How Proportional Representation Frames Pork Barrel Efforts: District Magnitude, Ballot Type and Position on the List Interactions

Abstract

I focus on pork barrel efforts, i.e. legislators’ actions to seek local public goods for their constituencies. Efforts in closed-list and open-list proportional representation are better explained as the interaction of district magnitude (M) and list position. In closed-list systems efforts will be greater when M is very small and as M increases they will describe a concave distribution at the list level. In open list systems efforts increase the larger the M and for legislators elected in the closest positions to the top of the list. I test this argument using an original dataset of bills initiation in the Honduran Congress between 1990 and 2009. In 2004, Honduras shifted from closed-list to open-list while maintaining district magnitude constant.