Incumbency Status Research Articles

Social media homophily among women and men political candidates

Abstract This paper assesses differences between women and men political candidates in their likelihood to interact with peers who share the same gender, political affiliation, electoral district, incumbency, age, and the governmental status of their party. Using Twitter (currently X) data from Finland’s 2019 election campaign, we find a tendency towards homophily—a tendency to interact predominantly with similar others—among all candidates across the various studied characteristics. However, some gender differences in the tendency towards homophily emerge. Notably, women are more inclined than men to retweet candidates from their own party but are less likely to retweet peers with the same incumbency status and the same gender. Our multivariate analyses further show that retweet tendencies based on age, shared electoral district and party governmental status exhibit no significant gender disparities. These nuanced variations in homophilous relations highlight the complex interplay between gender and other characteristics in candidates’ social media interactions during electoral campaigns.

Two terms of endearment? Incumbent-party performance in US presidential elections

Abstract Presidential elections are arguably the most consequential recurring political event in the United States. Understanding the factors that determine their outcomes, therefore, is of substantial importance. One proposed factor pertains to presidential candidates' incumbency status, yet its nature is complex and difficult to study with observational data. In particular, the individual-level mechanisms underlying incumbency effects remain unclear. This study proposes many citizens generally believe that, ceteris paribus, presidents should be afforded two terms. Crucially, such a norm implies that incumbency status possesses an inherent effect, operating independent of other mechanisms that may stem from incumbency. A large, pre-registered survey experiment was therefore employed to isolate the effect of incumbency status on presidential vote choice. The experiment finds strong evidence that one-term incumbent candidates have an inherent advantage against their non-incumbent opponents. The results also clarify that the two-term disadvantage present in observational data is not inherent, and is perhaps better understood simply as the absence of the one-term advantage. The study thus points toward a micro-foundational mechanism underlying incumbent-party performance in presidential elections. Finally, analyses of panel data explore which voters may be systematically inclined to vote based upon the incumbency status of presidential candidates.

Emotions and the status quo: The anti-incumbency bias in political prediction markets

Emotions are often associated with politics, with new research confirming this connection. There is a link between negative emotions and political actions that oppose an incumbent candidate or party. We examine whether this “anti-incumbency” bias extends to political prediction markets, where such emotions can conflict with economic rationality. We analyze unique data from Media Predict, a commercial prediction market. Before a trade is executed, participants are asked to write a justification for their actions. Using text analysis, we measure the emotional sentiment of the justifications of traders buying contracts predicting a change in the incumbent candidate or party. Consistent with anti-incumbency bias, the justifications of buyers of a challenger contract had significantly more negative emotional sentiment scores. We document this finding in prediction markets associated with the 2012 US Presidential Election and the 2015 UK General Election. We conclude that, despite incentives to the contrary, traders’ actions in political stock markets are associated with strong emotions tied to incumbency status.

The political economy of campaign contributions in insurance markets

AbstractContributions to election campaigns are tracked by the National Institute on Money in State Politics. In this paper, we use this data to examine patterns in political campaign contributions made by the insurance industry. We compile a state‐level data set that aggregates over 67,000 election campaign contributions to insurance regulators and governors; we show that candidate incumbency status is associated with a 20% to 30% increase in the share of contributions made to the incumbent insurance regulator's political party. Because incumbents are overwhelmingly favored to win elections, the industry's behavior suggests that insurers are more concerned with access to the elected official than with supporting a candidate that shares the industry's goals.

Citra Politik Kandidat Walikota Semarang dalam Instagram: Analisis Dramaturgi pada Pilwakot Semarang 2020

This article aims to analyze the political image of Hendrar Prihadi (Hendi), incumbent mayoral candidate of Semarang 2020 election shown on Instagram @hendrarprihadi in the midst of covid-19 pandemic. If most candidates concoct political slogans and deliver campaign promises, Hendi’s Instagram portrays more amusing content with a minimum amount of campaign messages. Dramaturgy theory used to analyze framing processes on Instagram as frontstage, and what backstage and offstage factors could affect this single candidate manage to get 91,4% of votes, even though activists consider election in the midst of pandemic as less humane, and single candidate could lower voters’ turnover. Qualitative analysis data collected from interviews and articles shows that amusing content on Hendi’s Instagram designed to pacify the public affected by covid-19, followers are easily extracted by amusing content, and as a method to sheer away from sensitive political issues. Backstage, although Semarang reported as the highest contributor of covid-19 cases in Indonesia, and numbers of rule violation campaigns, candidate characteristic, leadership, incumbent status, and also relation with public and political figure be the several things making candidate’s political image more stable, affecting candidate winning the 2020 Semarang Mayoral Election.

Competence in the Eye of the Electorate: Appearance, Incumbency, and Vote Shares

AbstractPrior studies have documented incumbency advantage for electoral candidates. A largely unrelated strand of literature has shown that perceived competence of candidates, as inferred from their physical appearance, also predicts their electoral success. We draw upon the framework of statistical discrimination and the dual‐system theory of human cognition to understand the relationship between a political candidate's vote share, physical appearance, and incumbency status. Voters possess relatively richer information about incumbents compared to challengers. Perceived competence of candidates, as inferred from their physical appearance, is therefore expected to have a relatively weaker influence on voters' decisions to vote for incumbents. Data from Australian state elections support this prediction.

How Do Mainstream Parties Justify Their (Un)willingness to Rule with Populist Parties? Evidence from Twitter Data

AbstractParties usually argue in favour or against a government coalition based on party considerations in terms of projected policy implementation, power in office and vote maximization – that is, the ‘policy, office, votes’ triad. So far, however, it remains unclear which claims mainstream parties invoke to motivate their choice to rule or not rule with populist parties. Adopting the ‘policy, voter, office’ triad, this article examines mainstream parties' Twitter claims on ruling with populist parties in Austria, Belgium, Germany and the Netherlands (2006–2021, N = 1,919). Mainstream parties mainly reject ruling with (mostly radical right) populist parties. To justify unwillingness, policy-based motives referring to the populist parties' extremist nature trump motives on office-seeking and vote maximization. To justify willingness, predominantly office-seeking motivations are invoked. Party characteristics (ideology, incumbency status, size) and context, however, shape these claims. This study sheds light on mainstream parties' patterns of political communication on coalition formation with populist parties.

Human cooperation in changing groups in a large-scale public goods game

How people cooperate to provide public goods is an important scientific question and relates to many societal problems. Previous research studied how people cooperate in stable groups in repeated or one-time-only encounters. However, most real-world public good problems occur in groups with a gradually changing composition due to old members leaving and new members arriving. How group changes are related to cooperation in public good provision is not well understood. To address this issue, we analyze a dataset from an online public goods game comprising approximately 1.5 million contribution decisions made by about 135 thousand players in about 11.3 thousand groups with about 234 thousand changes in group composition. We find that changes in group composition negatively relate to cooperation. Our results suggest that this is related to individuals contributing less in the role of newcomers than in the role of incumbents. During the process of moving from newcomer status to incumbent status, individuals cooperate more and more in line with incumbents.

Let the voters decide: Incumbents, opposition, and contested primaries in Argentina

Citizens’ ability to influence public decisions is the hallmark of democracy, and central to this are candidate selection mechanisms. Despite the increasing popularity of primaries across the globe, scholars disagree on how incumbency status shapes primary election contests. To address this question, I exploit an electoral reform in Argentina that forces parties and coalitions to participate in primaries, but allows these to be contested or uncontested. Employing an original data set on federal legislative nominations between 2011 and 2017, I show that internal divisions encourage contested primaries within the opposition, to which district-level rivals strategically respond in kind by fielding multiple internal lists to counter any potential electoral “bonus” others may enjoy from contesting primaries. Combined with the influence of presidents and governors over selection procedures, these patterns mean that primary races are closely fought within the opposition but are trouble-free under incumbency status.

The coming of age for paid digital campaigning: equalization or normalization in the 2019 Belgian federal elections?

PurposePaid digital campaigning tools play an increasingly pivotal role in individual election campaigns worldwide. Extant literature often juxtaposes the equalization theory, which argues that these tools create a level playing field, and the normalization theory, which contends that strong and resource-rich politicians benefit most from digital tools. This article aims to inform this debate by looking at it from a campaign expenditure perspective beyond the Anglo-American bias of most research on the subject.Design/methodology/approachThe authors use an original dataset on campaign expenditures and resources of 1,798 candidates running for 13 Belgian parties in the 2019 federal parliamentary election. Relying on multilevel statistical models, the authors link the candidates' digital campaign expenses to their incumbency status, which is expected to affect digital campaigning.FindingsWhile earlier work on majoritarian cases often showed contradicting results, this study on the Belgian flexible-list proportional representation (PR) case provides strong support for the equalization theory by demonstrating that incumbents are not only less inclined to spend on digital tools than challengers, but also spend a smaller part of their budget on these tools.Originality/valueThis paper contributes to the literature by exploring the equalization versus normalization debate from a campaign expenditure perspective using a made to purpose dataset in a non-Anglo-American context.Peer reviewThe peer review history for this article is available at: https://publons.com/publon/10.1108/OIR-12-2021-0679

Policy signals in party communication: explaining positional concreteness in parties’ Facebook posts

Policy signals are often conceived of as positions on an ideological scale. However, apart from the position – considered here as the policy objective – the policy instrument and the concreteness of the instrument must also be taken into consideration. In the article, a new conceptualisation of policy signals is developed, which integrates policy objectives, policy instruments and how concrete these are. Drawing on issue competition research, a set of expectations is advanced about the importance of actors’ control over outcomes for positional concreteness. Then, policy signals are looked at in the unmediated context of Danish parties’ Facebook posts ahead of the 2019 national election. Based on all textual and audio-visual posts in the year before the election, it is found that the levels of positional concreteness are generally high. Yet – in line with expectations – positional concreteness depends on parties’ incumbency status and the policy field.

Analyzing sales proposal rejections via machine learning

The sales profession is fraught with customer rejection and defections. Understanding why customers say “no” to a sales proposal is complex given that factors at the organizational-, individual-, and interactional-level are synthesized in the customer’s decision-making process. Academics and practitioners alike therefore stand to benefit from greater understanding of this phenomenon. The current study leverages text-based machine learning on postmortem interview transcripts from 113 business-to-business sales failures, spanning over 1,500 pages of text, to provide exploratory insights into the reasons for sales proposal rejections. Results reveal several thematic facets of sales proposal failures from the perspective of the customer, along with insights that variance in topic salience—i.e., buyer focus on a few topics or a spread of dimensions—is contingent on supplier incumbency status. Specifically, using topic modeling, findings show that buyers converge on a distributed (concentrated) range of sales proposal rejection topics for in- (out-) supplier proposals. Additionally, the authors show how the text-based machine learning approach can highlight key areas of concern for firms, enabling them to effectively enact changes that will improve future outcomes. Collectively, this research contributes to efforts to bridge the chasm between theoretical, managerial, and technical aspects of machine learning in sales.

Does Incumbency Matter?

During the 2018 House of Representatives elections, the United States saw a larger influx of minority candidates than elections in recent years. Many of these candidates were non-incumbents who ran successful campaigns against long-standing incumbents. Using the 2018 Cooperative Election Study data (CCES), we analyze the likelihood of Black voters to support White candidates over minority candidates, with a focus on incumbency status. Previous research has found that Black voters tend to display a larger affinity to support minority candidates due to theories such as group identity and racial voting. Given what is known from the literature about Black voting patterns, our study sets out to determine the extent to which incumbency matters for Black voters in the 2018 Congressional House of Representative (HOR) elections. The findings of our analysis reveal that Black voters are significantly more likely to support Democratic POC candidates, and significantly less likely to support Democratic white incumbents as compared to white voters. The findings of our study illuminate that both the affinity to support minority candidates and incumbency matter to Black voters.

When Do Politicians Use Populist Rhetoric? Populism as a Campaign Gamble

ABSTRACT Why do some politicians employ populist rhetoric more than others within the same elections, and why do the same politicians employ more of it in some elections? Building on a simple formal theoretical model of two-candidate elections informed by the ideational approach to populist communication, we argue that the initially less popular political actors are more likely to use populist rhetoric in a gamble to have at least some chance of winning. To test the empirical implications of our argument, we construct the most comprehensive corpus of U.S. presidential campaign speeches (1952–2016) and estimate the prevalence of populist rhetoric across these speeches with a novel automated text analysis method utilizing active learning and word embedding. Overall, we show the robustly greater use of populism among the presidential candidates with the lower polling numbers regardless of their partisanship or incumbency status.

From the American South to South America: Testing whether patterns of competition in two‐round elections travel from the United States to Latin America

AbstractObjectiveIn this paper, we seek to update and expand the understanding of whether the patterns of competition in two‐round elections in the United States exist in other countries.MethodsUsing insights from the well‐developed literature on two‐round elections in the U.S. South, we analyze an original data set covering two‐round presidential systems in Latin America. We focus on the likelihood that elections will go to a second round, and, once a second round happens, the role that first‐round electoral strength and incumbency status play in determining the ultimate outcome.ResultsUnlike previous work, our statistical model accounts for unobservable factors that simultaneously affect the likelihood of a second round occurring and of the first‐round leader winning that round.ConclusionsPatterns of competition across U.S. and Latin American two‐round elections are similar, though incumbency status may be a bigger asset in the latter than in the former.

Political Attacks in 280 Characters or Less: A New Tool for the Automated Classification of Campaign Negativity on Social Media

Negativity in election campaign matters. To what extent can the content of social media posts provide a reliable indicator of candidates' campaign negativity? We introduce and critically assess an automated classification procedure that we trained to annotate more than 16,000 tweets of candidates competing in the 2018 Senate Midterms. The algorithm is able to identify the presence of political attacks (both in general, and specifically for character and policy attacks) and incivility. Due to the novel nature of the instrument, the article discusses the external and convergent validity of these measures. Results suggest that automated classifications are able to provide reliable measurements of campaign negativity. Triangulations with independent data show that our automatic classification is strongly associated with the experts’ perceptions of the candidates’ campaign. Furthermore, variations in our measures of negativity can be explained by theoretically relevant factors at the candidate and context levels (e.g., incumbency status and candidate gender); theoretically meaningful trends are also found when replicating the analysis using tweets for the 2020 Senate election, coded using the automated classifier developed for 2018. The implications of such results for the automated coding of campaign negativity in social media are discussed.

Does Money Matter for Electability? Lesson Learned From the 2014 Legislative Election in Indonesia

Reform toward open-list elections in Indonesia has transformed the nature of campaigning to become more personalized. This has raised questions regarding the role of money in elections and calls for stricter campaign finance regulation. However, the merits of limits on campaign finance depend on whether and how campaign finance affects incumbents and challengers differently. Literature on this issue has produced ambiguous results, with only few studies conducted in a developing country democracy. This study estimates the effect of campaign money, along with other factors including list position and incumbency status, on the probability of a candidate being elected in the 2014 legislative election in Indonesia. Our econometric estimations confirm that campaign money effectively raises the probability of candidates being elected. The probability of getting elected will increase up to approximately 5 percentage points for each additional IDR 100 million of campaign money. Campaign money is positive and significant for both incumbents and challengers, with the magnitude being bigger for incumbents. However, the effect of diminishing returns of campaign money is slightly stronger for incumbents. Since raising additional campaign funding benefits incumbents more than it does for challengers, this study suggests the enforcement of campaign spending limits to create a more level playing field in Indonesia’s legislative elections.

Reexamining the Effects of Electoral Competition on Negative Advertising

Prior research suggests that campaigns become more negative when the election environment becomes more competitive. Much of this research suffers from data and design limitations. I replicate and extend prior analyses using a much larger number of cases. Using advertising data drawn from 374 U.S. Senate and gubernatorial campaigns contested from 2000 through 2018, I find evidence that electoral competition encourages candidates to engage in more negative advertising campaigns and that incumbency status conditions these effects. Incumbents of both parties use more negative messaging strategies as competition increases. The effects of competition among challengers and open seat candidates is mixed. These results add to what we know about campaign advertising behavior and suggest that researchers should take care to avoid ignoring important contextual factors that underlie candidates’ strategic choices.

The Effect of Characteristics, Incumbent Status and Political Party Affiliation of Local Head on Local Expenditure Deviation

This research aims to examine the effect of characteristics, incumbent status and political party affiliation of local head on local expenditure deviation. The independent variables are age, education level, professional background, incumbent status and political party affiliation of local heads. The dependent variable is local expenditure deviation. The population is all local heads in Indonesia in 2018. The study samples are 157 Local heads. The sampling method used is purposive sampling technique. The data analysis method is multiple regression facilitated by SPSS version 26 software . The research results show that age, education level, professional background, and incumbent status of local head do not affect on local expenditure deviation. The political party affiliation of local head has a positive effect on local expenditure deviation. Keywords: Characteristics of Local heads, Incumbent Status, Political Party Affiliation, Local Expenditure Deviation DOI: 10.7176/PPAR/11-6-07 Publication date: July 31 st 2021

Prime ministers, the vote of confidence and the management of coalition terminations between elections

When coalition leaders have powers to call a vote of confidence, they can invoke the threat of government resignation or early elections, and raise other actors’ costs of voting down the government. In this paper, this insight is applied to coalition replacements. The procedure, argued here, allows leaders to reduce their risk of losing office between elections by (i) managing the coalition’s cohesion and (ii) denying parliament the option of replacing the government without intervening elections. Premiers, moreover, can be expected to use these powers for partisan benefit, protecting primarily their own rather than their coalition partners’ incumbency status. To test this expectation, a novel measure of vote of confidence powers is applied to the analysis of coalition replacement risks in 20 European democracies. The results show that premiers with extensive confidence powers significantly reduce their risk of replacement between elections while their coalition partners do not benefit equally.