Using an extensive dataset covering all Portuguese local governments (308), this paper analyzes the determinants of municipal deficits and debt. The results clearly indicate the existence of a political budget cycle, but there is no evidence that fiscal policy is used strategically to condition...

We use a large and unexplored dataset covering all mainland Portuguese municipalities from 1979 to 2002 to evaluate the impact of political forces in the allocation of grants from the central government to local authorities. Empirical results clearly show that, besides variables that proxi local...

This is an article on policy instrument design wholly embodied in the state of the art endogenous regional development theory. The family of Collective Efficiency Strategies (CES) was originally con-ceived in Portugal during the 2005/2009 legislative term and is very much replicable in other...

This paper analyzes the impact of economic conditions on voter turnout at Portuguese legislative and municipal elections. We use four extensive datasets to estimate an economic turnout model in which local economic variables are included in quadratic form, so that non-linear effects can be taken...

Although the literature on the political economy of public finance is already quite extensive, most articles analyse the behaviour of central governments. Furthermore, studies about the Portuguese economy are scarce. The present article contributes for a better understanding of these phenomena...

This paper offers additional insights on the interactions between economics and politics in Portugal. We use an unexplored data set consisting of monthly polls on vote intentions for the main political parties in Portugal, since 1986. Results indicate that: (1) socialist governments had less...

In Portugal, as in most other European Union (EU) countries, the challenge of Economic and Monetary Union (EMU) has worked as a mechanism for economic stabilisation. However, the political consensus on the participation in EMU did not develop with respect to the need for implementing structural...

Using employment data for municipalities, we find strong evidence of political business cycles. Employment increases shortly before elections mainly in municipalities where the mayor´s party has a majority of deputies in the municipal assembly and where she is running for reelection....

In the last twenty years Portugal struggled to keep public finances under control, notably in containing primary spending. We use a new quarterly dataset covering 1979:1-2007:4, and estimate a Bayesian Structural Autoregression model to analyze the macroeconomic effects of fiscal policy. The...

Using data for 278 Portuguese mainland municipalities, we estimate the impact of national and local economic conditions on legislative electoral outcomes over the period from the reestablishment of democracy in 1974 to the present. Empirical results indicate that the performance of the national...