This paper presents a model of political competition with campaign contributions and informative political advertising. Policy-motivated parties compete by selecting candidates and interest groups provide contributions to enhance the electoral prospects of like-minded candidates. Contributions...

"This paper uses data from Texas liquor referenda to explore a new approach to understanding voter turnout, inspired by the theoretical work of Harsanyi (1980) and Feddersen and Sandroni (2001). It presents a model based on this approach and structurally estimates it using the referendum data....