Military careers of politicians matter for national security policy

David Stadelmann, Marco Portmann and Reiner Eichenberger ()

CREMA Working Paper Series from Center for Research in Economics, Management and the Arts (CREMA)

Abstract: Do politicians with a military background decide differently on military affairs? We investigate the informative institutional setting of the Swiss conscription army. Politicians who served in the military have a higher probability of accepting pro-military legislative proposals, even when controlling for party affiliations and revealed preferences of constituents that politicians are supposed to represent. While conscription requires all able-bodied man to serve at least as soldiers, we can exploit variation in exposure to enforced and voluntary service. This allows us to provide indicative evidence that motivation for the military, instead of compulsory service, plays a substantial role for explaining legislative decisions on military affairs.

Keywords: Military; Legislative voting; Constituents preferences (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: D72 J16 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2014-11
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-cdm and nep-pol
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Related works:
Journal Article: Military careers of politicians matter for national security policy (2015)
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:cra:wpaper:2014-18

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