This paper uses a new database on campaign funding on French members of parliament to analyze their efficiency. The database includes the level of funding, as well as the origin of the resources the politicians have at their disposal. The funding sources are identified with true resources used...

In French national elections, the presence of a national economic vote is clear. However, the character of the economic vote is less clear at the regional level. Assuming regional elections are second order, voters may wish to signal the national incumbent, by rewarding or punishing it for...

Recent scholarship heralds the emergence of programmatic legislative parties in Brazil capable of acting in a disciplined manner and making policy-based appeals to voters. This article uses statutory delegation to test the ability of legislative parties to limit executive policy discretion via...

This paper addresses the electoral consequences of catch-all parties' shifts to the political center. Although the move to the center of many European Social Democratic parties in the 1990s was first rewarded with victories, these parties have since faced a remarkable electoral drought that is...

Party identification plays a large role in voters decisions but what happens when the party affiliations of candidates are not readily available, as in many state supreme court and local elections? Voters are no longer able to rely on this efficient cue for making decisions and have to search...

A widely shared explanation of political devolution says that it is the result of pressure from mobilized parties of culturally distinct peripheries. According to it, whenever national politicians feel threatened by the electoral growth of peripheral parties they react by accommodating the...