The Impact of Media Markets on Accountability under Majoritarian and PR Rules

• In Event: Chaos in Order: Conflict Within and Across Political Parties

Abstract

This paper examines the differential impact of media coverage on representatives’ behavior across different electoral systems. Taking advantage of of the mixed electoral system in Germany, exogenous variation in spatial congruence between media markets and constituencies, and an original data set on newspaper circulation, I answer two questions: First, what is the extent to which media coverage influences the roll call voting behavior of politicians? Second, how does this effect differ between systems of majoritarian and proportional representation (PR)? I find that a one unit increase in the level of congruence between media markets and constituencies decreases a direct MP’s propensity to vote in line with his/her party leadership by an average of 3 to 7 percentage points, while it has no effect on list MPs. The findings suggest that greater transparency through the press aligns the behavior of single-member district representatives with their constituents’ preferences, while it has no such effect on representatives elected through party lists. This raises questions about the ‘electoral connection’ of list MPs. This paper makes two main contributions. First, it uses a rigorous identification strategy to show how the responsiveness of representatives elected through PR and majoritarian rules to media coverage vary. Second, it presents an original, highly disaggregated data set on newspaper circulation and MP behavior in Germany.

Author

• Pia Raffler, Harvard University