The Cabals of a Few or the Confusion of a Multitude: The Institutional Trade-off Between Representation and Governance

• 成果类型: Article
• 署名作者: Brooks, Leah; Phillips, Justin; Sinitsyn, Maxim
• 署名单位: University of Toronto; Columbia University; McGill University
• 刊物名称: AMERICAN ECONOMIC JOURNAL-ECONOMIC POLICY
• ISSN/ISSBN: 1945-7731
• DOI: 10.1257/pol.3.1.1
• 发表日期: 2011
• 页码: 1-24
• 关键词: incumbency advantage; political-parties; federal-grants; GOVERNMENT; CONSEQUENCES; interests; meetings; state; size

摘要

Our model illustrates how political institutions trade off between the competing goals of representation and governance, where governance is the responsiveness of an institution to a single pivotal voter. We use exogenous variation from the 30-year history of the federal Community Development Block Grant program to identify this trade-off. Cities with more representative governments-those with larger city councils-use more grant funds to supplement city revenues rather than implementing tax cuts, thereby moving policy further away from the governance ideal. In sum, more representative government is not without cost. (JEL D72, H71, R50)