Ethnic Voting and Accountability in Africa: A Choice Experiment in Uganda

Elizabeth Carlson

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

155 Scopus citations

Abstract

The strong support that African presidents retain among voters of their own ethnicity, despite clear evidence of shirking and corruption, has prompted numerous empirical investigations into whether an incumbent's ethnicity or performance is more important to African voters. The model of vote choice underlying almost all of these studies is additive and implies that either coethnicity or good performance can increase a candidate's vote share. However, there is little theoretical justification for such a model. In the dominant theory of ethnic voting in Africa, coethnicity is a signal of better outcomes, indicating that ethnicity and performance are not separate considerations. Using an experiment that is designed to determine how Ugandan voters make choices, the author shows that the effects of coethnicity and good performance interact: neither attribute increases support for a candidate in the absence of the other. Though previous analyses indicate that, all else being equal, voters always prefer coethnics, this study demonstrates that coethnics only have an advantage when they are not shirkers. Additionally, though previous studies indicate that voters always prefer good performers, this analysis shows that voters are indifferent to the performance of non-coethnic candidates. The article provides evidence that this pattern is in fact a result of voters' beliefs that they will only receive future goods from coethnics, making a demonstrated ability to provide such goods relevant for the electability of coethnic candidates, but not for non-coethnics. Since a large number of African voters do not share the ethnicity of their incumbent, this finding has troubling implications for accountability of African leaders.

Original languageEnglish (US)
Pages (from-to)353-385
Number of pages33
JournalWorld Politics
Volume67
Issue number2
DOIs
StatePublished - Apr 1 2015

All Science Journal Classification (ASJC) codes

  • Sociology and Political Science
  • Political Science and International Relations

Fingerprint

Dive into the research topics of 'Ethnic Voting and Accountability in Africa: A Choice Experiment in Uganda'. Together they form a unique fingerprint.

Cite this