Voters and their representatives: Electoral institutions and delegation in parliamentary democracies

Abstract

Of all the links in the democratic delegation chain, the first link (from voters to legislators) may be fraught with the greatest potential for agency losses. Voters -the ultimate principals -may lack the information and resources to select the best legislators and subsequently ensure that they do the public's bidding. This paper uses some of the insights of the principal-agent approach to examine the Voter-MP relationship by focusing primarily on two sets of organisational and institutional rules: methods of candidate selection and electoral laws. Since the emphasis is on direct links between voters and legislators (rather than on the intermediary role of parties), we examine electoral laws in terms of the incentives they provide for candidates to seek a personal vote. Since agency losses are most likely when the MPs' careers do not directly depend on voters, electoral systems are arranged on a continuum from party-centred systems (little or no incentive to seek personal votes), to intermediate systems (limited effectiveness of personal voting) to candidate-centred systems (where personal voting is most effective). One of the arguments is that a trade-off often exists between the directness of the link between voter and agent and the choice of agents that is crucial to voters' abilities to sanction agents. If it is thought desirable that voters have the ability to directly sanction representatives, then an institutional design involving effective preferential voting in districts of moderate magnitude should be optimal.

Electoral Systems, Political Career Paths and Legislative Behavior: Evidence from South Korea's Mixed-Member System

“…A variety of theoretical ideas have been put forward. In particular, John Carey, Matthew Shugart, and others argue that politicians elected under 'candidate-centric' electoral rules, such as an open-list PR system, are more likely to be independent from their parties than politicians who are elected under 'party-centric' rules, such as closed-list PR system (Carey and Shugart, 1995;Samuels, 1999;Shugart, 2005;Mitchell, 2000;Shugart et al, electoral systems, political career paths and legislative behavior 155 2005; Carey, 2007Carey, , 2008. When testing these propositions in cross-country research, a common problem is that it is difficult to identify the causal effect of electoral rules on legislative behavior independently from several other cross-country factors, such as how parties are organized.…”

Campaign-Personalization and Constituency Focus in a Mixed-Member Electoral System. The Case of Hungary

“…(4) Last, but not least, candidate selection rules exert a significant effect on personalization under the given electoral rules. Several scholars have shown that the way the party selects its candidates is one of the most important determinants of whether the system rewards or punishes candidate-centeredness (Atmor, Hazan, and Rahat, 2011;Carey and Shugart, 1995;Mitchell, 2000;Norris, 2004). The inclusiveness and decentralization of the nomination process greatly affect candidate incentives to personalize (Atmor et al, 2011).…”

Ballot Structure and Satisfaction with Democracy

“…As re-election depends on their personal performance, MPs would develop closer links with citizens (Lawson, 1980;Mitchell, 2000;Römmele et al, 2005) and would pay attention to personal relations -even if only as a means to personal vote chasing. Some authors have articulated this idea through the concept of "reputation" (Curtice & Shively, 2009: 173), whereas others preferred the looser "representative role" of MPs (Farrell & McAllister, 2006: 725-727;Ames, 1995).…”