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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 28 June 2021
Although partisan bias – when an authority transfers discretionary public resources to a politically aligned receiver − has been extensively studied, less is known about how this practice is affected by the voting regime − compulsory or voluntary voting. In this article, I study partisan bias in Chile, using administrative data of transfers from the central authority to local governments, highlighting two relevant scope conditions: the electoral cycle, and electoral uncertainty caused by the adoption of voluntary voting. I found strong evidence of partisan bias, especially in election years and in electorally riskier municipalities. This suggests that the uncertainty introduced by this electoral reform induced politicians to allocate a large share of resources to risky municipalities, because such resources would play a more significant role in the electoral outcome. Overall, these results imply that voluntary voting has a large impact on the way that resources are allocated across subnational units.
Aunque el favoritismo político – cuando una autoridad transfiere recursos públicos de forma discrecional a un receptor políticamente alineado − ha sido estudiado extensamente, se sabe menos acerca de cómo esta práctica se ve afectada por el régimen de votación, ya sea éste obligatorio o voluntario. En este artículo, estudio el favoritismo político en Chile, utilizando datos administrativos de transferencias de recursos desde la autoridad central a los gobiernos locales, subrayando dos condiciones relevantes: el ciclo electoral, y la incertidumbre electoral causada por la adopción del voto voluntario. Encontré fuertes evidencias de favoritismo político, especialmente en años electorales y en municipalidades electoralmente riesgosas. Esto sugiere que la incertidumbre introducida por esta reforma electoral indujo a los políticos a ubicar una gran cantidad de recursos a municipalidades en riesgo debido a que habrían de jugar un papel más significativo en el resultado electoral. Por encima de todo, estos resultados implican que el voto voluntario tiene un gran impacto en la forma en que los recursos son ubicados a lo largo de las unidades subnacionales.
Embora o favorecimento político-partidário – quando uma autoridade transfere recursos públicos discricionários para um partido alinhado politicamente – tenha sido amplamente estudado, pouco se sabe sobre como essa prática é afetada pelo regime eleitoral – voto obrigatório ou facultativo. Neste artigo, estudo o viés partidário no Chile, usando dados administrativos referentes à transferência de recursos da autoridade central para os governos locais, destacando duas condições de escopo relevantes: o ciclo eleitoral, e a incerteza eleitoral causada pela adoção do voto voluntário. Encontrei fortes evidências de parcialidade partidária, especialmente em anos eleitorais e em municípios eleitoralmente mais imprevisíveis. Os dados sugerem que a incerteza trazida pela reforma eleitoral induziu os políticos a alocar uma grande parcela de recursos em municípios de risco, pois tais recursos teriam um papel mais significativo no resultado eleitoral. Em geral, o estudo aponta que o voto facultativo tem um grande impacto na maneira como os recursos são alocados nas unidades subnacionais.
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31 Lara and Toro, ‘Tactical Distribution in Local Funding’.
32 Lijphart, ‘Unequal Participation’.
33 Carey and Horiuchi, ‘Compulsory Voting and Income Inequality’.
34 Peter Miller and Ruth Dassonneville, ‘High Turnout in the Low Countries: Partisan Effects of the Abolition of Compulsory Voting in the Netherlands’, Electoral Studies, 44 (Dec. 2016), pp. 132–43.
35 Fowler, ‘Electoral and Policy Consequences of Voter Turnout’.
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38 Díaz-Cayeros, ‘Electoral Risk and Redistributive Politics in Mexico and the United States’.
39 From now on, I use ‘left-wing’ to describe a mayor from the Nueva Mayoría and ‘right-wing’ for a mayor from Chile Vamos.
40 Given that these two coalitions dominate Chilean politics, I use the term ‘aligned mayor’ to define a mayor from the same electoral coalition as the president, not necessarily from the same party. Consequently, partisan bias is a transfer from the central to local governments that favours aligned mayors.
41 Pérez, Mario, ‘Análisis de los municipios chilenos: Ingresos por gestión versus transferencias del Fondo Común Municipal’, Revista Estudios de Políticas Públicas, 2: 2 (2016), pp. 121–30Google Scholar.
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43 ‘Bachelet promulga reforma que establece voto voluntario e inscripción automática’, El Mercurio, 27 March 2009, available at www.emol.com/noticias/nacional/2009/03/27/350970/bachelet-promulga-reforma-que-establece-voto-voluntario-e-inscripcion-automatica.html, last access 25 March 2021.
44 The SERVEL data is available at https://servel.cl/, last access 11 March 2021.
45 The SINIM data is available at www.sinim.gov.cl, last access 11 March 2021.
46 The CASEN data is available at http://observatorio.ministeriodesarrollosocial.gob.cl/encuesta-casen, last access 25 March 2021.
47 The INE data is available at www.ine.cl/estadisticas/sociales/demografia-y-vitales, last access 25 March 2021.
48 Although the CASEN survey is not representative at the municipality level for all local municipalities, it is still useful to perform continuity tests at the electoral threshold, since the data contains enough observations per municipality. Indeed, the 2011 edition of the survey included 590 observations per municipality on average. None of my results rely on the CASEN data, since I did not use covariates for the estimation of the treatment effects. I only used some variables from this source for the continuity tests.
49 Argote, Pablo, ‘Incumbency Advantage and Shocks in the Electorate: The Adoption of Voluntary Voting’, European Political Science Review, 12: 2 (2020), pp. 1–25CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
50 Note that aligned mayor's margin of victory is the standardised vote share of a mayor that belongs to the same coalition as the president. For instance, if the Left won the presidency in 2013, then the forcing variable for 2016 would be the margin of victory of left-wing mayors. Thus, a positive coefficient always implies positive partisan bias.
51 To test for a discontinuity in the forcing variable – for example, due to electoral fraud – I conducted a manipulation test based on the density discontinuity developed by Cattaneo, Jansson and Ma (Matias D. Cattaneo, Michael Janssen and Xinwei Ma, ‘Manipulation Testing Based on Density Discontinuity’, Stata Journal, 18: 1 (2018), pp. 234–61). I did not find evidence of fraud.
52 To discard any alternative discontinuity at the threshold, I estimated continuity tests with 13 pre-treatment covariates (see Table 9 in the Appendix). There is not a significant jump in the cut-off point, which corroborates the validity of the RD estimates.
53 To estimate the RD coefficients, I generally used an optimal bandwidth obtained by the Stata package ‘rdrobust’ developed by Calonico et al. (see Calonico, Sebastian, Cattaneo, Matias D. and Titiunik, Rocío, ‘Robust Data-Driven Inference in the Regression-Discontinuity Design’, Stata Journal, 14: 4 (2014), pp. 909–46CrossRefGoogle Scholar). For the interacted model described in equation 2, I estimated the RD model through a local linear regression with two bandwidths, 0.1 and 0.15, since the package does not allow me to add interaction terms.
54 Díaz-Cayeros, ‘Electoral Risk and Redistributive Politics in Mexico and the United States’.
55 Lara and Toro, ‘Tactical Distribution in Local Funding’.
56 Corvalan et al., ‘Indirect Political Budget Cycles’.
57 Lijphart, ‘Unequal Participation’.
58 Carey and Horiuchi, ‘Compulsory Voting and Income Inequality’; Fowler, ‘Electoral and Policy Consequences of Voter Turnout’; Miller and Dassonneville, ‘High Turnout in the Low Countries’.
59 Singh, Shane P., ‘Compulsory Voting and Parties’ Vote-Seeking Strategies’, American Journal of Political Science, 63: 1 (2019), pp. 37–52CrossRefGoogle Scholar.