Local Logrolling? Examining the Impact of District Representation on Distributive Politics
28 Pages Posted: 15 Jul 2012 Last revised: 19 Aug 2012
Date Written: 2012
Abstract
Over the past three decades, efforts to increase minority incorporation and representation have resulted in a shift away from at-large toward district-based elections in American cities. Observers and academics have blamed this institutional change for encouraging elected official to focus on district priorities while ignoring --- and perhaps even sacrificing --- broader municipal needs. Have improved electoral prospects for minority candidates come at the cost of parochialism and logrolling on city councils, as traditional models of urban and distributive politics predict? Using seven years worth of roll call data from the Los Angeles city council, we examine the hypothesis that district elections lead to vote-trading among its members. Overall, our analysis finds little evidence for distributive theories of legislative voting. Instead, the results support a model of conditional deference, suggesting that a district-based electoral system does not always incentivize elected officials to ignore the larger concerns of their polity when creating policy.
Keywords: district elections, logrolling, distributive politics, minority incorporation
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