Working Papers
The Electoral Effects of Anti-LGBTQ Policies
(co-authored with Violeta Haas, Tarik Abou-Chadi, Heike Klüver and Lukas Stoetzer)
Does elite-led anti-LGBTQ mobilization bolster the electoral fortunes of the radical right? To answer this question, we study the adoption of anti-LGBTQ resolutions in many Polish municipalities before and after the 2019 parliamentary. Using synthetic difference-in-differences and matrix completion methods, we find that anti-LGBTQ resolutions demobilized opposition voters and benefited the governing radical right Law and Justice party in both 2019 and 2023 parliamentary elections. While the number of votes for Law and Justice did not significantly change, its share has grown due to the opposition losing votes in absolute numbers. Overall, this study’s findings are relevant for understanding the electoral consequences of elite-led mobilization against stigmatized or discriminated groups, as well as the politics of social exclusion more broadly.
Presented by the authors at the 2023 MPSA, EPSA, EPOP, SISP and the 2024 SPSA conferences, the EuroWEPS workshop at Oxford and seminars at Bocconi and Princeton.
Shifting Ground: The 2023 Earthquake and Voting in Turkey
(co-authored with Hande Tuğrul)
Do voters punish authoritarian governments for calamities of nature? To answer this question, we study the 2023 Turkish elections in the aftermath of a devastating earthquake three months prior to the vote. Using georeferenced data on the earthquake intensity and electoral outcomes at the neighborhood level, we employ a difference-in-difference approach to estimate the causal effect of the disaster on voting behavior.
The research has been pre-registered before the voting day.
Presented at Bocconi University, at Toulouse School of Economics as well as the SISP 2023 and SPSA 2024 conferences
Immigration and Far-Right Government Support
How do citizens evaluate far-right governments in office? I conduct a survey experiment to study how immigration affects the support for a far-right government. The experiment, embedded in a representative survey of 2055 individuals in Italy, exposes different respondent groups to information regarding the government’s pledges and outcomes in immigration and economic growth. Drawing upon the literature, I find evidence that under the far right in office, citizens react negatively to non-attainment of pledged immigration outcomes. No heterogeneous treatment effects w.r.t. political views are evident, as the effect is neither more nor less pronounced among those who consider immigration important, people with left, right or far-right attitudes and among far-right party voters. By examining the dynamics between policy pledges, outcomes, and voter responses, this research sheds light on the evaluation of far-right governments by the electorate.
The research has been approved by the Ethics Committee of Bocconi University and pre-registered on OSF.
Presented at Bocconi University and NYU's Rebecca Morton Conference on Experimental Political Science.