Environmental Disasters and Electoral Cycle: An Empirical Analysis on Floods and Landslides in Italy

Alessio D’Amato (), Giovanni Marin and Andrea Rampa
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Alessio D’Amato: University of Rome “Tor Vergata”
Authors registered in the RePEc Author Service: Alessio D'Amato ()

Environmental & Resource Economics, 2019, vol. 74, issue 2, No 5, 625-651

Abstract: Abstract The aim of this paper is to analyse potential drivers of land use policy, in the form of building permits issued in Italian provinces. We first derive testable implications on the basis of a standard political agency framework, augmented to account for the impact of past environmental disasters (floods, landslides and earthquakes) and for the relevance of “building permits intensive” sectors in determining voters’ support to an incumbent politician. We then perform an empirical analysis that tests theoretical predictions using a unique dataset covering Italy in the period 2001–2012. Our main conclusions show that the occurrence of floods and earthquakes decreases building permits, implying that a bad history in terms of these phenomena strengthens the importance of voters affected by past disasters. No corresponding evidence seems to emerge with reference to landslides. On the other hand, the relevance of the construction sector increases the number of building permits issued. Finally, when elections approach, the number of building permits issued grows, suggesting that incumbent politicians may distort land use policies in order to favour “brown” voters in periods close to elections.

Keywords: Catastrophic events; Land use; Uncertainty; Environmental policy; Risk; Natural disaster; JEL Classification; H11; Q54; Q58 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2019
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (4)

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Working Paper: Environmental Disasters and Electoral Cycle: An Empirical Analysis on Floods and Landslides in Italy (2017)
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DOI: 10.1007/s10640-019-00338-7

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