Electoral Rules and Constitutional Structures as Constraints on Corruption

Abstract

Electoral rules and constitutional structures can influence the level of political corruption. We show that proportional representation (PR) systems are more susceptible to corrupt political rent-seeking than plurality systems. We argue that this result depends on the different loci of rents in PR and plurality systems, and on the monitoring difficulties faced by both voters and opposition parties under PR. We also examine the interaction between electoral rules and presidentialism. We test our main predictions and interaction effects on a cross-section of up to ninety-four democracies. The empirical findings strongly support our hypothesis that PR systems, especially together with presidentialism, are associated with higher levels of corrupt political rent-seeking.Elections serve two functions in representative democracies. First, they select political actors who enact public policies in the light of constituents' preferences. Secondly, they permit citizens to hold their representatives accountable and to punish them if they enrich themselves in corrupt or self-serving ways. In other words, elections provide both incentives for politicians to enact certain kinds of policies and constraints on politicians' malfeasance. In this article, we focus on the second of these two functions and investigate how different electoral systems constrain corrupt rent-seeking, holding constant other political, economic and social factors.We study three stylized categories of electoral rules: plurality/majoritarian systems with single-member districts (PLURALITY), and two kinds of proportional representation (PR) systems: closed-list and open-list. Under a closed-list (CLPR) system, party leaders rank candidates and voters only cast votes for parties. Under an open-list system (OLPR), voters both select a party and rank candidates given the party's selection of candidates. In contrast to PR systems, voters under plurality rule both cast their ballots for specific candidates and elect a single representative from their district of residence.We assume that politicians trade off their re-election chances against illicit personal enrichment because revelations of corrupt rent-seeking reduce re-election chances. Thus, the control of corrupt political rent-seeking depends both on the locus of rents and on whether any actors have both the incentives and the ability to monitor those politicians with access to rents. We argue that plurality and PR systems differ in two ways. First, the locus of corrupt rents differs. Under PR, the party leadership can more effectively concentrate

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