The Impact of Transparency on Legislative Behavior
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The impact of transparency on legislative behavior Taking position avoidance into account: The case of Chile Carmen Le Foulon Morán Submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY 2014 © 2014 Carmen Le Foulon All rights reserved The impact of transparency on legislative behavior Taking position avoidance into account: The case of Chile Carmen Le Foulon Morán Abstract This dissertation studies the effect of a transparency reform on legislators’ behavior. In order to specify how and why the transparency reform would have an impact, it builds a theoretical framework based on a theory of legislative behavior. The expectations are tested against the behavior of the Chilean Lower House legislators before and after a transparency reform. The theoretical expectations derive from a theory of legislative behavior based on reelection-oriented legislators organized in parties. This theoretical framework has two central features. First, position avoidance is taken explicitly into account. Second, from previous work on comparative representation, legislators may establish programmatic and non-programmatic linkages with their constituencies. In line with the literature, legislators who follow a programmatic linkage strategy are expected to adopt positions closer to their electoral constituency. Furthermore, as legislators build such positions from their roll call, I expect that legislators, when cross-pressured between their party and their constituency, will be more likely to side with their constituency. I argue that cross-pressured legislators may also avoid taking a position, as it does not influence observed party unity and does not imply voting against the constituency. Thus, reliance on position avoidance introduces a wedge between the public position taken by legislators and their effective position which has not been previously studied. I tested my hypotheses with observational data of the behavior of the Chilean Lower House members as a transparency reform took place in 2004, halfway through the legislative term. The case provides additional advantages to empirical assessment of my hypotheses, as legislators are allowed to abstain during any vote, and this option is recorded. The results provide evidence of the complex impact of transparency reform on legislators’ behavior. There is some evidence of a positive impact of transparency as it provides incentives for legislators to adopt public positions closer to their electoral constituencies. But the results on the use of position avoidance raise concerns as the observed moderation may partly be the result of obfuscation rather than of improved responsiveness. In particular, the strategic use of abstentions enables legislators to build a moderate reputation without having to support their constituencies´ preferences on all issues. TABLE OF CONTENTS List of Tables…………………………………………….……………………………………………..…….…iii List of Figures ………………………….…………………………………………………….…………………iv Acknowledgements .………………………………………………………………………………….……..v CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION............................................................................... 1 1. The argument ......................................................................................................... 3 2. Dissertation outline ................................................................................................ 5 CHAPTER 2: DEFINING THE CONCEPTS ................................................................ 9 1. Representation ..................................................................................................... 10 a) The concept of representation in the Assembly .............................................. 11 b) Empirical assessments of policy representation .............................................. 15 c) Representation beyond the Assembly ............................................................. 18 d) Parties and representation ............................................................................... 21 e) Collective versus individual accountability ....................................................... 27 2. The role of elections for representation: accountability and selection ............... 29 a) Political agency models .................................................................................... 31 b) Empirical evidence on the role of elections ..................................................... 33 c) The flip side of the coin: do voters hold legislators accountable at the polls? ...... 37 3. On the impact of transparency ............................................................................ 39 a) Costs and benefits of transparency of legislators actions ................................ 42 b) Evidence of the impact of transparency on legislators’ actions ....................... 45 4. Conclusions ........................................................................................................... 47 CHAPTER 3: THEORY OF LEGISLATIVE POLITICS ................................................. 50 1. Legislators’ goals and behaviors ........................................................................... 52 2. Strength of the electoral incentive faced by legislators ....................................... 55 a) Transparency .................................................................................................... 55 b) Voters care about legislators’ votes ................................................................. 57 3. Legislators as party members ............................................................................... 62 4. Position avoidance and the electoral incentive ................................................... 65 5. Expectations and hypotheses on the impact of transparency ............................. 68 i CHAPTER 4: DESCRIPTION AND RELEVANT ELEMENTS FOR THE ANALYSIS ......... 72 1. The President ........................................................................................................ 72 2. The Chilean Congress ........................................................................................... 74 3. Political cleavages and party system .................................................................... 76 4. Parties in Congress ............................................................................................... 78 5. The assumption of reelection oriented legislators .............................................. 81 6. Voting in Congress ................................................................................................ 82 7. Binominal electoral rules ...................................................................................... 84 8. The transparency reform ...................................................................................... 89 CHAPTER 5: DATA, MEASUREMENT, AND EMPIRICAL STRATEGY ....................... 94 1. Data and Measurement ....................................................................................... 94 a) Sources of data ................................................................................................. 94 b) Measuring district characteristics .................................................................... 98 c) Measuring characteristics of the vote ............................................................ 104 d) Measuring legislators’ behavior and characteristics ...................................... 106 e) The cross-pressured legislator-vote pair ........................................................ 114 2. Empirical strategy ....................................................................................... 117 a) Identification strategy ........................................................................................ 117 b) Statistical models................................................................................................ 119 3. Hypotheses summary and empirical expectations ........................................... 121 CHAPTER 6: POSITION TAKING AND POSITION AVOIDANCE ............................ 123 1. H1 and H2: Effects on revealed ideology as measured through roll call ........... 123 2. H3 and H4: Effects on position avoidance .......................................................... 138 CHAPTER 7: CONCLUSIONS ............................................................................. 153 BIBLIOGRAPHY ............................................................................................... 158 APPENDICES .................................................................................................. 178 Appendix 1: Descriptive statistics ................................................................................. 179 Appendix 2: H3 & H4: Regression results for all model specifications ......................... 181 Appendix 3: Description of 4-month sub-periods ......................................................... 197 Appendix 4: Legislators without clear expectations. .................................................…198 ii LIST OF TABLES Table 1: Results for all legislators…………………………………………….…………….……………..……..….123 Table 2: Results for out-of-step legislators …..………………..……………………….………….......…….125 Table 3: Results for legislators that do not follow a policy linkage strategy ……………….……126 Table 4: Results for legislators without clear expected transparency reform effects on electoral incentives …………………………………………………………….………………..……….….……128 Table 5: Type of legislator