A Protectionist Bias in Majoritarian Politics

We develop a novel model of campaigns, elections, and policy-making in which the ex ante objectives of national party leaders differ from the ex post objectives of elected legislators. This generates a distinction between "policy rhetoric" and "policy reality" and introduces an i...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Published in:The Quarterly journal of economics 2005-11, Vol.120 (4), p.1239-1282
Main Authors: Grossman, Gene M., Helpman, Elhanan
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Bias
Economic models
Export subsidies
Free trade
Legislators
Objectives
Policy making
Political campaigns
Political candidates
Political elections
Political parties
Stock shares
Studies
Tariffs
Trade policy
Citations: Items that this one cites
Items that cite this one
Online Access:Get full text
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
Description
Summary:We develop a novel model of campaigns, elections, and policy-making in which the ex ante objectives of national party leaders differ from the ex post objectives of elected legislators. This generates a distinction between "policy rhetoric" and "policy reality" and introduces an important role for "party discipline" in the policy-making process. We identify a protectionist bias in majoritarian politics. When trade policy is chosen by the majority delegation and legislators in the minority have limited means to influence choices, the parties announce trade policies that favor specific factors, and the expected tariff or export subsidy is positive. Positions and expected outcomes monotonically approach free trade as party discipline strengthens.
ISSN:0033-5533
1531-4650
DOI:10.1162/003355305775097498