Dissertation

Working Paper

Data  

CV

Representation and Policy Responsiveness: The Median Voter, Election Rules and Redistributive Welfare Spending (with G. Bingham Powell Jr.)

[Abstract]

This analysis addresses three questions. First, given the many economic and social conditions that shape welfare spending, are developed democracies nonetheless responsive, as promised, to what their voters want? Second, is the delivery of redistributive welfare policy more responsive to voters under Proportional Representation election rules than under Single Member Districts, as we might expect from the representational superiority of PR rules? If not, is it the greater voter preference for leftist policies that accounts for the often-observed greater welfare spending in countries with PR electoral systems? Finally, are government campaign promises the mechanism that links voter preferences and redistributive welfare spending? The results are grounds for cautious optimism about the promises of liberal democracy. (Menuscript avaiable upon request.)

The Influence of Presidential Power on Government Formation Processes in Semi-Presidentialism

(paper presented at the 2004 Annual Meeting of the American Political Science Association)

[Abstract]

Upon realizing that there exist two qualitatively different institutional arrangements with regard to the government formation in semi-presidentialism, the paper present two models of government formation process in semi-presidentialism: premier-presidentialism and president-parliamentarism. By comparing equilibrium results drawn from two different models of semi-presidential regimes, we show that there exist multiple equilibria under certain exogenous conditions in which traditional bargaining theories, which do not assume the existence of the president with some power to influence on the bargaining process, predict a unique equilibrium; that there exist an equilibrium outcome in which the presidential party is systematically advantaged by the presidential power; and that the institutional arrangements of president-parliamentary system by which the president can defend his or her preferred policy without the need to win parliamentary confidence can have significant (negative) implications on the development of democracy in the sense that it may help the president to rule without parliament confidence. (pdf)