Nudging voters to choose women. Evidence from Italy.

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Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
School of Business | Master's thesis
Date
2019
Major/Subject
Mcode
Degree programme
Economics
Language
en
Pages
87
Series
Abstract
In this thesis, I examine the impact of a new voting system: double preference voting conditioned on gender. In a context of proportional representation with open lists, the policy allows voters to cast up to two votes, one for a female candidate and one for a male candidate. This policy was first implemented in the 2013 local elections in Italy in municipalities with more than 5,000 inhabitants. In smaller municipalities voters may choose only one candidate. I extend Baltrunaite et al. (2017) using a regression discontinuity design to investigate how the policy affects the share of votes received by women. While only a minority of voters effectively placed two preference votes (around 28%), I find that the new voting policy has increased the share of female candidates in municipal councils from around 20%to 34% (13.4 p.p.). The policy has not significantly increased turnout of male or female voters, nor has it raised the quality of elected councilors measured as their years of education. In addition, it has not had a significant impact on the share of female mayors. If all voters used their second vote, votes for male and female candidates would be distributed equally: the share of votes received by female candidates would be 50%. I thus complement the analysis using a survey on political preferences and voting behavior to investigate voters’ preferences and their use of the new policy. Around half (49%) of the participants to the survey (N=702) were unaware of the opportunity to use two preference votes in elections. Of voters surveyed, 70% perceived equal representation in the municipal council as very important. Lack of information, and not unwillingness to use second votes, could then be the reason behind the moderate impact the policy has achieved compared to its potential.
Description
Thesis advisor
Bagues, Manuel
Keywords
electoral systems, voting behavior, gender, Italy
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