Local Government Institutions and Political Representation

Session Submission Type: Full Paper Panel

Session Description

There are nearly 90,000 local governments in the United States, accounting for hundreds of thousands of local elected officials, over ten million employees, and a quarter of the nation's tax revenue (Trounstine 2009, 2010). Local governments are central actors in the debates over policing, housing, infrastructure, public health, and other crucial policy areas. Yet, voter turnout in local elections is extremely low compared to national contests and only ten percent of local elected officials are people of color compared to 23 percent in Congress.
Unique electoral institutions and policies may lie at the heart of these disparities. Local elections are often held “off-cycle,” taking place on different dates than national and state contests. Many local elections are legally non-partisan, preventing ballots from disclosing candidates’ party identification. Some local governments are structured using regional districts, some use at-large representatives, while others use a combination of both. Recent research has leveraged growing public data on local governments to better understand how these institutions shape participation, vote choice, and representation (Warshaw 2019). However, many questions regarding how local political institutions shape democratic representation remain open.
This panel aims to bring together a broad set of papers that explore the relationship between local electoral institutions and political representation, largely focusing on racial and ethnic inequalities. Papers will explore how local electoral rules, like election timing and non-partisan elections, shape who wins contests, how cities spend and collect revenue, and how organized interests behave and compete.

Sub Unit

• Division 30: Urban Politics

Individual Presentations

• Who Wins: City Election Timing and Racial and Ethnic Minority Candidate Success - George Agustin Markarain, Loyola University Chicago; Vladimir Kogan, Ohio State University

• How Local Election Timing Impacts Government Spending and Taxation - Zoltan L. Hajnal, University of California, San Diego

• Do Off-Cycle Elections Advantage Organized Groups? - Michael T. Hartney, Boston College

• Racial Polarization in Local Elections - Jessica Luce Trounstine, University of California, Merced; Shana Kushner Gadarian, Syracuse University; Melody Crowder-Meyer, Davidson College

Chair

• Sarah F. Anzia University of California-Berkeley

Discussant

• Julia Payson New York University