Isolated Capital Cities, Accountability and Corruption: Evidence from US States

Campante, Filipe; Do, Quoc-Anh

Isolated Capital Cities, Accountability and Corruption: Evidence from US States

Abstract: We show that isolated capital cities are robustly associated with greater levels of corruption across US states, in line with the view that this isolation reduces accountability. We then provide direct evidence that the spatial distribution of population relative to the capital affects different accountability mechanisms: newspapers cover state politics more when readers are closer to the capital, voters who live far from the capital are less knowledgeable and interested in state politics, and they turn out less in state elections. We also find that isolated capitals are associated with more money in state-level campaigns, and worse public good provision.

Keywords: Isolated Capital Cities; Corruption; Accountability; US states (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2014-08
Note: View the original document on HAL open archive server: https://sciencespo.hal.science/hal-03393022
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (6)

Published in American Economic Review, 2014, 104 (8), pp.2456 - 2481. ⟨10.1257/aer.104.8.2456⟩

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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:hal:spmain:hal-03393022

DOI: 10.1257/aer.104.8.2456

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