The Variable Incumbency Advantage: New Voters, Redistricting, and the Personal Vote

Scott W. Desposato and John R. Petrocik

American Journal of Political Science, 2003, vol. 47, issue 1, 18-32

Abstract: In this article we explore the personal vote costs of redistricting. After redistricting, incumbents often face significant numbers of new voters—voters that were previously in a different incumbent's district. Existing conceptualizations of the incumbency advantage suggest that the cost to incumbents of having new voters should be relatively small and predictable. We propose a different formulation: a variable incumbency advantage. We argue that any incumbency advantage among the electorate is a function of short‐term effects, partisanship, and electoral saliency. We use a massive untapped dataset of neighborhood‐level electoral data to test our model and to demonstrate how the intersection of the personal vote, redistricting, and short‐term environmental variables can provide a healthy margin to incumbents—or end their careers.

Date: 2003
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:wly:amposc:v:47:y:2003:i:1:p:18-32

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