Incumbency effects in government and opposition: Evidence from Germany

Florian Ade, Ronny Freier and Christian Odendahl

European Journal of Political Economy, 2014, vol. 36, issue C, 117-134

Abstract: Do district incumbents in an election have an advantage, and if so, do these advantages depend on which party is in government? We estimate the incumbency effect for the direct district candidates in German federal and state elections using a regression discontinuity design (RDD). When studying the heterogeneity in these effects, we find that incumbents from both large parties, the center-right CDU and the center-left SPD, have an advantage only if the SPD is in government. This effect is robust and shows even in state elections that are unrelated to federal elections.

Keywords: Incumbency advantage; Regression discontinuity design; Federal elections; State elections (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: H10 H11 H77 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2014
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (10)

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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:poleco:v:36:y:2014:i:c:p:117-134

DOI: 10.1016/j.ejpoleco.2014.07.008

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