This article provides a detailed set of coding rules for disaggregating electoral volatility into two components: volatility caused by new party entry and old party exit, and volatility caused by vote switching across existing parties. After providing an overview of both types of volatility in post-communist countries, the causes of volatility are analysed using a larger dataset than those used in previous studies. The results are startling: most findings based on elections in post-communist countries included in previous studies disappear. Instead, entry and exit volatility is found to be largely a function of long-term economic recovery, and it becomes clear that very little is known about what causes ‘party switching’ volatility. As a robustness test of this latter result, the authors demonstrate that systematic explanations for party-switching volatility in Western Europe can indeed be found.

Corporations and political action committees (PACs) flood congressional elections with money. Understanding why they contribute is essential for determining how money influences policy in Congress. To test theories of contributors' motivations we exploit committee exile-the involuntary removal of committee members after a party loses a sizable number of seats, and the losses are unevenly distributed across committees. We use exile to show that business interests seek short-term access to influential legislators. Sectors regulated by the committee decrease contributions after a legislator is exiled, instead PACs from regulated sectors direct their contributions to new committee members from the opposite party. Partisan interests, in contrast, attempt to influence electoral outcomes-boosting contributions to exiled members. Together, we provide evidence that corporations and business PACs use donations to acquire immediate access and favor-suggesting they at least anticipate that the donations will influence policy. * We thank Gary Jacobson for sharing his candidate quality data, Arjun Wilkins for sharing his election data, Adam Bonica for his campaign finance data, and the Center for Responsive Politics for its industry and committee oversight classifications. We thank

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We show how preferred committee assignments act as an electoral subsidy for members of Congress-empowering representatives' legislative careers. When holding preferred assignments, legislators are free to focus on legislative activity in Washington, DC. But when the subsidy is removed, legislators are forced to direct attention to the district. To test our theory of legislative subsidy, we exploit committee exile-the involuntary removal of committee members after a party loses a sizable number of seats. Legislators are selected for exile using members' rank on the committee, causing exiled and remaining legislators to appear strikingly similar. Using exile, we show that it has only limited electoral consequences, but this is partly due to compensatory efforts. Exiled legislators shift attention away from Washington and towards the district: they raise and spend more money for reelection, author less legislation, are absent for more days of voting, and vote with their party less often.

In 2008 and 2009, the House of Representatives directed billions of dollars to the auto industry by passing a bailout and the “cash for clunkers” program. Moving beyond corporate influence via campaign contributions, we demonstrate that the presence of auto workers in a district strongly predicts legislative support for both bills. In addition to this critical legislation, we also analyze over 250 bills on which the auto industry either lobbied or took a public position. We find no patterns relating a district's workers or corporate campaign contributions to these votes on broader legislation where other groups, such as environmental advocates or labor unions, are at the table. Instead, the auto industry garners consistent support only on quasi-private, particularistic legislation. Thus, we contend that on particularistic legislation the presence of workers (not just campaign contributions) drives legislative support; however, when legislators expand the scope of conflict, the influence of a single industry is attentuated by other interests.