Pork Barrel Politics in Postwar Italy, 1953–1994

Lucio Picci and Miriam Golden

MPRA Paper from University Library of Munich, Germany

Abstract: This paper analyzes the political determinants of the distribution of infrastructure expenditures by the Italian government to the country’s 92 provinces between 1953 and 1994. Extending implications of theories of legislative behavior to the context of open-list proportional representation, we examine whether individually powerful legislators and ruling parties direct spending to core or marginal electoral districts, and whether opposition parties share resources via a norm of universalism. We show that when districts elect politically more powerful deputies from the governing parties, they receive more investments. We interpret this as indicating that legislators with political resources reward their core voters by investing in public works in their districts. The governing parties, by contrast, are not able to discipline their own members of parliament sufficiently to target the parties’ areas of core electoral strength. Finally, we find no evidence that a norm of universalism operates to steer resources to areas when the main opposition party gains more votes.

Keywords: pork barrel; distributive politics; electoral systems; Italy; public spending; infrastructure (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: H40 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2007-11
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-cdm, nep-his and nep-pol
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (38)

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Related works:
Working Paper: Pork Barrel Politics in Postwar Italy, 1953–1994 (2007)
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:pra:mprapa:5626

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