A banana republic? The effects of inconsistencies in the counting of votes on voting behavior

Abstract

We examine whether local inconsistencies in the counting of votes influence voting behavior. We exploit the case of the second ballot of the 2016 presidential election in Austria. The ballot needed to be repeated because postal votes were counted carelessly in individual electoral districts ("scandal districts"). We use a difference-indifferences approach comparing election outcomes from the regular and the repeated round. The results do not show that voter turnout and postal voting declined significantly in scandal districts. Quite the contrary, voter turnout and postal voting increased slightly by about 1 percentage point in scandal districts compared to nonscandal districts. Postal votes in scandal districts also were counted with some greater care in the repeated ballot. We employ micro-level survey data indicating that voters in scandal districts blamed the federal constitutional court for ordering a second election, but did not seem to blame local authorities.

Electoral cycles in perceived corruption: International empirical evidence

“…On electoral consequences of inconsistencies in the counting of votes seePotrafke and Roesel (2018).…”

Do inheritance rules affect voter turnout? Evidence from an Alpine region

“…On how group identity relates to voter turnout seeHillman et al (2015).22 We cannot rule out, of course, that the estimates constitute a case of ecological fallacy and we do not know which individuals turn up for the vote, because we do not have data on who exactly is voting. Aggregated macro variables tend to predict individual voting behavior quite well, however (see, for example,Alabrese et al 2019;Potrafke and Roesel 2019).…”