In clientelistic environments, voters want to know which politicians are most likely to deliver on targeted benefits. We argue that in these contexts, voters use their social proximity with candidates as heuristics to inform vote choice. To test our theory, we rely on local naming conventions to reconstruct family networks spanning one whole city in the Philippines and assess blood and marriage links between voters and local candidates. We then collect survey data on pre-election candidate leanings and actual voting behavior of 894 randomly drawn voters. We show that the degrees of separation between voters and candidates explain not only aggregate electoral outcomes, as previous studies have found, but also individual vote choice, controlling for pre-election leanings. We demonstrate that this is because private inducements are channeled through family networks. These findings highlight the electoral importance of social proximity with politicians as an information shortcut when voters are choosing whom to support at the polls.
AdidaC. L. (2015). Do African voters favor coethnics? Evidence from a survey experiment in Benin. Journal of Experimental Political Science, 2(1), 1–11. https://doi.org/10.1017/xps.2014.26
2.
AndayaB. W. (1993). Political development between the sixteenth and eighteenth centuries. In TarlingN. (Ed.), The Cambridge History of Southeast Asia (pp. 402–459). Cambridge University Press. https://doi.org/10.1017/chol9780521355056.009
3.
AndersonB. (1988). Cacique democracy and the Philippines: Origins and dreams (pp. 3–31). New Left Review.
4.
ArulampalamW.DasguptaS.DhillonA.DuttaB. (2009). Electoral goals and center-state transfers: A theoretical model and empirical evidence from India. Journal of Development Economics, 88(1), 103–119. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jdeveco.2008.01.001
5.
AspinallE.(2014). When brokers betray: Clientelism, social networks, and electoral politics in Indonesia. Critical Asian Studies, 46. https://doi.org/10.1080/14672715.2014.960706
6.
AspinallE.DettmanS.WarburtonE. (2011). When religion trumps ethnicity: A regional election case study from Indonesia. South East Asian Research, 19(1), 27-58. https://doi.org/10.5367/sear.2011.0034
7.
AspinallE.,SukjamatiM. (2016). Electoral dynamics in Indonesia: Money politics, patronage and clientelism at the grassroots. National University of SingaporeNUS Press.
8.
AtkinsonJ.AllenH.RavanillaN. (2015). Building inclusive Democracies in ASEAN. Manila: Anvil chapter pork & typhoons: The influence of political connections on disaster response (pp. 74-96).
9.
AuyeroJ. (2000). The logic of clientelism in Argentina: An ethnographic account (pp. 55-81). ” Latin American research review.
10.
BlaydesL. (2010). Elections and distributive politics in mubarak’s Egypt. Cambridge University Press.
11.
BondR. M.FarissC. J.JonesJ. J.KramerA. D.MarlowC.SettleJ. E.FowlerJ. H. (2013). A 61-million-person experiment in social influence and political mobilization. Nature, 489(7415), 295–298. https://doi.org/10.1038/nature11421
12.
BrolloF.NanniciniT. (2012). Tying your enemy’s hands in close races: The politics of federal transfers in Brazil. American Political Science Review, 106(4), 742–761. https://doi.org/10.1017/s0003055412000433
13.
CacioppoJ. T.FowlerJ. H.ChristakisN. A. (2009). Alone in the crowd: The structure and spread of loneliness in a large social network. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 97(6), 977–991. https://doi.org/10.1037/a0016076
14.
CarlinR.SingerM.ZechmeisterE. (2015). The Latin American voter: Pursuing representation and accountability in challenging contexts. University of Michigan Press.
15.
CarlsonE. (2015). Ethnic voting and accountability in Africa: A choice experiment in Uganda. World Politics, 67(2), 353–385. https://doi.org/10.1017/s0043887115000015
16.
ChandraK. (2004). Why ethnic parties succeed. Cambridge University Press.
17.
ChristakisN.,FowlerJ. (2007). The spread of obesity in a large social network over 32 years. New England Journal of Medicine, 357, 370–379. https://doi.org/10.1056/nejmsa066082.
18.
ChristakisN.,FowlerJ. (2008). The collective dynamics of smoking in a large social network. New England Journal of Medicine, 358, 2249–2258. https://doi.org/10.1056/nejmsa0706154
CruzC.LabonneJ.QuerubÍnP. (2017). Politician family networks and electoral outcomes: Evidence from the Philippines. American Economic Review, 107(10), 3006–3037. https://doi.org/10.1257/aer.20150343
21.
FafchampsM.,LabonneJ. (2017). Politician family networks and electoral outcomes: Evidence from the Philippines. Journal of Law, Economics, and Organization, 33(2), 268–300. https://doi.org/10.1093/jleo/ewx001.
FowlerJ.ChristakisN.RouxS.RouxD. (2009). Dynamic spread of happiness in a large social network: longitudinal analysis of the framingham heart study social network. Bmj: British Medical Journal, 338(7685), 23–27.
24.
FowlerJ. H.HeaneyM. T.NickersonD. W.PadgettJ. F.SinclairB. (2011). Causality in political networks. American Politics Research, 39(2), 437–480. https://doi.org/10.1177/1532673x10396310.
25.
GerberA.GreenD.LarimerC. (2008). Social pressure and voter turnout: Evidence from a large-scale field experiment. American Political Science Review, 102(1), 34–48. https://doi.org/10.1017/s000305540808009x.
26.
HickenA. (2019). Strong patronage, weak parties: The case for electoral system redesign in the Philippines (pp. 27–40). Anvil Press Manila, Philippines chapter Why and how electoral systems shape development outcomes.
27.
HickenA.LeiderS.RavanillaN.YangD. (2018). Temptation in vote-selling: Evidence from a field experiment in the Philippines. Journal of Development Economics, 131(1), 1–14. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jdeveco.2017.10.012
28.
HuckfeldtR.,SpragueJ. (1987). Networks in context: The social flow of political information. The American Political Science Review, 81(4), 1197–1216. https://doi.org/10.2307/1962585
29.
HuckfeldtR.,SpragueJ. (1991). Discussant effects on vote choice: intimacy, structure, and interdependence. The Journal of Politics, 53(01), 122. https://doi.org/10.2307/2131724.
30.
HutchcroftP. D.,RocamoraJ. (2003). Strong demands and weak institutions: The origins and evolution of the democratic deficit in the Philippines. Journal of East Asian Studies, 3(2), 259–292. https://doi.org/10.1017/s1598240800001363
31.
KitscheltH. (2000). Linkages between citizens and politicians in democratic politics. Comparative Political Studies, 33(6/7), 845–879. https://doi.org/10.1177/001041400003300607
32.
KitscheltH.,WilkinsonS. (2007). Citizen-politician linkages: An introduction. In KitscheltH.WilkinsonS. (Eds.), Patrons, Clients and Policies: Patterns of Democratic Accountability and Political Competition. Cambridge University Press.
33.
LandeC. (1965). Leaders, factions, and parties. Southeast asia studies. Yale University.
34.
LarreguyH. (2013). “Monitoring political brokers: Evidence from clientelistic networks in Mexico.”Working Paper.
35.
LarreguyH.,MonteiroJ. (2014). Media networks and political accountability: Evidence from radio networks in Brazil. Working Paper.
36.
LupiaA.,McCubbinsM. (1998). The democratic dilemma: Can citizens learn what they need to know?Cambridge University Press.
37.
McClurgS.WadeM. LWright-PhillipsM. V (2012). Gender, social networks, and voting behavior.
38.
MutzD. C. (2002). Cross-cutting social networks: testing democratic theory in practice. The American Political Science Review, 96(1), 111–126. https://doi.org/10.1017/s0003055402004264.
39.
NickersonD. W. (2008). Is voting contagious? Evidence from two field experiments. The American Political Science Review, 102(1), 49–57. https://doi.org/10.1017/s0003055408080039.
40.
PadgettJ.,PowellW. (1993). The emergence of organizations and markets. Princeton University Press.
41.
RavanillaN.(2019). Strong patronage, weak parties: The case for electoral system redesign in the Philippines (pp. 162–181). Anvil Press Manila. Philippines chapter The multimember plurality system in the Philippines & its implications.
42.
RavanillaN.2021. “Replication data for voting in clientelistic social networks: Evidence from the Philippines. https://doi.org/10.7910/DVN/QBJLRO
43.
RavanillaN.HaimD.AllenH. (2021). Brokers, social networks, reciprocity, and clientelism. American Journal of Political Science. https://doi.org/10.1111/ajps.12604.
44.
SchmidtS.GuastiL.LandC.ScottJ. (1977). Friends, followers, and factions: A reader in political clientelism. University of California Press.
SidelJ. T. (1999). Capital, coercion, and crime. Stanford University Press.
47.
Sole-OlleA.,Sorribas-NavarroP. (2008). “Does partisan alignment affect the electoral reward of intergovernmental transfers?” Working papers 2008/2. Institut d’Economia de Barcelona (IEB).
48.
StithornT. (2012). Political engagement and participation of Thai citizens: the rural–urban disparity. Contemporary Politics, 18(1), 87–108.
49.
StokesS. C. (2005). Perverse accountability: A formal model of machine politics with evidence from Argentina. American Political Science Review, 99(3), 315–325. https://doi.org/10.1017/s0003055405051683
50.
StokesS.DunningT.NazarenoM.BruscoV. (2013). Brokers, voters, and clientelism: The puzzle of distributive politics. Cambridge University Press.
51.
SzwarcbergM. (2009). Making local democracy: Political machines, clientelism, and social networks in Argentina. PhD Thesis, University of Chicago.
52.
TancangcoL. (1992). The anatomy of electoral fraud: Concrete bases for electoral reforms. MLAGM.
53.
WantchekonL. (2003). Clientelism and voting behavior: evidence from a field experiment in Benin. World Politics, 55(3), 399–422. https://doi.org/10.1353/wp.2003.0018
54.
WurfelD. (1991). Filipino politics: Development and decay. Cornell University Press.
Supplementary Material
Please find the following supplemental material available below.
For Open Access articles published under a Creative Commons License, all supplemental material carries the same license as the article it is associated with.
For non-Open Access articles published, all supplemental material carries a non-exclusive license, and permission requests for re-use of supplemental material or any part of supplemental material shall be sent directly to the copyright owner as specified in the copyright notice associated with the article.
