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Choosing the Form of Government: Theory and Evidence from Brazil

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  • Marcos Yamada Nakaguma

Abstract

This paper proposes a model to study the main factors that influence the preferences of different population groups between presidential and parliamentary systems. Our theory suggests that the parliamentary regime leads to a type of fiscal decentralization in the form of more transfers to constituencies. Ceteris paribus, the poor groups in the population tend to prefer a presidential system relatively more than the rich, since the lower quality of their local accountability institutions (e.g. local media and judicial courts) makes them more vulnerable to the expropriation of rents by their legislators. We also show that in order to perform adequately a parliamentary regime depends on the existence of a class of politicians that can be trusted to represent well the interests of voters. Our model is able to account for the main stylized facts emerging from an analysis of referendum data from Brazil.

Suggested Citation

  • Marcos Yamada Nakaguma, 2013. "Choosing the Form of Government: Theory and Evidence from Brazil," Working Papers, Department of Economics 2013_17, University of São Paulo (FEA-USP).
    • Handle: RePEc:spa:wpaper:2013wpecon17
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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Constitutions; political regime; presidential system; parliamentary system;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • D02 - Microeconomics - - General - - - Institutions: Design, Formation, Operations, and Impact
    • D7 - Microeconomics - - Analysis of Collective Decision-Making
    • H0 - Public Economics - - General

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