Clarity of Alternatives and Corruption Voting

• In Event: The Contradictory Potential of Accountability Institutions in Latin America

Abstract

This article argues that the clarity of electoral alternatives influences the capacity of voters to penalize corrupt politicians. The proposition is that while citizens are ready to punish corruption, the electoral toll for a corrupt record would be reduced in districts of unclear electoral choices. Traditional approximations to the question of why corrupt politicians win elections focus on the issues of limited availability of trustworthy information or on voter biases toward partisan candidates. However, the scholarship does not provide systematic insight into the connections between corruption voting and the structure of electoral choices. This article aims to fill this gap by proposing the concept of the clarity of alternatives and a scheme to classify electoral districts by the extent to which they facilitate the identifiability of electoral options. An empirical application of the concept of the clarity of alternatives to two case studies using an exogenous corruption indicator reveals that the clarity of alternatives contributes to electoral accountability for corruption. The implication of this finding is that those party decisions that increase voter uncertainty about the clarity of alternatives contribute to the electoral fortune of corrupt politicians.

Author

• Sofia B. Vera, University of Kansas