Too afraid to vote? The effects of COVID-19 on voting behaviour()

This paper studies the causal effect of local exposure to COVID-19 on voting behaviour and electoral outcomes using evidence from the regional elections held in Spain on 12 July 2020. Exploiting the variation in exposure to COVID-19 and using a difference-in-differences identification strategy, we s...

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Detalles Bibliográficos
Autores principales: Fernandez-Navia, Tania, Polo-Muro, Eduardo, Tercero-Lucas, David
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: The Authors. Published by Elsevier B.V. 2021
Materias:
Article
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8417350/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/34511674
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.ejpoleco.2021.102012
Descripción
Sumario:This paper studies the causal effect of local exposure to COVID-19 on voting behaviour and electoral outcomes using evidence from the regional elections held in Spain on 12 July 2020. Exploiting the variation in exposure to COVID-19 and using a difference-in-differences identification strategy, we show that turnout was between 2.6 and 5.1 percentage points lower in municipalities that experienced positive cases of COVID-19. In addition, the results show a substantial increase in the probability of voting for nationalist parties. We discuss the idea of perceived fear being the potential mechanism driving our results.

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