Seminar Schedules

Naila Shofia

(National University of Singapore)

Date: Wednesday, April 9

Time: 16:40-18:10

Location: Room K, GRIPS 

Title: You are Fired, My Lord: Accountability and Identity Politics in Indonesia

Abstract: Do voters support incompetent candidates that share their religion or ethnicity? Can voters be encouraged to prioritize a candidate's track record? We run a multi-wave survey experiment on a large representative sample of Indonesian citizens. Respondents chose between candidate pairs differing in track record, policy stances, and ascriptive features like ethnicity and religion. Track records, especially those related to corruption, are the most important for voters; ethno-religious congruence and ideological proximity follow; importantly, voters are willing to support out-group candidates with good track records. An informational intervention—explaining in simple terms the logic of elections as instruments of accountability—significantly increases the weight voters place on track records, especially among those initially less informed about the idea that elected officials are agents (“employees”) of the public. Overall, while identity politics matters, voters prioritize candidate quality. A simple and scalable informational intervention further increases the importance that voters assign to performance in office.