Electoral Competition and Local Government Responsiveness in Brazil

Abstract

The main objective of this paper is to verify whether electoral competition increases the supply of public goods in a federalist country where the decision-making process about public policy occurs at the local level (there are both local executive and legislative branches) and the political system has fewer barriers to the entry of new competitors. Brazilian local governments fulfill these characteristics. Our results show that the number of effective candidates running for the executive branch enhances the supply of local public goods (increasing the percentage number of physicians per 1,000 inhabitants and immunization coverage per capita, and reducing infant mortality per capita). Moreover, our robustness tests show that the difference between both the first and second candidates running for the executive branch (more competitive elections) and the elected mayor’s quality of management do not affect these results significantly.