Journal Articles

Elections in the Arab World Why Do Citizens Turn Out?

---

This article examines the determinants of voting in competitive authoritarian regimes in the Arab world. In contrast to scholars who view elections in the Arab World purely as patronage contests, we argue that citizens also care about policy outputs and use turnout as a way to signal their approval or disapproval with the regime. We draw on the literature on economic voting in democratic regimes to develop an argument about economic voting under authoritarian conditions, and we propose a mediation model to get at the mechanisms of economic voting. We test our argument with original data based on surveys conducted in seven Arab countries between 2006 and 2009. Our results show that although patronage helps to explain turnout, especially among high-income citizens, policy outcomes are also important in the calculus of voting. Most voters turn out to vote to show approval of the regime and its economic performance.

---

Availability

No copy data

Detail Information

Series Title

Comparative Political Studies

Call Number

-

Publisher

Thousand Oaks : Sage Publications., 2015

Collation

-

Language

English

ISBN/ISSN

0010-4140

Classification

NONE

Content Type

-

Media Type

-

Carrier Type

-

Edition

Volume 48, Issue 11 September 2015, P. 1355-1388

Subject(s)

Electoral Behavior
Electoral authoritarianism
Regime legitimacy
Mediation analysis

Specific Detail Info

-

Statement of Responsibility

-

Other version/related

File Attachment

Comments

---

You must be logged in to post a comment