Plausible deniability

2019 ◽  
Vol 31 (4) ◽  
pp. 600-625
Author(s):  
Joshua A Strayhorn
Keyword(s):  
Formal Model ◽  
Elected Officials ◽  
Electoral Accountability ◽  
Corrupt Activity ◽  
Is Failure

One explanation for why voters sometimes fail to hold elected officials accountable for corruption is failure to correctly attribute blame. Yet existing theories of how voters attribute responsibility do not consider how voters assessments may be shaped by the possibility that politicians can strategically delegate corrupt activity. This paper develops a formal model of an electoral accountability environment where politicians can pursue malfeasance directly or indirectly, but where ‘rogue agents’ occasionally pursue malfeasance independently. Corruption can arise via multiple pathways, and politicians sometimes possess plausible deniability. In one equilibrium, voters rationally reelect after plausibly deniable corruption due to a non-obvious and novel mechanism. Politicians are also more likely to delegate malfeasance to agents when they anticipate lenience. Voter lenience is non-monotonically related to many parameters, including politician competence, the agent’s malfeasance preferences, and transparency.

scholarly journals Accountability in Governing Hierarchies

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Greg Sasso ◽  
Ian R Turner ◽  
Christopher Li
Keyword(s):  
Bureaucratic Politics ◽  
Elected Officials ◽  
High Quality ◽  
Electoral Accountability ◽  
Accountability Standards ◽  
Conflicting Interests ◽  
Formal Theories

Formal theories of accountability and bureaucratic politics typically consider voter-politician interactions in isolation from politician-bureaucrat interactions. In this paper, we study a model of electoral accountability with a hierarchy consisting of a voter, a politician, and a bureaucrat. The politician and bureaucrat both produce government output valued by the voter. The voter controls the politician via election and the politician provides incentives to bureaucrats, who may have conflicting interests. We show that when times are conducive to high quality governance -- budgets are large and players are farsighted -- incorporating the bureaucratic layer of the hierarchy makes for weaker accountability standards. However, when times are tough and budgets are small or players are myopic it is possible that voters may benefit from increasing their demands on elected officials. These accountability standards change even when reelection does not depend at all on the bureaucrat's output directly.

scholarly journals Popular Referendum and Electoral Accountability

2016 ◽  
Vol 6 (4) ◽  
pp. 715-731 ◽  
Author(s):  
Patrick Le Bihan
Keyword(s):  
Decision Making ◽  
Direct Democracy ◽  
Representative Democracy ◽  
Elected Officials ◽  
Policy Decisions ◽  
Public Officials ◽  
Electoral Accountability ◽  
Additional Information ◽  
The Cost ◽  
Elected Representatives

This paper studies how citizen-initiated referenda affect the decision-making of elected representatives. In the absence of direct democracy, elected officials who do not share the preferences of voters may enact their preferred policies even at the cost of decreasing the likelihood of reelection. Direct democracy diminishes the policy benefits of doing that, as voters may now overturn some of the policy decisions. Hence, elected officials are induced to implement the policies preferred by the voters not only on those issues that are subject to a possible citizen-initiated referendum, but also on those that are not. This result holds even when the voters’ information about their true interests is limited. Moreover, whereas in a representative democracy, being more informed may undermine voters’ ability to control public officials, the possibility of citizen-initiated referenda means that additional information improves voter control, including on issues that may be outside the direct democracy domain.

scholarly journals Electoral Accountability in the Midst of Criminal Violence: Evidence from Mexico

2017 ◽  
Vol 59 (1) ◽  
pp. 3-27 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sandra Ley
Keyword(s):  
Quality Of Life ◽  
Organized Crime ◽  
Fundamental Question ◽  
Elected Officials ◽  
Electoral Accountability ◽  
Issue Voting ◽  
Criminal Violence ◽  
Political Alignment ◽  
Voting Models

AbstractRising levels of crime and insecurity affect the quality of life. A fundamental question for the prospects of democracy is whether voters, in hopes of reaching better solutions to conditions of prevailing insecurity, can hold their elected officials accountable for such situations. This article argues that electoral accountability amid criminal violence requires voters to be able to assign responsibility for crime, and that partisan alignment across levels of government facilitates this task. Recent Mexican elections are examined to test this argument. Relying on both aggregate electoral data and individual survey evidence, this study shows that voters hold politicians accountable for crime in the narrow circumstances of organized crime–related violence and political alignment. This evidence not only provides additional caveats to issue voting models, but also opens new avenues of research on electoral accountability.

scholarly journals Policy Bundling and Costly Monitoring

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Greg Sasso
Keyword(s):  
Formal Model ◽  
Elected Officials ◽  
Type I ◽  
Political Accountability ◽  
Good Type ◽  
Costly Monitoring

When should elected officials be in charge of multiple vs single policy areas? To study this question, I analyze a formal model of political accountability where politicians can have authority over one or two policy areas. When all politicians act sincerely, voters are always better off with unbundled policies. However, the voter is indifferent when all politicians pander. When bundled politicians partially-pander, the optimal institution is dependent on how likely the politician is to be a good type. I then show that voters are willing to spend more to monitor politicians in charge of multiple policy areas.

DEVELOPMENT OF A METHOD FOR DESIGNING INFORMATION SYSTEMS FOR ENERGY COMPANIES

2020 ◽  
Vol 5 (333) ◽  
pp. 53-57
Author(s):  
T.B. Aldongar ◽  
◽  
F.U. Malikova ◽  
G.B. Issayeva ◽  
B.R. Absatarova ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Information Systems ◽  
Business Processes ◽  
Design Research ◽  
Graphical Model ◽  
Formal Model ◽  
Workflow Management ◽  
Research Process ◽  
Information Models ◽  
The Creation ◽  
Concept Of Information

The creation of information models requires the use of known methods and the development of new methods of formalizing the pre-design research process. The modeling process consists of four stages: data collection on the object of management - pre-project research; creation of a graphical model of business processes taking place in the enterprise; development of a formal model of business processes; business research by optimizing the formal model. To support the creation of workflow management services and systems, the complex offers methodologies, standards and specialized software that make up the developer's tools. This can be ensured only by modern automated methods based on information systems. It is important that the information collected is structured to meet the needs of potential users and stored in a form that allows the use of modern access technologies. Before discussing the effectiveness of FIM, it should be noted that the basic concept of information itself is still not the same. In a pragmatic way, it is a set of messages in the form of an important document for the system. Information can be evaluated not only by volume, but also by various parameters, the most important of which are: timeliness, relevance, value, aging, accuracy, etc. in addition, the information may be clear, probable and accurate. The methods of its reception and processing are different in each case.

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