practice, incumbency advantage and coordination issues may lead to the (re)election of bad politicians. We ask whether these …In theory, free and fair elections can improve the selection of politicians and incentivize them to exert effort. In … elections, we find that winning an election increases candidates' chances to win the next election by 25.1 percentage points …

A key tenet of representative democracy is that politicians' discourse and policies should follow voters' preferences … content of 9,000 primary and general election websites of candidates for the U.S. House of Representatives, 2002-2016, as well … opponent, as compared to the platform of the runner-up who did not qualify for the last round. We conclude that politicians …

's jurisdiction increases significantly pre-election, spiking 23%, with zero equivalent move for equivalently global (but domestic …

economically unrepresentative American politicians were in the 20th century, and why. Future members under the age of 18 in 1940 … politicians, future members of Congress between the ages of 18 and 40 in 1940 were higher-earners and more educated, indicating … that socioeconomic background alone does not explain the differences between politicians and non-politicians. Examining a …

. We find that the share of voters who state a pre-election vote intention corresponding to their final vote choice … increases by 15 percentage points in the two months preceding the election. Changes in individual vote choices mostly result …

We test whether politicians can use direct contact to reconnect with citizens, increase turnout, and win votes. During …

In 2010, we informed a random set of Delhi councilors, some ineligible for re-election in their current ward, that a …

incentivize hard work by politicians. We discuss and test possible explanations. Our results suggest that the "accountability …