Vineeta Yadav

Political Parties, Business Groups, and Corruption in Developing Countries

Political corruption is one of the globes most pressing yet seemingly permanent problems. It is a root cause of low growth and inequality, and plagues numerous nations throughout the world in varying degrees. In the past, it proved difficult to measure, and the political science literature on it was thin. In recent years, political scientists have greatly improved their analytical tools for analyzing and contextualizing corruption, and it is now a hot topic in the discipline. In Political Parties, Business Groups, and Corruption in Developing Countries, Vineeta Yadav examines corruption levels in sixty-four developing democracies over a twenty-year period. Her comparative focus is on Brazil and India, two of the most important developing nations. Drawing from a 2005-06 survey of Brazilian and Indian businesses that she conducted, Yadav finds that legislative institutions are central in determining the degree and type of corruption. Most importantly, in legislatures where the party holds sway (as opposed to individual legislators), the level of corruption is higher. Party costs are higher than that of any one legislator, which explains part of the difference. More fundamentally, the fact that different systems offer different incentives to business groups and legislatures explains why some systems are less corrupt than others. Given structural variation across democratic political systems, her book allows to predict which states are most susceptible to political corruption, and which reforms might best alleviate the problem. Available in OSO: http://www.oxfordscholarship.com/oso/public/content/politicalscience/9780199735907/toc.html

Legislative Institutions and Corruption in Developing Country Democracies

This article extends the research on institutional sources of corruption by investigating whether legislative institutions play a significant role in driving corruption in developing country democracies. The author argues that when legislative rules (a) give parties control over agenda setting and (b) allow parties to strip legislators who vote against the party line of their legislative mandates, parties can exercise valuable influence over the legislative policy process, which allows them to engage in practices leading to higher corruption. The author derives two testable hypotheses linking higher party influence over agenda setting and voting in the legislature to higher corruption and test them by using a new data set on legislative rules for 64 developing country democracies from 1984 to 2004. The empirical results corroborate the hypotheses and remain robust when controlling for alternative explanations, employing different estimation techniques, and using different measures of corruption.

Electoral Particularism, Bank Concentration, and Capital Account Liberalization in Developing Democracies

Extant research suggests that democracy fosters capital account liberalization in developing countries. Yet the data reveal that there exists substantial variation in the extent of capital account openness across democracies in the developing world. When do democratic governments in developing states liberalize their capital account policies? We hypothesize that the market concentration of domestic private banks has a positive effect on capital account liberalization, but only when the degree of electoral particularism in these states is sufficiently high. Specifically, we claim that highly market-concentrated private banks have interests and the capacity to lobby elected politicians to liberalize capital account transactions. We then argue that politicians in particularistic democracies will respond to such lobbying pressure by dismantling capital controls as they have political incentives to cater to the interests of powerful bankers. Statistical results from a comprehensive data set provide robust support for our main hypothesis.

Regional International Organizations and Individual Immigration Attitudes: Results from Finite Mixture Models

When are individuals more likely to support immigration? We suggest here that regional international organizations (IOs; for example, the European Union) publicly release reports about the scale and benefits of immigration to member states in the region in which these IOs operate. We argue that unlike individuals who are uninformed about immigration, informed individuals who have more knowledge of the main regional IO in which their country participates will be more likely to employ immigration reports released by their regional IO to construct their immigration attitudes. They will also perceive that these reports are credible. The credibility of these reports helps individuals with more knowledge about their region’s main IO to view immigrants favorably, which translates to support for immigration. We test our prediction by developing a finite mixture model that statistically accounts for the econometric challenges that emerge when uninformed individuals “save face” by disproportionately opting for the middle “status quo” category in ordinal survey response variables of immigration support. Results from the finite mixture model corroborate our prediction and are more reliable than estimates from a standard ordered probit model.

Democracy, Electoral Systems, and Judicial Empowerment in Developing Countries

The power granted to the courts, both in a nations constitution and in practice, reveals much about the willingness of the legislative and executive branches to accept restraints on their own powers. For this reason, an independent judiciary is considered an indication of a nations level of democracy. Vineeta Yadav and Bumba Mukherjee use a data set covering 159 developing countries, along with comparative case studies of Brazil and Indonesia, to identify the political conditions under which de jure independence is established. They find that the willingness of political elites to grant the courts authority to review the actions of the other branches of government depends on the capacity of the legislature and expectations regarding the judiciarys assertiveness. Moving next to de facto independence, Yadav and Mukherjee bring together data from 103 democracies in the developing world, complemented by case studies of Brazil, India, and Indonesia. Honing in on the effects of electoral institutions, the authors find that, when faced with short time horizons, governments that operate in personal vote electoral systems are likely to increase de facto judicial independence, whereas governments in party-centred systems are likely to reduce it.

Studying legislative party politics in data scarce environments A new empirical approach

Efforts to study the dynamics of legislative and party politics in developing countries often confront a serious obstacle – lack of public data on legislative actions. This paper proposes a new feasible approach for obtaining legislative information indirectly – analyzing the perceptions and lobbying behaviors of business interest groups who are experienced, knowledgeable and highly invested in staying informed on policymaking processes. I build on extant literatures on political parties and lobbying to show how we can systematically exploit group insights to study legislative parties in data-scarce environments and complement existing approaches in data-rich cases. I then demonstrate and evaluate this approach by using original data from a 2006 survey of 158 groups in a data-rich case, Brazil, to mediate existing scholarly debates regarding the sources of legislative unity of Brazilian parties.

Candidate-centred systems, public banks and equity market restrictions in developing democracies

ABSTRACT The pace of financial globalization across the developing world grew rapidly after developing country governments started reducing restrictions on foreign ownership of domestic equities. Studies suggest that the emergence of democracy in developing states played a critical role in facilitating the reduction of controls on foreign investment in domestic equities. Yet, the data reveals that although some developing country democracies have curtailed equity market restrictions, a significant share of developing democracies have increased barriers on foreign ownership of domestic equities. This raises an important question: when do democratic governments in the developing world raise restrictions on foreign ownership of the equities of domestic firms? We suggest that policymakers in candidate-centred developing democracies will increase equity market restrictions in response to pressure from market concentrated public sector banks. Specifically, we claim that highly market concentrated public banks have incentives and the capacity to lobby policymakers to keep the domestic equity market closed to foreign investors. We then argue that policymakers from candidate-centred—but not party-centred—developing democracies have political incentives to be responsive to such pressure, which will induce them to raise barriers on foreign ownership of domestic equities. Statistical results obtained from a comprehensive sample of developing country democracies support our hypothesis.

Electoral Institutions, Political Competition and De Facto Judicial Independence

The importance of the judiciary in consolidating and sustaining a robust democracy and, an attractive business environment has led scholars to study the conditions which allow judiciaries to function with genuine or de facto independence. One of the most influential theories in the current literature argues that high levels of political competition, whether for office or among branches of government, create conditions supportive of high levels of de facto judicial independence (DFJI). However, comprehensive data over a 20-year period from 103 developing country democracies reveal a puzzle: under conditions of high political competition political elites in 56% of countries did indeed increase de facto judicial independence (DFJI) but fully 44% reduced the independence their judiciaries enjoyed. We explain this puzzle by arguing that in order to understand when political elites have incentives to support de facto judicial independence, it is essential to consider not just the effect of the magnitude but also the nature of political competition created by a country’s electoral institutions. Only in countries with electoral institutions which create high levels of electoral particularism do legislators and weak parties from both government and opposition have incentives to support DFJI when strategic time horizons shrink and, judges facing low risks and costs of political retaliation make a bid for DFJI. In countries with low levels of particularism however well-disciplined parties and their legislators do not find an independent judiciary attractive and, judges facing high political costs and certainty of retaliation choose to be subservient leading to low levels of DFJI. These claims are assessed using a comprehensive TSCS data of 103 developing countries observed as democracies anytime from 1985 to 2004. The statistical results corroborate our claims and remain robust when we control for alternative explanations, employ different estimation techniques, and use different measures of de facto judicial independence.

Decentralization and Recentralization in the Developing World: Comparative Studies from Africa and Latin America Decentralization and Recentralization in the Developing World: Comparative Studies from Africa and Latin America. By Dickovick. University Park: The Pennsylvania State University Press, 2011. 248p.

Consequently, they continue to represent the central institutions of a political system, providing the main linkages between government, policies and citizens.The central argument of the book is that – compared to the past – parties’ means, strategies and behaviour have suffered modifications. For example, declining membership has altered the approach to political mobilisation (i.e. style of campaigning) and led to a change in the means employed to gather funding. At the same time, their general functions and importance for the democratic process have remained relatively constant. The empirical evidence presented in this book indicates that modern political parties undergo organisational and programmatic adaptation to fulfil their wide-ranging functions as agents of representation between citizens and the state. Parties continue to be the main electoral competitors, to mobilise and represent voters, or to control the government. One merit of the book lies in its detailed approach to key dimensions of party roles and functions. The linkages between parties and citizens are framed around five different forms. To this end, the authors structure their argument in three interconnected parts, each of them reflecting the broad roles of the parties. Political parties are first presented as electorally oriented institutions for which voter mobilisation and campaigning are the necessary means to securing votes. The second part portrays the connection between voters and parties, emphasising the ideological dimension of the supply side and preferences of the demand side. In this context, the process of partisan representation and voter choice are crucial. The party in public office complements the picture with an emphasis on coalition governments and policy formulation and implementation. The complexity of the puzzle addressed by the authors requires multilayered analysis based on various types of data: individual-level (CSES, module 2), party-level (CSES and manifestos) and country-level (electoral institutions, legislative provisions and policy data). Almost one century after James Bryce’s claims that parties are inevitable in free countries, Political Parties and Democratic Linkage reveals that party politics remains the only game in town for modern democracies around the world.