of experimentation is suboptimal, taking decisions by direct democracy, or electing risk-loving politicians, could …

they cannot run for re-election. Consistent with the Law of 1/N, this tendency is less pronounced in states with many …

As the performance of long-term projects is not observable in the short run politicians may pander to public opinion … to stand for reelection. Reelection thresholds are offered by politicians during campaigns. We show that, on balance, the …

Politicians regularly underperform in their job duties due to the obscurity of their actions to constituents. In this … study, we investigate the effects of a local NGO's initiative to improve the transparency of politicians' performance in a … multi-year field experiment involving 408 politicians in 20 Ugandan district governments between the 2011 and 2016 elections …

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 …

political selection. Overall, we conclude that voters select more competent politicians when they face uncertainty about the …

the mayoral election in March 2020, the Bavarian state government announced an official state of emergency with measures …

We estimate the effect of winning a mayoral election on long-run licit earnings, which plays a key role in the … an election is equal to 35,000€, or 85 percent of the annual labor and social security earnings for the average candidate … years after the election. Net of compensations for service, this effect is negative during the first ten years after the …

that direct election regimes ease the selection of competent politicians into office. …This paper investigates how direct election regimes (à la presidential democracy) affect the selection of women into … of female mayors substantially. The results are stronger in cities with a high pre-reform share of female politicians and …

We estimate the effect of winning a mayoral election on long-run licit earnings, which plays a key role in the … an election is equal to 35,000€, or 85 percent of the annual labor and social security earnings for the average candidate … years after the election. Net of compensations for service, this effect is negative during the first ten years after the …