Suchergebnisse

O uso do conceito de clientelismo tornou-se comum como paradigma de explicacao para os "desajustes" entre o desenvolvimento economico-social e a falta de estabilidade das instituicoes politicas, referindo-se basicamente aos estagios de sociedades tradicionais, sociedades em transicao e sociedades politicamente desenvolvidas. O artigo discute a passagem do segundo para o terceiro estagio, que constitui, para o autor, o problema do caso brasileiro, concentrando-se na analise de "clientelismo eleitoral". (Novos Estudos)

During the period in which Latin America underwent the most lasting and widespread wave of democratization, we test whether governments targeted increases in social spending to coincide with presidential elections in a panel of eighteen Latin American democracies from 1980 to 2008. Results confirm that governments increase health and social security expenditures during elections and that democracies that were most apt to channel increases in social spending to coincide with elections were those in the transition stage of democratization.

We test for political budget cycles in a panel of eighteen Latin American democracies from 1973 to 2008. Recent studies have argued that the pattern of deficit cycles in a large cross-section of countries is driven by the experience of ''new democracies." As a large share of the countries that underwent democratization during this period are in Latin America, we seek to verify if these patterns are robust using an updated data set on fiscal expenditures, democratization and elections. Our results suggest that political budget cycles are driven by democratic transitions in Latin America. Our findings are robust to whether objective judgment and observational criteria of democracy and democratic transitions are employed, or measures based on vague and arbitrary operational rules. Furthermore, we show that the deficit cycle in transitional Latin American democracies appears to be driven by lower election-year revenue collection rather than an increase in public expenditures.

The scholarship on the accountability of local incumbents usually focuses on two main hypotheses. The first, the sub-national vote, argues that voters rely mostly on information on incumbent's local performance. The second hypothesis, the referendum vote, argues that is voters´ decision give more weight to national aspects, particularly their assessment of the president's performance. In this last case, the electoral fate of local incumbents would be determined by aspects outside their reach. In this paper we test those two hypotheses for the Brazilian case using a data set on 131 governor's elections for the 27 Brazilian states between 1990 and 2006. To our knowledge, this is the first time these two hypotheses are tested in a multiparty context, since previous studies focused mainly on two-party systems. Our results show no support for the referendum hypothesis, as national variables did not have any effect on the probability of governors´ reelection. Among the local variables, there is a negative effect from state fiscal deficits, a result that contradicts usual expectations on new democracies.

We test for political budget cycles in a panel of eighteen Latin American democracies from 1973 to 2008. Recent studies have argued that the pattern of deficit cycles in a large cross-section of countries is driven by the experience of ''new democracies." As a large share of the countries that underwent democratization during this period are in Latin America, we seek to verify if these patterns are robust using an updated data set on fiscal expenditures, democratization and elections. Our results suggest that there are important differences when objective judgment and observational criteria of democracy and democratic transitions are employed in comparison to measures that rely on vague and arbitrary operational rules. Furthermore, we show that the deficit cycle in transitional Latin American democracies appears to be driven by lower election-year revenue collection rather than an increase in public expenditures.

In this paper, we show that education, health and social security expenditures did not increase during elections. Based on a panel of fifteen Latin American democracies from 1973 to 2000, we show that there are important increases in social spending in the inaugural year of a new presidential administration. We argue that social policy is used by Latin American democracies as an instrument to reward voters after winners enter office and not as a tool to manipulate outcomes before elections as commonly argued in the literature.

This chapter uses candidates' reports to the Brazilian electoral court to examine the evolution of campaign spending during four elections between 2002 to 2014. Focusing on campaigns for federal representative, we show that campaign spending rose significantly in this period, albeit with significant variation across and within states. Our results suggest that both district magnitude and regional characteristics have limited influence on spending. Similarly, the aggregation of candidates by parties also reveals a complex picture that cannot be explained by the traditional dichotomy of government and opposition. Most importantly, campaign spending has remained concentrated on a few candidates, suggesting that electoral competition in Brazil is less intense than would be expected by observing the raw number of candidates per seat.

This paper analyzes the reverse coattail effect on Brazilian elections, a term originally coined by Ames (1994). More specifically, it deals with the ability of local party organizations to transfer votes to upper levels party candidates by concentrating on the causal electoral effect of electing a mayor over subsequent statewide proportional elections. To identify the effect of electing a mayor, it employs a regression discontinuity design (RDD) focusing on observations in which the electoral difference between the elected mayor and the runner-up is very tight. The use of a large dataset, covering elections between 1996 and 2010, allows exploring parties' heterogeneity inThis paper analyzes the reverse coattail effect on Brazilian elections, a term originally coined by Ames (1994). More specifically, it deals with the ability of local party organizations to transfer votes to upper levels party candidates by concentrating on the causal electoral effect of electing a mayor over subsequent statewide proportional elections. To identify the effect of electing a mayor, it employs a regression discontinuity design (RDD) focusing on observations in which the electoral difference between the elected mayor and the runner-up is very tight. The use of a large dataset, covering elections between 1996 and 2010, allows exploring parties' heterogeneity in both cross-section and temporal analyses. Main results show that the positive effect of electing a mayor on party performance in subsequent proportional election holds for the entire period. Another finding is that Brazilian parties show different capabilities in getting votes from their mayors, pointing that intra-party linkages may vary among parties. Finally, the impact of electing a mayor vary along the years.

There is current a large concern with corruption around the world as it may be one of the causes for lagging development. There is also a concern that corrupt government will succeed to stay in power using the money obtained in corruption activities to finance political campaigns. Consequently, corruption might jeopardize economic development for a long period of time and questions democracy. To test the consequences and causes of corruption we need to measure the phenomenon. Traditional measures rely on perception surveys despite the shortcomings of these measures. Field and natural experiments or even survey experiments are other alternatives to measure the phenomenon. In this paper we review the measures available in the literature and propose an index based on objective information from random audit reports. We show that this index is a tool to analyze municipalities in Brazil and that our index is consistent with expected (stylized) behavior, it is relatively easy to compute, and it is normalized between 0 and 1. ; Existe no mundo hoje em dia uma grande preocupação com corrupção. Há uma percepção geral de que a corrupção pode ser uma das causas para o desenvolvimento tardio. Também há uma preocupação de que governos corruptos seriam bem sucedidos em manter-se no poder utilizando-se do dinheiro obtido com atividades corruptas para financiar suas campanhas eleitorais. Consequentemente, a corrupção pode comprometer o desenvolvimento econômico por um longo período de tempo e também colocar em xeque a democracia. Para testar as consequências e causas da corrupção é necessário, antes de tudo, medir o fenômeno. As medidas tradicionais partem de pesquisas de percepção com todos os problemas relacionados a essa medida. Experimentos naturais e de campo, ou até experimentos com pesquisa de campo são outras alternativas para medir o fenômeno. Neste artigo revisamos as medidas disponíveis na literatura e propomos um índice baseado em informações objetivas de relatórios de auditoria aleatória. Mostramos que o índice ...