Far-right parties have surged to power across democracies, but their electoral accountability remains poorly understood. Through a series of essays, this dissertation provides a comprehensive analysis of how voters respond to the policies and outcomes of far-right incumbents and how policy effects on different parties can be evaluated. The findings contribute to the literature on political behavior, illiberal and far-right politics, and political methodology. In the first chapter, I empirically investigate to what extent performance in office affects support for the far right, and which voters hold them accountable. To answer these questions, I conducted a novel pre-registered survey experiment embedded in a representative survey of 2055 individuals in Italy. Respondents were randomly exposed to factual information about rising immigration or economic growth under the far-right government of Giorgia Meloni. I find that rising immigration erodes support towards the government, with an effect comparable to economic voting. The effect does not vary by partisanship, policy preferences, or issue salience, suggesting a broad-based valence reaction rather than a partisan or ideological one. These findings suggest that far-right governments are not insulated from electoral accountability, as immigration can influence voter support in a manner comparable to economic conditions. In the second chapter, I study whether state-sponsored homophobia bolsters the support for the government. While a growing body of literature documents the increasing politicization of LGBTQ- and gender-related issues by illiberal elites, little is known about the electoral effects of these strategies. I address this important question by studying whether anti-LGBTQ mobilization pays off electorally for the initiating party. Empirically, I study the adoption of anti-LGBTQ resolutions in many Polish municipalities prior to the 2019 parliamentary election. Using a synthetic difference-in-differences design, I find that these resolutions significantly depressed turnout in affected municipalities, with opposition parties showing less mobilization capacity. By contrast, turnout for the incumbent Law and Justice Party increased substantially. Overall, this study's findings are relevant for understanding the electoral consequences of both elite-led mobilization against stigmatized and discriminated groups, and policies of subnational democratic backsliding. In the third chapter, I address the methodological challenge of estimating causal effects on party vote shares by synthetic control methods. Synthetic control methods are widely used for causal inference in case studies and panel data settings, often applied to model counterfactuals for proportional outcomes. However, conventional synthetic control methods are designed for univariate outcomes, leading researchers to model counterfactuals for each proportion separately. This study introduces an extension to synthetic control methods to simultaneously handle multivariate outcomes in compositional data. The approach establishes constant control comparisons by using the same weights for each proportion, improving comparability while adhering to treatment constraints. Results from a simulation study and an empirical application of the method to the study from chapter 2 and another study on climate policy effects underscore the benefits of accounting for the interplay of proportional outcomes. This advancement extends the validity and reliability of synthetic control estimates to common outcomes in political science.

Electoral Accountability for Illiberal Governments: Essays on Immigration, State-Sponsored Homophobia and Political Methodology

BOGATYREV, KONSTANTIN
2025

Abstract

Far-right parties have surged to power across democracies, but their electoral accountability remains poorly understood. Through a series of essays, this dissertation provides a comprehensive analysis of how voters respond to the policies and outcomes of far-right incumbents and how policy effects on different parties can be evaluated. The findings contribute to the literature on political behavior, illiberal and far-right politics, and political methodology. In the first chapter, I empirically investigate to what extent performance in office affects support for the far right, and which voters hold them accountable. To answer these questions, I conducted a novel pre-registered survey experiment embedded in a representative survey of 2055 individuals in Italy. Respondents were randomly exposed to factual information about rising immigration or economic growth under the far-right government of Giorgia Meloni. I find that rising immigration erodes support towards the government, with an effect comparable to economic voting. The effect does not vary by partisanship, policy preferences, or issue salience, suggesting a broad-based valence reaction rather than a partisan or ideological one. These findings suggest that far-right governments are not insulated from electoral accountability, as immigration can influence voter support in a manner comparable to economic conditions. In the second chapter, I study whether state-sponsored homophobia bolsters the support for the government. While a growing body of literature documents the increasing politicization of LGBTQ- and gender-related issues by illiberal elites, little is known about the electoral effects of these strategies. I address this important question by studying whether anti-LGBTQ mobilization pays off electorally for the initiating party. Empirically, I study the adoption of anti-LGBTQ resolutions in many Polish municipalities prior to the 2019 parliamentary election. Using a synthetic difference-in-differences design, I find that these resolutions significantly depressed turnout in affected municipalities, with opposition parties showing less mobilization capacity. By contrast, turnout for the incumbent Law and Justice Party increased substantially. Overall, this study's findings are relevant for understanding the electoral consequences of both elite-led mobilization against stigmatized and discriminated groups, and policies of subnational democratic backsliding. In the third chapter, I address the methodological challenge of estimating causal effects on party vote shares by synthetic control methods. Synthetic control methods are widely used for causal inference in case studies and panel data settings, often applied to model counterfactuals for proportional outcomes. However, conventional synthetic control methods are designed for univariate outcomes, leading researchers to model counterfactuals for each proportion separately. This study introduces an extension to synthetic control methods to simultaneously handle multivariate outcomes in compositional data. The approach establishes constant control comparisons by using the same weights for each proportion, improving comparability while adhering to treatment constraints. Results from a simulation study and an empirical application of the method to the study from chapter 2 and another study on climate policy effects underscore the benefits of accounting for the interplay of proportional outcomes. This advancement extends the validity and reliability of synthetic control estimates to common outcomes in political science.
17-giu-2025
Inglese
35
2022/2023
PUBLIC POLICY AND ADMINISTRATION
Settore SPS/04 - Scienza Politica
DE VRIES, CATHERINE EUNICE
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Utilizza questo identificativo per citare o creare un link a questo documento: https://hdl.handle.net/11565/4074076
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