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Begin New Search Topic Democratization Political Geography India Content Type Working Paper Publication Year within 10 Years

1. Understanding the Indian Voter

Author:
Milan Vaishnav
Publication Date:
06-2015
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Carnegie Endowment for International Peace
Abstract:
The Bharatiya Janata Party’s (BJP’s) historic victory in India’s 2014 general election prompted declarations of a watershed in the behavior of the Indian voter. Upon closer inspection, the reality is more nuanced. On some parameters, such as voting based on economic and ethnic considerations, there were indeed discernible changes. However, the empirical evidence suggests these shifts were well under way before 2014. In other areas—namely, support for regional parties, dynastic politicians, and candidates associated with criminal activity—contemporary voters demonstrated much greater continuity with the past.
Topic:
Democratization, Demographics, Ethnic Conflict, Political Economy, and Governance
Political Geography:
South Asia and India

2. A Tale of Two Villages: Kinship Networks and Political Preference Change in Rural India

Author:
Neelanjan Sircar
Publication Date:
09-2015
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
The Cato Institute
Abstract:
This paper develops a theory on how voters form and change political preferences in democratic developing world contexts. In the developing world, where state institutions are often weak, voters tend to be more focused on the competence and capacity of parties and candidates to deliver benefits. Such information may be difficult to ascertain, so voters must glean information from how candidates conduct themselves during the electoral campaign. Voters use kinship networks to develop more accurate preferences by collectively reasoning through newly available information on candidates. In order to demonstrate these claims, this study analyzes data collected on political preferences and kinship networks in two villages just before and after the campaign period during the 2011 Assembly election in the Indian state of West Bengal. The paper finds very strong kinship network effects on changes in issue preferences and vote choice over the course of the campaign and explains the results through qualitative work and a series of network autoregressive statistical models. In sum, this paper demonstrates how voters develop independent preferences and implement political change, even in low information contexts with weak human capital.
Topic:
Democratization, Politics, Self Determination, and Elections
Political Geography:
India

3. Whose Side Are You On? Identifying the Distributive Preferences of Local Politicians in India

Author:
Mark Schneider and Neelanjan Sircar
Publication Date:
08-2015
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
The Cato Institute
Abstract:
The literature on decentralized public programs suggests that errors in the targeting of anti-poverty programs are rooted in the capture of these programs by local elites or local politicians. Consistent with the literature on moral economy in political science and experimental economics, we argue that voters in contexts of rural poverty prefer local leaders who target subsistence benefits to the poor. In a high information village context, where voters and leaders know each other, we argue that local elections lead to the selection of local leaders with pro-poor preferences over the distribution of these benefits. We show this with a novel theory of local politicians’ social preferences. We test our theory with unique data from a behavioral measure, conducted in the context of a lottery with a modest cash prize in rural India, that captures a scenario in which local leaders have full discretion and anonymity over allocation among members of their rural communities. We analyze our data using a novel estimation strategy that takes the characteristics of the pool of potential beneficiaries into account in decisions over allocation under a budget constraint. We find that local leaders have strong preferences for targeting the poor, and particularly those they believe supported them politically in the past. This article suggests that free and fair elections at the local level can powerfully encourage pro-poor targeting even in contexts of weak institutions and pervasive poverty. It also makes a fundamental contribution to research on distributive politics by challenging research in this area to demonstrate the effect of electoral strategies and other distortions on allocation relative to local leaders’ baseline distributive preferences.
Topic:
Democratization, Economics, Politics, Political Theory, and Elections
Political Geography:
India

4. India 2014: Return of the One-Party Dominant System

Author:
Neera Chandhoke
Publication Date:
06-2014
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Istituto Affari Internazionali
Abstract:
The current elections, which gave to the BJP a majority in Parliament, have brought back the one-party dominant system that was once used to describe the hegemony of the Congress party, and the lack of an opposition. The "new" one-party dominant system is however dramatically different from the original one. The BJP unlike the Congress is a cadre based party and subscribes to a distinct ideology. It is also headed by the powerful figure of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, whose image looms larger than the party and his colleagues. India will witness a qualitatively different style of governance in the next five years.
Topic:
Democratization, Power Politics, and Governance
Political Geography:
India and Southeast Asia

5. In India, Election Season Is Never Over

Author:
Richard M. Rossow
Publication Date:
07-2014
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Center for Strategic and International Studies
Abstract:
The Bharatiya Janata Party's (BJP) historic victory in the spring 2014 Lok Sabha1 election was a tremendous accomplishment—yet it still leaves the party with impartial control, at best. Weakness in the Rajya Sabha, where the BJP only holds 43 out of 243 seats, may limit the party's ability to enact legislative reforms. And the fact that the BJP only controls 5 of India's 29 states will also blunt the impact of any policy measures adopted at the center. In order to enact a true economic transformation, the BJP will either need the support of a wide range of unaligned parties—which would be a historical abnormality—or to consolidate its power at the state level by winning upcoming state elections. With the BJP's powerful show of force across India in the Lok Sabha election, winning state elections appears to be a viable path.
Topic:
Democratization, Regime Change, Governance, and Reform
Political Geography:
India and Southeast Asia