Abstract
This article analyses whether and how the persistent positive relationship between socioeconomic status and political participation can be moderated by institutional design. Hopes to boost turnout rates of socially disadvantaged citizens often rest upon the introduction of participatory institutions. Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Alexis de Tocqueville and John Stuart Mill had already asserted claims about the educative effect of close political institutions at the local level, which presumably result in a decrease in social inequality. More recently, campaigns for greater regional authority throughout Europe have represented a demand for opportunities to participate in decentralised, accessible polities. Based on data from 259 regions in Europe, we investigate whether political decentralisation and increased opportunities to participate are appropriate means of mitigating political inequality. The results not only fail to meet expectations but show that decentralisation in fact reinforces unequal voter turnout. These findings are particularly relevant for combatting inequality and indicating the potential side effects of decentralisation campaigns.
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Notes
This assumption is based on the frequent empirical observation that the individual practice of various forms of political participation, such as unconventional and conventional forms as well as local and national forms of engagement, is generally highly correlated [Kaase (1999) interpersonal trust, political trust and non-institutionalised political participation in Western Europe. West European Politics, 22, 1–21, Van Deth and Theocharis (2017) Political participation in a changing world: conceptual and empirical challenges in the study of citizen engagement, Routledge, London].
The most recent values are available for 2010 at http://www.unc.edu/~gwmarks/data_ra.php.
In multiple imputation, one imputes m values for each missing cell in the data matrix and creates m completed data sets. We imputed missing values using chained equations and imputed a total of 5 data sets. Across these completed data sets, the observed values are the same, but the missing values are filled in with different imputations that reflect the uncertainty about the missing data. After imputation, each data set was separately analysed, and the results were then combined.
This occurs for example when there is no regional assembly and government or when there is a legislature and/or executive appointed by the central government.
The number of contextual entities differs between additional models, since income was not queried in Portugal but education and occupation were.
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Appendices
Appendix 1: Operationalisation and summary statistics
Operationalisation | N | Mean | SD | Min | Max | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Electoral participation | Voted last national election (dummy) | 36,653 | 0.768 | 0.422 | 0 | 1 |
RAI | Regional authority index (Hooghe et al. 2016) | 265 | 9.209 | 7.713 | 1 | 25.50 |
SES factor | Predicted scores from factor analysis | 26,593 | − 0.030 | 0.798 | − 1.71 | 2.05 |
Income | Household’s total net income (all sources) | 29,529 | 5.035 | 2.816 | 1 | 10 |
Education | Highest level of education (ES-ISCED) | 39,340 | 3.607 | 1.847 | 1 | 7 |
Prestige | Occupational prestige according to Treiman (1977) based on name or title of respondent’s main job | 34,698 | 39.90 | 13.88 | 6 | 78 |
Gender | Respondent’s gender (dummy) | 39,516 | 1.541 | 0.498 | 1 | 2 |
Age | Age in years | 39,516 | 48.74 | 18.68 | 14 | 101 |
Place of living | Description of area where respondent lives (factor) | 39,516 | 2.884 | 1.224 | 1 | 5 |
Belonging to religion | Belonging to particular religion or denomination (dummy) | 39,516 | 1.364 | 0.481 | 1 | 2 |
Household size | Number of people living regularly as member of household | 39,516 | 2.679 | 1.389 | 1 | 19 |
Population density | Population density in 2010 (log) | 265 | 4.614 | 1.193 | 0.92 | 8.84 |
GDP | GDP in 2010 at current market prices in Euro per inhabitant | 265 | 20,389 | 12,891 | 2300 | 69,100 |
Compulsory voting | Compulsory voting in national elections (dummy) | 21 | 0.095 | 0.301 | 0 | 1 |
Income inequality | Gini coefficient of equivalised disposable income in 2010 | 21 | 28.91 | 4.131 | 23.60 | 36.90 |
Party system | Effective number of parties | 21 | 5.136 | 1.883 | 2.790 | 10.04 |
Electoral system | Type of electoral system (factor) | 21 | 2.143 | 0.573 | 1 | 3 |
Direct democracy | Constitutional provisions for direct democracy (Bühlmann et al. 2012) | 21 | 30.95 | 39.89 | 0 | 100 |
Fractionalisation | Fractionalisation of language groups (Alesina et al. 2003) | 21 | 0.189 | 0.161 | 0.020 | 0.541 |
Appendix 2: Additional models
(1) | (2) | (3) | (4) | (5) | (6) | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Main effects only | Multiply imputed data | Self-rule only | Shared rule only | Representation | Cumulative change of RAI | |
Explanatory variables | ||||||
Regional authority indicator | − 0.042 | − 0.005 | − 0.024 | − 0.020 | − 0.054 | − 0.451** |
(0.10) | (0.01) | (0.10) | (0.09) | (0.060) | (0.123) | |
SES factor | 0.680** | 0.554** | 0.688** | 0.686** | 0.589** | 0.785** |
(0.02) | (0.03) | (0.02) | (0.02) | (0.047) | (0.109) | |
Interaction RAI*SES | 0.009** | 0.058* | 0.080** | 0.037** | − 0.054 | |
(0.00) | (0.02) | (0.03) | (0.016) | (0.054) | ||
Individual control variables | ||||||
Gender | 0.039 | − 0.005 | 0.040 | 0.040 | 0.040 | 0.039 |
(0.03) | (0.03) | (0.03) | (0.03) | (0.033) | (0.033) | |
Age | 0.515** | 0.030** | 0.513** | 0.513** | 0.561** | 0.561** |
(0.02) | (0.00) | (0.02) | (0.02) | (0.020) | (0.020) | |
Place of living (suburb) | 0.169** | 0.174** | 0.165* | 0.167** | 0.166** | 0.171** |
(0.06) | (0.06) | (0.06) | (0.06) | (0.064) | (0.064) | |
Place of living (small city) | 0.103* | 0.088* | 0.101* | 0.102* | 0.100* | 0.102* |
(0.05) | (0.04) | (0.05) | (0.05) | (0.050) | (0.050) | |
Place of living (village) | 0.270** | 0.249** | 0.265** | 0.265** | 0.266** | 0.269** |
(0.05) | (0.04) | (0.05) | (0.05) | (0.051) | (0.051) | |
Place of living (countryside) | 0.302** | 0.251** | 0.298** | 0.296** | 0.297** | 0.306** |
(0.09) | (0.08) | (0.09) | (0.09) | (0.092) | (0.092) | |
Belonging to religion | − 0.300** | 0.301** | − 0.301** | − 0.300** | − 0.301** | − 0.300** |
(0.04) | (0.04)** | (0.04) | (0.04) | (0.038) | (0.038) | |
Household size | 0.101** | 0.065 | 0.101** | 0.102** | 0.103** | 0.103** |
(0.02) | (0.01)** | (0.02) | (0.02) | (0.019) | (0.019) | |
Regional control variables | ||||||
Population density (log) | − 0.078 | − 0.096** | − 0.075 | − 0.077 | − 0.076 | − 0.115** |
(0.05) | (0.03) | (0.05) | (0.05) | (0.046) | (0.044) | |
GDP | 0.037 | 0.000* | 0.028 | 0.034 | 0.033 | 0.076 |
(0.08) | (0.00)* | (0.08) | (0.08) | (0.076) | (0.071) | |
Country-level control variables | ||||||
Compulsory voting | 0.786* | 0.745** | 0.778* | 0.774* | 0.781* | 0.798** |
(0.34) | (0.26) | (0.34) | (0.34) | (0.343) | (0.233) | |
Income inequality | − 0.099 | − 0.020 | − 0.101 | − 0.099 | − 0.075 | − 0.062 |
(0.11) | (0.02) | (0.12) | (0.11) | (0.117) | (0.078) | |
Party system | − 0.151 | − 0.109* | − 0.147 | − 0.157 | − 0.128 | − 0.195* |
(0.13) | (0.05) | (0.13) | (0.13) | (0.127) | (0.086) | |
Electoral system (PR) | 0.154 | 0.128 | 0.155 | 0.167 | 0.195 | 0.040 |
(0.36) | (0.28) | (0.36) | (0.36) | (0.360) | (0.245) | |
Electoral system (mixed) | 0.055 | 0.154 | 0.025 | 0.078 | 0.009 | 0.0001 |
(0.37) | (0.29) | (0.39) | (0.36) | (0.372) | (0.250) | |
Direct democracy | − 0.238 | − 0.006* | − 0.236 | − 0.231 | − 0.268* | − 0.212** |
(0.12) | (0.00) | (0.13) | (0.12) | (0.125) | (0.078) | |
Fractionalisation of language groups | 0.096 | 0.997 | 0.085 | 0.099 | 0.078 | 0.175 |
(0.14) | (0.70) | (0.14) | (0.15) | (0.145) | (0.102) | |
Random effects | ||||||
Country variance | 0.166* | 0.31* | 0.169* | 0.165* | 0.170* | 0.071* |
(0.07) | (0.07) | (0.07) | (0.07) | (0.070) | (0.035) | |
Region variance | 0.054** | 0.21** | 0.053** | 0.053** | 0.052** | 0.055** |
(0.01) | (0.02) | (0.01) | (0.01) | (0.012) | (0.013) | |
Intercept | 1.521** | 0.577 | 1.531** | 1.509** | 1.575** | 2.383** |
(0.33) | (0.786) | (0.34) | (0.33) | (0.366) | (0.352) | |
Model parameters | ||||||
N (individuals) | 25,557 | 39,107 | 25,557 | 25,557 | 25,557 | 25,557 |
N (regions) | 259 | 275 | 259 | 259 | 259 | 259 |
N (countries) | 20 | 20 | 20 | 20 | 20 | 20 |
AIC | 23,894 | 23,890 | 23,886 | 23,891 | 23,886 | |
BIC | 24,073 | 24,078 | 24,073 | 24,078 | 24,073 | |
Loglikelihood | − 11,925 | − 11,922 | − 11,919 | − 11,922 | − 11,920 | |
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Gundelach, B., Fatke, M. Decentralisation and political inequality: a comparative analysis of unequal turnout in European regions. Comp Eur Polit 18, 510–531 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1057/s41295-019-00197-y
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/s41295-019-00197-y