VIII Workshop (UAB 2023)

Recent studies suggest that partisan animus might pose a threat to the stability of democracies. At the same time, some studies indicate that being an election winner or loser affects individuals’ support for core democratic principles. However, these two perspectives have not been integrated. Combining the insights from these literature strands we test how supporting the winning party in elections interacts with affective polarization in influencing the degree to which people prioritize majority rule at the direct expense of the rights of minorities. We leverage changes in winner/loser status following national elections, out-party dislike and variation in the timing of survey interviews with respect to elections in the CSES to study individuals’ positions on the trade-off between unconstrained majority rule and the protection of minority rights. This allows us to assess if electoral winners exercise restraint without abusing their position as winners and the degree to which such  majoritarianism is reinforced by partisan animosity towards the opposition. Moreover, by exploiting variation in the timing of survey interviews we analyze if winners' prioritization of majority rule at the expense of the rights of minorities fades as time goes by after elections. This study contributes to our understanding of how individuals’ democratic restraint is influenced by winning and losing dynamics and how this process is intimately linked to affective polarization.

Waste management activities tend to be capital-intensive services that require coordination and information sharing due to their reliance on technology developments and technical expertise. Therefore, municipalities have been using intermunicipal cooperation (IMC) as a way to generate economies of scale increasing the efficiency of service delivery without losing local autonomy. Yet, there is a tension between democracy and efficiency in the structure of intermunicipal cooperation, as these cooperative arrangements do not usually have direct election mechanisms that make them accountable to citizens. One way to measure the democratic principles of an intermunicipal association in charge of waste management is by focusing attention on the procedure and performance of the institution. In this article, we argue that information sharing is one of the main dimensions of transparency that links democracy and efficiency in intermunicipal associations. The main argument is that the homogeny of the members (regarding size, party, policy, and proximity) helps information sharing, as there is more trust between members. Contrary, we hypothesize that information sharing when there is no homogeneity makes the institution more transparent without increasing trust, creating a situation of functional distrust. The article analyses the information sharing levels in the Consortium, an intermunicipal association in charge of waste sorting facilities and treatment plants, as well as other waste management activities. 

Unearned incomes and non-tax revenues have been linked to personalist rule in autocracies. Natural resources, foreign aid and FDI share many similarities, but only the relationship between oil and personalism has been studied. Therefore, this paper addresses this puzzle and asks: what is the effect of foreign aid and FDI on dictators' personalism? We propose three arguments to explain the logic of foreign resources in autocracies. We contend that foreign aid will increase the dictator's personalism, while the effect of FDI is less clear. Thus, we propose two opposing arguments: either that FDI will increase personalism levels or that it will help establish power-sharing. Using a sample of autocracies for the period 1960-2010 for foreign aid and 1970-2010 for FDI, and using a new latent index of personalism, we find empirical evidence that foreign aid increases personalism while FDI increases power-sharing, confirming that different foreign resources to autocratic regimes function according to opposite logics.

We are aware that many people believe they have a duty to cast a ballot in elections, but do they also feel a corresponding duty to protest? Although research shows that the concept of civic duty is central to the study of political behaviour, surprisingly little attention has been paid to the role it plays in mass protest. In this paper, I will address the question of whether demonstrators feel a duty to protest and explore the conditions that may facilitate this perception of duty. I will rely on comparative survey data from 75 street demonstrations that occurred in 9 European countries between 2009 and 2013.