IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/kap/pubcho/v159y2014i1p235-249.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

A preferential attachment model of campaign contributions in state legislative elections

Author

Listed:
  • Greg Vonnahme

Abstract

In state legislative elections some candidates attract contributions from many donors whereas other candidates have much smaller donor pools. Why? What are the origins of these disparities? This paper conceptualizes contributions as a type of attachment between the donor and the state legislative candidate. To model the formation of these attachments, this paper proposes a variant of the Barabasi-Albert preferential attachment model. The theoretical model is tested with data on over one million contributions to state legislative candidates in 2008. The paper also derives implications for macro-level inequities across candidates which are tested by comparing the observed inequities to simulations of the preferential attachment model. The results provide strong support for the hypotheses and show that the preferential attachment model provides a parsimonious representation of contributions to state legislative candidates. Copyright Springer Science+Business Media New York 2014

Suggested Citation

  • Greg Vonnahme, 2014. "A preferential attachment model of campaign contributions in state legislative elections," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 159(1), pages 235-249, April.
    • Handle: RePEc:kap:pubcho:v:159:y:2014:i:1:p:235-249
    DOI: 10.1007/s11127-012-0041-y
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://hdl.handle.net/10.1007/s11127-012-0041-y
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1007/s11127-012-0041-y?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Jay Dow & James Endersby & Charles Menifield, 1998. "The industrial structure of the California Assembly: Committee assignments, economic interests, and campaign contributions," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 94(1), pages 67-83, January.
    2. Denzau, Arthur T. & Munger, Michael C., 1986. "Legislators and Interest Groups: How Unorganized Interests Get Represented," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 80(1), pages 89-106, March.
    3. Stephen Coate, 2004. "Pareto-Improving Campaign Finance Policy," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 94(3), pages 628-655, June.
    4. Prat, Andrea, 2002. "Campaign Spending with Office-Seeking Politicians, Rational Voters, and Multiple Lobbies," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 103(1), pages 162-189, March.
    5. Brady, Henry E. & Schlozman, Kay Lehman & Verba, Sidney, 1999. "Prospecting for Participants: Rational Expectations and the Recruitment of Political Activists," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 93(1), pages 153-168, March.
    6. Thomas Stratmann, 2009. "How prices matter in politics: the returns to campaign advertising," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 140(3), pages 357-377, September.
    7. Walter J. Stone & L. Sandy Maisel & Cherie D. Maestas, 2004. "Quality Counts: Extending the Strategic Politician Model of Incumbent Deterrence," American Journal of Political Science, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 48(3), pages 479-495, July.
    8. Dow, Jay K & Endersby, James W & Menifield, Charles E, 1998. "The Industrial Structure of the California Assembly: Committee Assignments, Economic Interests, and Campaign Contributions," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 94(1-2), pages 67-83, January.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Matthew T. Cole & Ivan Pastine & Tuvana Pastine, 2018. "Incumbency Advantage in an Electoral Contest," The Economic and Social Review, Economic and Social Studies, vol. 49(4), pages 419-436.
    2. Bombardini, Matilde & Trebbi, Francesco, 2011. "Votes or money? Theory and evidence from the US Congress," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 95(7-8), pages 587-611, August.
    3. Thomas Stratmann, 2005. "Some talk: Money in politics. A (partial) review of the literature," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 124(1), pages 135-156, July.
    4. Cotton, Christopher, 2012. "Pay-to-play politics: Informational lobbying and contribution limits when money buys access," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 96(3), pages 369-386.
    5. Bekkouche, Yasmine & Cagé, Julia & Dewitte, Edgard, 2022. "The heterogeneous price of a vote: Evidence from multiparty systems, 1993–2017," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 206(C).
    6. Thomas Bassetti & Filippo Pavesi, 2012. "Deep Pockets, Extreme Preferences: Interest Groups and Campaign Finance Contributions," Working Papers 222, University of Milano-Bicocca, Department of Economics, revised Apr 2012.
    7. Matthias Dahm & Nicolás Porteiro, 2008. "Side Effects of Campaign Finance Reform," Journal of the European Economic Association, MIT Press, vol. 6(5), pages 1057-1077, September.
    8. Juan Carlos Berganza, 2000. "Politicians, voters and electoral processes: an overview," Investigaciones Economicas, Fundación SEPI, vol. 24(3), pages 501-543, September.
    9. Laurent Bouton & Micael Castanheira & Allan Drazen, 2024. "A Theory of Small Campaign Contributions," The Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 134(662), pages 2351-2390.
    10. Cotton, Christopher, 2009. "Should we tax or cap political contributions? A lobbying model with policy favors and access," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 93(7-8), pages 831-842, August.
    11. Schnakenberg, Keith & Turner, Ian R, 2023. "Formal Theories of Special Interest Influence," SocArXiv 47e26, Center for Open Science.
    12. Wittman, Donald, 2007. "Candidate quality, pressure group endorsements and the nature of political advertising," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 23(2), pages 360-378, June.
    13. Thomas Bassetti & Filippo Pavesi, 2017. "Electoral Contributions And The Cost Of Unpopularity," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 55(4), pages 1771-1791, October.
    14. Bekkouche, Yasmine & Cagé, Julia & Dewitte, Edgard, 2022. "The heterogeneous price of a vote: Evidence from multiparty systems, 1993–2017," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 206(C).
    15. Yasmine Bekkouche & Julia Cage, 2019. "The Heterogeneous Price of a Vote: Evidence from France, 1993-2014," SciencePo Working papers Main hal-03393084, HAL.
    16. repec:spo:wpecon:info:hdl:2441/2ahul47tb09rvqfl9eelv7o5ca is not listed on IDEAS
    17. Konishi, Hideki, 2006. "Spending cuts or tax increases? The composition of fiscal adjustments as a signal," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 50(6), pages 1441-1469, August.
    18. Christoph Vanberg, 2005. "“One Man, One Dollar”? Examining the equalization argument in support of campaign contribution limits," Public Economics 0512001, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    19. Michael Dorsch, 2013. "Bailout for sale? The vote to save Wall Street," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 155(3), pages 211-228, June.
    20. Jürgen Huber & Michael Kirchler, 2013. "Corporate campaign contributions and abnormal stock returns after presidential elections," Public Choice, Springer, vol. 156(1), pages 285-307, July.
    21. Sobbrio, Francesco, 2009. "Indirect Lobbying and Media Bias," MPRA Paper 18215, University Library of Munich, Germany.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:kap:pubcho:v:159:y:2014:i:1:p:235-249. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Sonal Shukla or Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.springer.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.