Year: 2011
Type: report
Abstract: When voters fear that politicians may have a right-wing bias or that they may be influenced or corrupted by the rich elite, signals of true left-wing conviction are valuable.As a consequence, even a moderate politician seeking reelection chooses "populist' policies -i.e., policies to the left of the median voter -as a way of signaling that he is not from the right.Truly right-wing politicians respond by choosing more moderate, or even left-of-center policies.This populist bias of policy is greater when the value of remaining in office is higher for the politician; when there is greater polarization between the policy preferences of the median voter and right-wing politicians; when politicians are indeed more likely to have a hidden right-wing agenda; when there is an intermediate amount of noise in the information that voters receive; when politicians are more forward-looking; and when there is greater uncertainty about the type of the incumbent.We show that similar results apply when some politicians can be corrupted or influenced through other non-electoral means by the rich elite.We also show that 'soft term limits' may exacerbate, rather than reduce, the populist bias of policies.
DOI: 10.3386/w17306
Language: English
Field: Social Sciences
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: green
OpenAlex ID: W4298239556