Similar Search Results

Ossokina, Ioulia V.; Swank, Otto - Tinbergen Institute - 2001

In the literature on electoral politics full convergence of policy platforms is usually regarded as socially optimal. The reason is that risk-averse voters prefer a sure middle-of-the-road policy to a lottery of two extremes with the same expectation. In this paper we study the normative...

Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10005450800

How Polarization and Political Instability affect Learning through Experimentation

Ossokina, Ioulia V.; Swank, Otto H. - Tinbergen Institute - 2001

following elections (exogenous elections) and <LI>the decision is salient and the election outcome depends on it (endogenous … elections). </OL> We show that while the possibility of learning increases activism, the existence of political instability … distorts learning. Furthermore, in contrast to the existing literature, we demonstrate that, when elections are exogenous …

Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10005144519

Do Elections lead to Informed Public Decisions?

Swank, Otto H.; Visser, Bauke - Tinbergen Institute - 2003

and implement public policies, we show that examination takes place in spite of, rather than thanks to, elections …. Elections are needed as a carrot and a stick to motivate politicians, yet politicians who are overly interested in re …

Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10005137020

Experimental Public Choice

Schram, Arthur J.H.C. - Tinbergen Institute - 2002

A review is given of the use of laboratory experiments in the Public Choice literature. A distinction is made in experiments on public goods, participation games, rent-seeking and lobbying, and spatial voting.

Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10005136963

Polarization, Information Collection and Electoral Control

Martinez, Silvia Dominguez; Swank, Otto H. - Tinbergen Institute - 2004

We identify the conditions under which voters can induce political parties to collect information and to select policies which are optimal from the representative voter’s point of view. We show that when parties are office motivated the voting rule should encourage parties to collect...

Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10005016251

Does Electoral Competition create Incentives for Political Parties to collect Information about the Pros and Cons of Alternative Policies?

Martinez, Silvia Dominguez; Swank, Otto H. - Tinbergen Institute - 2004

A well-known rationale for representative democracy is that direct democracy leads to a free-rider problem as to the collection of information. A problem with this rationale is that it takes for granted that representatives collect information. In this paper we examine whether or not electoral...

Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10005016253

Is Transparency to no avail? Committee Decision-making, Pre-meetings, and Credible Deals

Swank, Otto H.; Visser, Bauke - Tinbergen Institute - 2007

Transparent decision-making processes are widely regarded as a prerequisite for the working of a representative democracy. It facilitates accountability, and citizens may suspect that decisions, if taken behind closed doors, do not promote their interests. Why else the secrecy? We provide a...

Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10005144398

Transparency and Pre-meetings

Swank, Job; Swank, Otto; Visser, Bauke - Tinbergen Institute - 2006

Some committees are made up of experts, persons interested in both the (subject) matter at hand and in coming across as able decision-makers. Such committees would like to conceal disagreement from the public. We present a theory that describes the reaction of experts to the requirement to...

Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10005144492

Household Inequality, Welfare, and the Setting of Trade Policy

Francois, Joseph; Rojas-Romagosa, Hugo - Tinbergen Institute - 2004

We analyze general equilibrium relationships between trade policy and the household distribution of income, decomposing social welfare into real income level and variance components through Gini and Atkinson indexes. We embed these inequality-adjusted social welfare functions in a general...

Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10005144496

Politicians' Motivation, Political Culture, and Electoral Competition

Beniers, Klaas J.; Dur, Robert - Tinbergen Institute - 2004

We study electoral competition among politicians who are heterogeneous both in competence and in how much they care about (what they perceive as) the public interest relative to the private rents from being in office. We show that politicians may have stronger incentives to behave...

Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10005144528