Information and Extremism in Elections

Raphael Boleslavsky and Christopher Cotton

American Economic Journal: Microeconomics, 2015, vol. 7, issue 1, 165-207

Abstract: We model an election in which parties nominate candidates with observable policy preferences prior to a campaign that produces information about candidate quality, a characteristic independent of policy. Informative campaigns lead to greater differentiation in expected candidate quality, which undermines policy competition. In equilibrium, as campaigns become more informative, candidates become more extreme. We identify conditions under which the costs associated with extremism dominate the benefits of campaign information. Informative political campaigns increase political extremism and can decrease voter welfare. Our results have implications for media coverage, the number of debates, and campaign finance reform. (JEL D72, D83)

JEL-codes: D72 D83 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2015
Note: DOI: 10.1257/mic.20130006
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (21)

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Working Paper: Information and Extremism in Elections (2012)
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