Fertilizer and votes: Does strategic economic policy explain the 2009 Malawi election?

• Samuel Brazys ^[1] ; Peter Heaney ; Patrick Paul Walsh ^[1]
  1. [1] University College Dublin

     University College Dublin

     Irlanda

     
• Localización: Electoral Studies: An international Journal, ISSN 0261-3794, Nº 39, 2015, págs. 39-55
• Idioma: inglés
• Texto completo no disponible (Saber más ...)
• Resumen

  • Ethno-regional voting cleavages have featured in a number of sub-Saharan African states during the third wave of democratization. While these voting patterns are well studied, there have been few attempts to understand if pan-ethno-regional coalition building based on targeted economic policies can be employed to secure national electoral coalitions. We examine the 2009 Malawian parliamentary elections where a newly-formed national party used its incumbent position to promote an economic policy based on food security in order to overcome traditional ethno-regional voting patterns. After presenting a formal model of an optimal allocation of an economic resource to induce vote-switching, we use district-level data in a system of equations approach finding that this strategic allocation did indeed contribute to the nation-wide electoral victory.