Hostname: page-component-8448b6f56d-dnltx Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-04-19T21:27:08.829Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Corruption and satisfaction with democracy: the conditional role of electoral disproportionality and ballot control

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  08 January 2018

Alessandro Pellegata  and
Vincenzo Memoli
Alessandro Pellegata*
Affiliation:
Department of Social and Political Sciences, Università degli Studi di Milano, Milano, Italy
Vincenzo Memoli
Affiliation:
Department of Political and Social Sciences, Università degli Studi di Catania, Catania, Italy
*
*E-mail: alessandro.pellegata@unimi.it
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Existing literature has analysed the relationship between electoral systems and either corruption or satisfaction with democracy (SWD) focussing on the traditional distinction between majoritarian and proportional systems. This paper, instead, investigates if and how specific aspects of electoral systems moderate the negative effects of corruption perceptions on SWD. We argue that two mechanisms act simultaneously but at different levels. The first mechanism is the relationship between voters and the national government, while the second links single representatives to their constituents. We advance conditional hypotheses that postulate an attenuating effect of disproportionality and a reinforcing impact of personal vote. Empirical results from 35 elections in 33 democracies, using both individual and aggregate-level data, confirm the research hypotheses. More disproportional electoral systems weaken the impact of citizens’ perceived corruption on their democratic satisfaction, while this is strengthened by systems in which the ballot control is mostly in the hand of the voters.

Keywords

corruptiondisproportionalityelectoral systemsballot controlsatisfaction with democracy
Type
Research Article
Information
European Political Science Review , Volume 10 , Issue 3 , August 2018 , pp. 393 - 416
Copyright
© European Consortium for Political Research 2018 

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.)

References

Aarts, K. and Thomassen, J. (2008), ‘Satisfaction with democracy: do institutions matter?’, Electoral Studies 27(1): 5–18.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ai, C. and Norton, E.C. (2003), ‘Interaction terms in logit and probit models’, Economics Letters 80: 123–129.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Anderson, C.J. and Guillory, C.A. (1997), ‘Political institutions and satisfaction with democracy: a cross-national analysis of consensus and majoritarian systems’, American Political Science Review 91(1): 66–81.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Anderson, C.J. and Tverdova, Y.V. (2003), ‘Corruption, political allegiances and attitudes toward government in contemporary democracies’, American Journal of Political Science 47(1): 91–109.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Arceneaux, K. and Nickerson, D.W. (2009), ‘Modelling certainty with clustered data: a comparison of methods’, Political Analysis 17(2): 177–190.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bågenholm, A. (2013), ‘Throwing the rascals out? The electoral effects of corruption allegations and corruption scandals in Europe 1981–2011’, Crime, Law & Social Change 60: 595–609.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bågenholm, A. and Charron, N. (2014), ‘Do politics in Europe benefit from politicising corruption?’, West European Politics 37(5): 903–931.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bellucci, P. and Memoli, V. (2012), ‘The determinants of support in Europe’, in D. Sanders, P.C. Magalhaes and G. Toka (eds), Citizens and European Polity. Mass Attitudes Toward European and National Polities, Oxford: Oxford University Press, pp. 9–38.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bernauer, J. and Vatter, A. (2012), ‘Can’t get no satisfaction with the Westminster model? Winners, losers and the effects of consensual and direct democratic institutions on satisfaction with democracy’, European Journal of Political Research 51(4): 435–468.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Berry, W.D., DeMeritt, J.H.R. and Esarey, J. (2010), ‘Testing for interaction in binary logit and probit models: is a product term essential?’, American Journal of Political Science 54(1): 248–266.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Berry, W.D., Golder, M. and Milton, D. (2012), ‘Improving tests of theories positing interaction’, The Journal of Politics 74(3): 653–671.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bormann, N.C. and Golder, M. (2013), ‘Democratic electoral systems around the World, 1946–2011’, Electoral Studies 32(2): 360–369.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Brambor, T., Clark, W.R. and Golder, M. (2006), ‘Understanding interaction models: improving empirical analyses’, Political Analysis 14(1): 63–82.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Carey, J.M. and Shugart, M.S. (1995), ‘Incentives to cultivate a personal vote: a rank ordering of electoral formulas’, Electoral Studies 14(4): 417–439.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Chang, E.C. and Chu, Y.-h. (2006), ‘Corruption and trust: exceptionalism in Asian democracies?’, The Journal of Politics 68(2): 259–271.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Charron, N. (2015), ‘Do corruption measures have a perception problem? Assessing the relationship between experiences and perceptions of corruption among citizens and experts’, European Political Science Review 8(1): 147–171.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Clausen, B., Aart, K. and Zsolt, N. (2011), ‘Corruption and confidence in public institutions: evidence from a global survey’, The World Bank Economic Review 25(2): 212–249.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Curini, L. (2015), ‘The conditional ideological inducement to campaign on character valence issues in multiparty systems: the case of corruption’, Comparative Political Studies 48(2): 168–192.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Curini, L., Jou, W. and Memoli, V. (2012), ‘Satisfaction with democracy and the winner/loser debate: the role of policy preferences and past experience’, British Journal of Political Science 42(2): 241–261.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Dahlberg, S. and Holmberg, S. (2014), ‘Democracy and bureaucracy: how their quality matters for popular satisfaction’, West European Politics 37(3): 515–537.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Dahlberg, S. and Linde, J. (2016), ‘Losing happily? The mitigating effect of democracy and the quality of government on the winner-loser gap in political support’, International Journal of Public Administration 39(9): 652–664.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Dahlberg, S., Linde, J. and Holmberg, S. (2015), ‘Democratic discontent in old and new democracies: assessing the importance of democratic input and governmental output’, Political Studies 63(1): 18–37.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Della Porta, D. (2000), ‘Social capital, beliefs in government, and political corruption’, in S. Pharr and R. Putnam (eds), Disaffected Democracies: What’s Troubling the Trilateral Countries, Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, pp. 202–230.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Della Porta, D. and Vannucci, A. (1995), ‘Politics, the mafia, and the market for corrupt exchange’, in C. Mershon and G. Pasquino (eds), Italian Politics: Ending the First Republic, Boulder, CO: Westview Press, pp. 165–184.Google Scholar
Easton, D. (1965), A Framework for Political Analysis, Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall.Google Scholar
Easton, D. (1975), ‘A re-assessment of the concept of political support’, British Journal of Political Science 5(4): 435–457.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ezrow, L. and Xezonakis, G. (2011), ‘Citizen satisfaction with democracy and parties’ policy offerings’, Comparative Political Studies 44(9): 1152–1178.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Farrell, D.M. (2001), Electoral Systems. A Comparative Introduction, London: Macmillan Palgrave.Google Scholar
Farrell, D.M. and McAllister, I. (2006), ‘Voter satisfaction and electoral systems: does preferential voting in candidate-centred systems make difference?’, European Journal of Political Research 45(5): 723–749.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gallagher, M. (1991), ‘Proportionality, disproportionality and electoral systems’, Electoral Studies 10(1): 33–51.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Golden, M. and Chang, E.C.C. (2001), ‘Competitive corruption: factional conflict and political malfeasance in postwar Italian Christian democracy’, World Politics 53(4): 588–622.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kaiser, A., Lenhert, M., Miller, B. and Sieberer, U. (2002), ‘The democratic quality of institutional regimes: a conceptual framework’, Political Studies 50(2): 313–331.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Karp, J.A. and Bowler, S. (2001), ‘Coalition government and satisfaction with democracy: an analysis of New Zealand’s reaction to proportional representation’, European Journal of Political Research 40(1): 57–79.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Klingemann, H.-D. (1999), ‘Mapping political support in the 1990s: a global analysis’, in P. Norris (ed.), Critical Citizens. Global Support for Democratic Governance, Oxford, New York: Oxford University Press, pp. 31–56.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lijphart, A. (1994), Electoral Systems and Party Systems: A Study of Twenty-Seven Democracies 1945–1990, Oxford, New York: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lijphart, A. (1999), Patterns of Democracy: Government Forms and Performance in Thirty-Six Countries, New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.Google Scholar
Linde, J. and Ekman, J. (2003), ‘Satisfaction with democracy: a note on a frequently used indicator in comparative politics’, European Journal of Political Research 42(3): 391–408.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Long, S.J. (1997), Regression Models for Categorical and Limited Dependent Variables, Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.Google Scholar
Lupia, A. (2003), ‘Delegation and its perils’, in K. Strøm, W.C. Müller and T. Bergman (eds), Delegation and Accountability in Parliamentary Democracies, Oxford, New York: Oxford University Press, pp. 33–54.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Manzetti, L. and Wilson, C.J. (2007), ‘Why do corrupt governments maintain public support?’, Comparative Political Studies 40(8): 949–970.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Melgar, N., Rossi, M. and Smith, T. (2010), ‘The perception of corruption’, International Journal of Public Opinion Research 22(1): 120–131.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mishler, W. and Rose, R. (2001), ‘What are the origins of political trust? Testing institutional and cultural theories in post-communist societies’, Comparative Political Studies 34(1): 30–62.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mishler, W. and Rose, R. (2008), ‘Seeing is not always believing: measuring corruption perceptions and experiences’. Unpublished paper, University of Manchester, UK.Google Scholar
Myerson, R.B. (1993), ‘Effectiveness of electoral systems for reducing government corruption: a game-theoretic analysis’, Games and Economic Behaviour 5: 118–132.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Norris, P. (ed.) (1999a), Critical Citizens. Global Support for Democratic Governance, Oxford: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Norris, P. (1999b), ‘Institutional explanations for political support’, in P. Norris (ed.), Critical Citizens. Global Support for Democratic Governance, Oxford: Oxford University Press, pp. 217–235.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Norris, P. (2004), Electoral Engineering: Voting Rules and Political Behaviour, New York: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Pellegata, A. and Memoli, V. (2016), ‘Can corruption erode confidence in political institutions among European countries? Comparing the effects of different measures of perceived corruption’, Social Indicators Research 128(1): 391–412.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Persson, T., Tabellini, G. and Trebbi, F. (2003), ‘Electoral rules and corruption’, Journal of the European Economic Association 1(4): 958–989.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Powell, B.G. (2000), Elections as Instruments of Democracy. Majoritarian and Proportional Visions, New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.Google Scholar
Przeworski, A., Alvarez, M.E., Cheibub, J.A. and Limongi, F. (2000), Democracy and Development. Political Institutions and Well-Being in the World 1950–1990, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Rabe-Hesket, S. and Skrondal, A. (2012), Multilevel and Longitudinal Modeling Using Stata. Categorical Responses, Counts and Survival, College Station, TX: Stata Press Publication.Google Scholar
Rae, D.W. (1967), The Political Consequences of the Electoral Laws, New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.Google Scholar
Rose-Ackerman, S. (1999), Corruption and Government. Causes, Consequences and Reform, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Rothstein, B. and Teorell, J. (2008), ‘What is quality of government? A theory of impartial government institutions’, Governance 21(2): 165–190.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sarsfield, R. and Echegaray, F. (2005), ‘Opening the black box: how satisfaction with democracy and its perceived efficacy affect regime preference in Latin America’, International Journal of Public Opinion Research 18(29): 153–173.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Seligson, M.A. (2002), ‘The impact of corruption on regime legitimacy: a comparative study of four Latin American countries’, Journal of Politics 64(2): 408–433.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Singh, S.P. (2014), ‘Not all elections winners are equal: satisfaction with democracy and the nature of the vote’, European Journal of Political Research 53(2): 308–327.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Steenbergen, M.R. and Bradford, J.S. (2002), ‘Modelling multilevel data structure’, American Journal of Political Science 46(1): 218–237.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Tavits, M. (2007), ‘Clarity of responsibility and corruption’, American Journal of Political Science 51(1): 218–229.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Treisman, D. (2000), ‘The causes of corruption: a cross-national study’, Journal of Public Economics 76(3): 399–457.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Treisman, D. (2007), ‘What have we learned about the causes of corruption from ten years of cross-national empirical research?’, Annual Review of Political Science 10: 211–244.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wagner, A.F., Schneider, F.G. and Halla, M. (2009), ‘The quality of institutions and satisfaction with democracy in Western Europe – a panel analysis’’, European Journal of Political Economy 25(1): 30–41.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wallack, J.S., Gaviria, A., Panizza, U. and Stein, E. (2003), ‘Particularism around the world’, The World Bank Economic Review 17(1): 133–143.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Warwick, P.V. (1994), Government Survival in Parliamentary Democracies, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Warwick, P.V. (2011), ‘Government intentions and citizens preferences in a dynamic perspective’, British Journal of Political Science 41(3): 599–619.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Xezonakis, G., Kosmidis, S. and Dahlberg, S. (2016), ‘Can electors combat corruption? Institutional arrangements and citizen behavior’, European Journal of Political Research 55(1): 160–176.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Supplementary material: File

Pellegata and Memoli supplementary material

Appendix

Download Pellegata and Memoli supplementary material(File)
File 24.9 KB