Multi-level Electoral Accountability in France

The link between economic performance and electoral outcomes has been extensively studied in the economic voting literature. Voters are more likely to reward incumbent if the economy is doing all right. What is more puzzling is the link between institutions and electoral accountability. Powell and Whiten (1993) show that the ‘clarity of responsibility’ principle conditions the impact of economic voting arguing that complex institutional structures blur lines of responsibility and restricts economic voting, and thus electoral accountability (Duch and Stevenson, 1995). In this paper, we investigate new institutional patterns of electoral accountability by focusing on the rules of electoral systems. Based on data collected in France for three different elections (national, municipal and European elections) with three electoral systems (respectively two-rounds majoritarian system, two-rounds list-PR system, PR system), we test whether electoral accountability is strongly or not connected with the complexity of the electoral rule.