A Political Theory of Populism
63 Pages Posted: 16 Aug 2011 Last revised: 18 Aug 2011
There are 3 versions of this paper
A Political Theory of Populism
A Political Theory of Populism
A Political Theory of Populism
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.
Keywords: political economy, inequality, populism, voting, signaling
JEL Classification: D71, D74, C71
Suggested Citation: Suggested Citation
Do you want regular updates from SSRN on Twitter?
Recommended Papers
-
A Political Economy Model of Congressional Careers
By Daniel Diermeier, Michael P. Keane, ...
-
By Francesco Caselli and Massimo Morelli
-
A Political Economy Model of Congressional Careers, Second Version
By Daniel Diermeier, Michael P. Keane, ...
-
A Political Economy Model of Congressional Careers: Supplementary Material
By Daniel Diermeier, Michael P. Keane, ...
-
Mixed Equilibrium in a Downsian Model with a Favored Candidate
-
By Matthias Messner and Mattias Polborn
-
Political Careers or Career Politicians?
By Andrea Mattozzi and Antonio Merlo
-
Political Careers or Career Politicians?
By Andrea Mattozzi and Antonio Merlo
-
Political Careers or Career Politicians?
By Andrea Mattozzi and Antonio Merlo
-
Political Careers Or Career Politicians? Second Version
By Andrea Mattozzi and Antonio Merlo