Electoral backlash against climate policy : a natural experiment on retrospective voting and local resistance to public policy
Name
924273940-MIT.pdf
Description
Full printable version
Size
4.51 MB
Format
Adobe PDF
Checksum (MD5)
c6e796fa8bf95bf0af49300ef59f548b
Author(s)
Stokes, Leah C
Advisor(s)
Christopher Warshaw.
Date Issued
2015
Publisher
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Abstract
Retrospective voting studies typically examine policies where the public has common interests. By contrast, climate policy has broad public support but concentrated opposition in communities where costs are imposed. This spatial distribution of weak supporters and strong, local opponents mirrors opposition to other policies with diffuse public benefits and concentrated local costs. I use a natural experiment to investigate whether citizens living in proximity to wind energy projects retrospectively punished an incumbent government because of its climate policy. Using both fixed effects and instrumental variable estimators, I identify electoral losses for the incumbent party ranging from 4-10%, with the effect persisting 3 km from wind turbines. Voters also discriminate by correctly punishing the level of government responsible for the policy, providing evidence that voters are informed. I conclude that the spatial distribution of citizens' policy preferences can affect democratic accountability and exacerbate political barriers to addressing climate change.
Description
Thesis: S.M., Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Department of Political Science, 2015.
Cataloged from PDF version of thesis.
Includes bibliographical references (pages 34-40).
Subjects
Political Science.
MIT Department
Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Department of Political Science
Terms of Use
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