Abstract
The project studies the effect of voting mechanisms and contextual socioeconomic factors on political and economic variables, in both modern and historical settings. The project develops several distinct but closely related lines of research. The first part focuses on the impact of voting mechanisms on political variables and on other variables reflecting public policies, analyzing these issues across different institutional contexts and using specific datasets. The second part examines how the variables mentioned above are influenced by contextual socioeconomic factors, through the use of large individual-level datasets, including information on voter turnout, political orientation, and other characteristics. The project aims to better understand the factors that influence democratic participation and the institutional and social consequences of electoral reforms, producing empirical evidence useful for both scholarly debate and public policy. The expected outputs include scientific publications in international journals and the creation of new datasets of historical and social interest.
Results achieved
The research contributed to the project objective of analyzing how socio-economic contextual factors shape individual voting behavior, with particular attention to the role of local conditions, information environments, institutional rules, and administrative voting costs. The project was split into four components, relating to different research questions, datasets, and empirical approaches. The results of the project were presented in a conference at the University of Bologna. Component 1 examined how access to local public services affects electoral participation. The research developed and expanded an administrative panel dataset for the city of Bologna, linking individual socio-demographic characteristics, household structure, residential location, and electoral participation with spatial information on public services. The analysis focused in particular on childcare infrastructure and its relationship with the time costs of voting, providing evidence on how the local socio-economic environment can shape political participation, especially among parents of young children. Component 2 analyzed the development of local media markets in democratizing societies. The research constructed a new historical dataset on newspapers in England and Wales and used it to study changes in the structure, reach, price, and political orientation of the press during a period of major political, regulatory, and technological transformation. The component examined how media systems evolved alongside franchise reform and market expansion, contributing to the understanding of how information environments develop in contexts of democratization. Component 3 studied the effects of voter registration reforms in the United States. The research combined a theoretical framework of political participation with empirical analysis of registration and voting behavior over several decades. It compared different types of registration reform and examined how they affect participation through distinct channels, including reductions in the cost of registration and changes in the relationship between registration and turnout. The component also considered heterogeneous effects across demographic groups. Component 4 examined the consequences of administrative voting costs in Italy. The research analyzed the expiration of the Tessera Elettorale as a source of increased voting costs and assessed its effects on turnout, electoral outcomes, and local government performance. Using complementary empirical strategies, the component investigated how even relatively modest administrative frictions can affect political participation and, through participation, the functioning of local democratic institutions. Taken together, the four components produced new datasets, empirical strategies, and analytical frameworks for studying political participation and environments across different historical and institutional settings. The project therefore strengthened the empirical basis for understanding how barriers to participation arise, how they differ across social groups, and why they matter for democratic representation.Dettagli del progetto
Responsabile scientifico: Jonathan Neil Chapman
Strutture Unibo coinvolte:
Dipartimento di Scienze Economiche
Coordinatore:
ALMA MATER STUDIORUM - Università di Bologna(Italy)
Contributo totale di progetto: Euro (EUR) 242.500,00
Contributo totale Unibo: Euro (EUR) 165.493,00
Durata del progetto in mesi: 29
Data di inizio
28/09/2023
Data di fine:
28/02/2026
