Median Voter Theory PDF

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Median Voter Theory Essay 1: ● Main theory: Anthony downs; importance of managing the electoral cycle, median voter and pressure groups ○ Outcome: These factors are all important ● Part 1: Intro ○ Two party elections won through slight margins (Ansolabehere 1992) ○ Economic theory → candidates aim for median to maximise potential votes ● Part 2: Hotelling and Spatial competition theorem (1929) ○ There are other factors in consumer demand than price: ■ distance from the shop ■ perceived quality ■ familial relationships ■ combination of determinants ● Transport costs ○ result of transportation costs = customer loyalty ○ Became linear market theory ■ Price = same and good are homogenous → only difference is transport costs ● Part 3: Hotelling and Downs

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The line represents an ideological span, 0 = most left wing and vice versa Transport costs = shift in political position ■ Voters vote to the candidate nearest them ■ Ideologically the transport costs increases with distance Elections can revolve around the median voter and how they lean Median voter = indifferent

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Normally distributed electorate → minimal changes from a change in government due to the close resemblance of the parties (Downs 1957) Part 4: Game theory

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Median, Median = only nash equilibrium ■ Median = best reply to all actions Part 5: Pressure groups ○ Politicians sell policies for votes ■ Therefore pressure groups donate to candidates ○ Lobbyist: influence gov actions by promoting their case, usually different to median (lobbying needed). ■ Taking the stance of the pressure group = travel cost ■ So pressure group offers favours, endorsements, donations of favourable advertising (Grant 2011) ○ Pressure groups = restraint to candidate being median ■ NRA (national rifle association): extensive lobbying → influencing politicians despite americans wanting increased gun control (Pew Research Centre, 2013) ○ US require you to be voted as party candidate → often become more ideological to become party leader then move back to median to try and win presidency Part 6: Election cycle ○ Voters are utility maximising in their decisions ○ Grofman (1995) voters = myopic → pay attention to recent rather than distant ■ Candidate then exploit cycle for their advantage. ● Extreme at beginning → median at end

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Risky due to increased media: social media and the internet allows access to everything any candidate has ever said in a public forum. Seamless movement of political ideology without decreased credibility is required ● There is an argument against long run fundability as travel cost is not temporary is position changes perception of the candidate Downs (1957) a change in government in a polarised electorate causes radical alterations to the policy.

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Median voter approach is broken down as votes can be gained by becoming more ideological

Part 7: Conclusion ○ Probability maximizing strategy for winning = down the middle. ○ Constraints facing candidates → many other factors ■ Manage electoral cycle ● Cautious between population vs corporate responsibility. ● Part 8: Feedback ○ More Hotelling type model ○ Voting behaviour: Voting participation percentage decreasing ■ Possible reason: extreme view don't vote → single peak is important ● Model would also require development. Essay 2: ● Main theory: Role of middle ground within an election ○ Outcome:Median voter is vital to gain political popularity but interest groups are used to gain a base of voters ● Part 1: Intro ○ Hotelling-Downs is median voter best? ○ Based on US gov ● Part 2: Hotelling - Downs model (HDM) and the Median Voter (MVM) ○ Hotelling Spatial competition = two sellers in a market make products as similar as possible to gain maximum market share (1929) ■ Product differentiation is often decreasing transport costs ○ Beach example: ■ Two ice cream trucks → first mover towards middle for advantage → both keep moving towards middle for more customers → until nash eq reached ● NE: Both sellers are located directly in the middle

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○ Each is capturing half and neither is better off by moving. ○ Downs (1957) used Hotelling to describe electoral competition ■ Start with left or right ideology and progressively move to the middle to capture votes. ■ Assumed that voters have single peaked preferences: ● The optimal preference for a voter is in the form of a ‘bliss point’ where a deviation from their ideal in either direction is not preferable. ○ Osborne (1995) found HDM to be robust; but only in 2 party ■ Highly complex if >2 ■ Parliamentary elections MVM not satisfied due to number of parties hence the cycle of elected parties (Stevens 2015) ○ Abhijit and Kunal Seguptar (2006) accounted for parliamentary elections by allowing candidates to exit prior to elections ■ Findings: Under arbitrary finite number of candidates → NE in pure strategies which must involve policy divergence toward the centre. ○ Brusco et al (2012) HDM with 2+ and runoff voting → NE in pure strategies for both candidates located at the median and those who were in distinct positions Part 3: Effect of interest groups ○ MDM states candidates should be middle but model lacks element to explain anomalies to rule. ■ Assumptions = oversimplification: more than one dimension of decision making policy ■ Buchanan and Tollison (1984) 2+ issues being decided simultaneously = MVM break down & parties stay loyal to more extreme views. ○ Special interest group model tries to explain all public sector activity as the sale of favours by the legislature to special interest groups (Ahmed and Greene, 2000) ■ Groups do not equal MV position, thus preventing candidates from being MV. ■ Require extreme ideology at beginning → median at end, maximising possible voter spectrum ○ Grossman and Helpman (1996) parties deviate from the median position to attract votes and campaign contributions ■ Campante (2011) contributions have negligible impact, but there is an endogenous wealth bias in the political process, providing a significant advantage for wealthier voters to move a party’s position more towards their preferences. ○ 2 stage game for political pressure of interest groups ■ 1st: Groups design contributions to maximise their welfare ■ 2nd: Party choose which platform maximises their representation, taking the interest group contributions into account. ■ informed voters decide which candidate represents their most preferable platform; whereas uninformed voters respond to political campaigns ● Parties behave as if maximising a weighted sum of aggregate welfares of informed voters and members of special interest groups ○ Party due to win majority seats caters more to special interest groups - opposite to MVM

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Baron (1994) cycle where candidates appeal to interest groups for £ then use £ to influence uninformed voters. ■ Some parties more willing to change policy so effect of pressures vary ■ Model only contains analysis of 2 parties, more needed for parliamentary Part 4: Redistribution of preferences ○ Personal view of candidate quality can change during election process due to new info or advertising ■ This can significantly change preferences and skewness of preferences/political ideology ■ Particularly true for informed voters ○ Bartels (1996) new information makes uniformed act as if they have perfect knowledge ■ Major issues in policy often unknown by public → unstable preferences ● Making uninformed more responsive to new info ● Candidates do better when their voters aren’t fully informed due to imperfect information, demonstrating a Principal-Agent problem leading up to and during elections ○ And effect of bias campaigning may be effective on this group ○ Larcinese (2005) redistribution of votes < MVM predicts as level of responsiveness to elections increase when voters = more informed ■ Income increase → demand for info increases ● More votes cast by high income → low income unheard/unrepresented Part 5: Conclusion ○ Ahmed and greene (2000) interest group models not weaker than median voter model ■ Models cannot be discarded given econometric testing (Ahmed and Greene 2000) ■ Comparison between MVM and Non-MVM has shown MVM to hold advantage ○ Ceteris paribus: candidate → middle = more votes. ■ Explains how extreme parties don't come into power ○ Interest groups impact party positioning through funding ■ Party must then position preferences between median voter and extreme interest group ■ More extreme policies are adopted to garner a party’s base, which is then developed to appeal the median voter prior to elections in order to achieve a majority. Part 6 Feedback ○ Weakness: application of theory to real world ■ Applied to US but no reference to UK ● One minor party receiving substantial media attention; and that is very difficult to categorise in the traditional means because part of its appeal is an offer of constitutional reform....