman, Geoffrey C., Carsey, Thomas M., Green, John C., Herrera, Richard Cooperman, Rosalyn. 2010. Activists and Conflict Extension in American Politics. American Political Science Review 104 (2):324–346.Google Scholar
Lijphart, Arend. 1984. Democracies: Patterns of Majoritarian and Consensus Government in Twenty-One Countries. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.Google Scholar
Linz, Juan J. 1978. The Breakdown of Democratic Regimes: Crisis, Breakdown and Reequilibration. Baltimore, MD: Johns Hopkins University Press.Google Scholar
Lipset, Seymour Martin Rokkan, Stein. 1967. Party Systems and Voter Alignments: Cross-National Perspectives. New York: The Free Press.Google Scholar
Maddens, Bart, Wauters, Bram, Noppe, Jo Friers, Stefaan. 2006. Effects of Campaign Spending in an Open List PR System: The 2003 Legislative Elections in Flanders/Belgium. West European Politics 29 (1):161–168.Google Scholar
Martin, Warren S., Fruchter, Benjamin Mathis, William J.. 1974. An Investigation of the Effect on the Number of Scale Intervals on Principal Components Factor Analysis. Educational and Psychological Measurement 34:537–545.Google Scholar
May, John D. 1973. Opinion Structure of Political Parties: The Special Law of Curvilinear Disparity. Political Studies 21 (2):135–151.Google Scholar
Milyo, Jeffrey. 1998. The Electoral Effects of Campaign Spending in House Elections. Los Angeles: Citizens’ Research Foundation.Google Scholar
Moser, Robert. 1999. Electoral Systems and the Number of Parties in Postcommunist States. World Politics 51 (3):359–384.Google Scholar
Mowrey, Tim, Pelletier, Alain. 2002. Electoral Insight: Election Financing in Canada. Elections Canada. Available from www.elections.ca, accessed 15 June 2012.Google Scholar
Nassmacher, Karl Heinz. 1993. Comparing Party and Campaign Finance in Western Democracies. In Campaign and Party Finance in North America and Western Europe, edited by Arthur Gunlicks. Boulder, CO: Westview Press.Google Scholar
Norris, Pippa. 1995. May's Law of Curvilinear Disparity Revisited. Party Politics 1 (1):29–47.Google Scholar
Ordeshook, Peter C. Shvetsova, Olga V.. 1994. Ethnic Heterogeneity, District Magnitude, and the Number of Parties. American Journal of Political Science 38 (1):100–123.Google Scholar
OSCE. 2007. Swiss Confederation Federal Elections. OSCE/ODIHR Needs Assessment Mission Reports. Available from http://www.osce.org/odihr/elections/switzerland/31390, accessed 15 June 2012.Google Scholar
OSCE. 2011. Swiss Confederation Federal Elections. OSCE/ODIHR Needs Assessment Mission Reports. Available from http://www.osce.org/odihr/elections/81780, accessed 15 June 2012.Google Scholar
Paltiel, Khayyam Zev. 1981. Campaign Finance: Contrasting Practices and Reforms. In Democracy at the Polls: A Comparative Study of Competitive National Elections, edited by David E. Butler, Howard Rae Penniman, and Austin Ranney, 138–172 Washington, DC: American Enterprise Institute.Google Scholar
Persson, Torsten Tabellini, Guido. 2003. The Economic Effects of Constitutions: What Do the Data Say? Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.Google Scholar
Pierre, Jon, Svasand, Lars Widfeldt, Anders. 2000. State Subsidies to Political Parites: Confronting Rhetoric with Reality. West European Politics 23 (3):1–24.Google Scholar
Pinto-Duschinsky, Michael. 2002. Financing Politics: A Global View. Journal of Democracy 13 (4):69–86.Google Scholar
Powell, G. Bingham. 2000. Elections as Instruments of Democracy: Majoritarian and Proportional Visions. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.Google Scholar
Primo, David M. Milyo, Jeffrey. 2006. Campaign Finance Laws and Political Efficacy: Evidence from the States. Election Law Journal 5 (1):23–39.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Rahn, Wendy M., Aldrich, John H. Borgida, Eugene. 1994. Individual and Contextual Variations in Political Candidate Appraisal. American Political Science Review 88 (1):193–199.Google Scholar
Riera, Pedro. 2012. Electoral Coordination in Mixed-Member Systems: Does the Level of Democratic Experience Matter? European Journal of Political Research Forthcoming.Google Scholar
Rohrschneider, Robert Loveless, Matthew. 2010. Macro Salience: How Economic and Political Contexts Mediate Popular Evaluations of the Democracy Deficit in the European Union. The Journal of Politics 72 (4):1029–1045.Google Scholar
Roper, Steven D. 2002. The Influence of Romanian Campaign Finance Laws on Party System Development and Corruption. Party Politics 8 (2):175–192.Google Scholar
Rosenson, Beth Ann. 2009. The Effect of Political Reform Measures on Perceptions of Corruption. Election Law Journal 8 (1):31–46.Google Scholar
Samuels, David. 2001. Incumbents and Challengers on a Level Playing Field: Assessing the Impact of Campaign Finance in Brazil. Journal of Politics 63:569–584.Google Scholar
Scarrow, Susan E. 2006. Party Subsidies and the Freezing of Party Competition: Do Cartel Mechanisms Work? West European Politics 29:619–639.Google Scholar
Scarrow, Susan E. 2007. Political Finance in Comparative Perspective. Annual Review of Political Science 10:193–210.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Scarrow, Susan Gzegor, Burcu. 2010. Declining Memberships, Changing Members? European Political Party Members in A New Era. Party Politics 16 (6):823–843.Google Scholar
Schneider, Gerald. 2004. Is Everything Falling Apart? Left-Right Polarization in the OECD World after World War II. Paper Presented at the workshop of the Polarization and Conflict Network, Barcelona, 10–12 December.Google Scholar
Schofield, Norman Sened, Itai. 2006. Multiparty Democracy: Elections and Legislative Politics. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Sharpe, Andrew, Savoie, Donald J., Thunert, Martin. 2011. Canada Report. Sustainable Governance Indicators 2011.Google Scholar
Shvetsova, Olga. 2003. Endogenous Selection of Institutions and Their Exogenous Effects. Constitutional Political Economy 14 (3):191–212.Google Scholar
Singer, Matthew M. Stephenson, Laura B.. 2009. The Political Context and Duverger's Theory: Evidence at the District Level. Electoral Studies 28:480–491.Google Scholar
Strom, Kaare. 1990. A Behavioral Theory of Comparative Political Parties. American Journal of Political Science 34 (2):565–598.Google Scholar
Taagepera, Rein Shugart, Matthew Soberg. 1989. Seats and Votes: The Effects and Determinants of Electoral Systems. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.Google Scholar
Tavits, Margit. 2007. Party Systems in the Making: The Emergence and Success of New Parties in New Democracies. British Journal of Political Science 38:113–133.Google Scholar
Tavits, Margit Annus, Taavi. 2006. Learning to Make Votes Count: The Role of Democratic Experience. Electoral Studies 25:72–90.Google Scholar
Teixeira, Ruy A. 1992. The Disappearing American Voter. Washington, DC: The Brookings Institution.Google Scholar
Tsebelis, George. 2002. Veto Players: How Political Institutions Work. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
van Biezen, Ingrid. 2003. Political Parties in New Democracies. London: Palgrave.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
van Biezen, Ingrid Kopecký, Petr. 2007. The State and the Parties: Public Funding, Public Regulation, and Rent-Seeking in Contemporary Democracies. Party Politics 13 (2):235–254.Google Scholar
Widfeldt, Anders. 1999. Losing Touch? The Political Representativeness of Swedish Parties, 1985–1994. Scandinavian Political Studies 22 (4):307–326.Google Scholar
Supplementary material: File

Potter Supplementary Material

Appendix

Download Potter Supplementary Material(File)
File 21.6 KB
Supplementary material: File

Potter Supplementary Material

Appendix

Download Potter Supplementary Material(File)
File 3.1 KB