Punching above one's weight–on overcommitment in election campaigns
In this paper, we develop a game-theoretic model to study how candidates compete in elections when voters care about the winner’s ability to implement policies. In our model, the candidates make commitments before the election regarding the plans they will try to implement if elected. These commitme...
| Main Authors: | , , |
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| Other Authors: | |
| Format: | Journal Article |
| Language: | English |
| Published: |
2024
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| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | https://hdl.handle.net/10356/180029 |
| _version_ | 1826124746972987392 |
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| author | Haan, Marco A. Onderstal, Sander Riyanto, Yohanes Eko |
| author2 | School of Social Sciences |
| author_facet | School of Social Sciences Haan, Marco A. Onderstal, Sander Riyanto, Yohanes Eko |
| author_sort | Haan, Marco A. |
| collection | NTU |
| description | In this paper, we develop a game-theoretic model to study how candidates compete in elections when voters care about the winner’s ability to implement policies. In our model, the candidates make commitments before the election regarding the plans they will try to implement if elected. These commitments serve as a signal of ability. In equilibrium, candidates make overambitious promises. While the candidate with the highest ability wins, the electorate may be better off having a random candidate implement her best plan, rather than seeing the winner implementing an overambitious plan. |
| first_indexed | 2024-10-01T06:25:45Z |
| format | Journal Article |
| id | ntu-10356/180029 |
| institution | Nanyang Technological University |
| language | English |
| last_indexed | 2024-10-01T06:25:45Z |
| publishDate | 2024 |
| record_format | dspace |
| spelling | ntu-10356/1800292024-09-15T15:30:24Z Punching above one's weight–on overcommitment in election campaigns Haan, Marco A. Onderstal, Sander Riyanto, Yohanes Eko School of Social Sciences Social Sciences Election promises Signalling In this paper, we develop a game-theoretic model to study how candidates compete in elections when voters care about the winner’s ability to implement policies. In our model, the candidates make commitments before the election regarding the plans they will try to implement if elected. These commitments serve as a signal of ability. In equilibrium, candidates make overambitious promises. While the candidate with the highest ability wins, the electorate may be better off having a random candidate implement her best plan, rather than seeing the winner implementing an overambitious plan. Published version Onderstal gratefully acknowledges financial support from the Dutch National Science Foundation (NWO-VICI 453.03.606). 2024-09-10T05:07:40Z 2024-09-10T05:07:40Z 2024 Journal Article Haan, M. A., Onderstal, S. & Riyanto, Y. E. (2024). Punching above one's weight–on overcommitment in election campaigns. De Economist, 172(2), 121-139. https://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s10645-024-09435-5 0013-063X https://hdl.handle.net/10356/180029 10.1007/s10645-024-09435-5 2-s2.0-85193703065 2 172 121 139 en De Economist © 2024 The Author(s). Open Access. This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article’s Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article’s Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this licence, visit http://creativecommons.org/ licenses/by/4.0/. application/pdf |
| spellingShingle | Social Sciences Election promises Signalling Haan, Marco A. Onderstal, Sander Riyanto, Yohanes Eko Punching above one's weight–on overcommitment in election campaigns |
| title | Punching above one's weight–on overcommitment in election campaigns |
| title_full | Punching above one's weight–on overcommitment in election campaigns |
| title_fullStr | Punching above one's weight–on overcommitment in election campaigns |
| title_full_unstemmed | Punching above one's weight–on overcommitment in election campaigns |
| title_short | Punching above one's weight–on overcommitment in election campaigns |
| title_sort | punching above one s weight on overcommitment in election campaigns |
| topic | Social Sciences Election promises Signalling |
| url | https://hdl.handle.net/10356/180029 |
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