Presidential Popularity and the Politics of Distributing Federal Funds in Argentina

Lucas González

Publius: The Journal of Federalism, 2016, vol. 46, issue 2, 199-223

Abstract: This article studies the main factors that affect the allocation of non-earmarked federal funds to subnational units in Argentina between 1999 and 2009. The main contribution is that it brings presidential popularity together with presidential structural and partisan preferences for distribution into the analysis. It argues that electorally strong and popular presidents tend to increase transfers to developing districts and reduce allocations to richer districts. Investing in developing provinces is more efficient, and governors from these districts tend to support redistributive presidents and be weaker political challengers than governors from richer units. In contrast, weaker presidents are less capable of resisting pressures from governors from larger and richer districts. There is also more distribution to developing regions when presidents have a larger share of partisan allies there and fewer in richer states. The article discusses these results, compares them with competitive claims, and explores implications for the comparative debate.

Date: 2016
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
http://hdl.handle.net/10.1093/publius/pjw001 (application/pdf)
Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:oup:publus:v:46:y:2016:i:2:p:199-223.

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
https://academic.oup.com/journals

Access Statistics for this article

Publius: The Journal of Federalism is currently edited by Paul Nolette and Philip Rocco

More articles in Publius: The Journal of Federalism from CSF Associates Inc. Oxford University Press, Great Clarendon Street, Oxford OX2 6DP, UK.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Oxford University Press ().