T OULOUSE S CHOOL OF E CONOMICS

E CONOMIC E FFECTS OF P OLITICAL I NSTITUTIONS

M2 P UBLIC P OLICY AND D EVELOPMENT

How Does Access to Mass Media Affect

Susceptibility to Vote Buying?
An Empirical Approach

Author: Supervisor:
Stefan P REUSS Michael B ECHER, PhD
stfpreuss@gmail.com
ID: 21911322

06/01/2020
Contents

1 Introduction 2

2 Empirical Estimation 3

2.1 Data . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3

2.2 Cross-Sectional Analysis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5

2.2.1 Empirical Strategy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5

2.2.2 Main Results . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5

2.2.3 Effects by Media Type . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6

2.3 Panel Analysis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7

2.3.1 Empirical Strategy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7

2.3.2 Results . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8

2.3.3 Threats to Identification . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8

3 Research Extension 8

3.1 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8

3.2 Data Requirements . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9

3.3 Empirical Method . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10

3.4 Remaining Caveats . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11

3.4.1 Measurement Error . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11

3.4.2 Effect Channels . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12

3.4.3 Interpretation of Treatment Effects . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12

4 Conclusion 13

Acronyms

ATE average treatment effect

FE fixed effects

ITT intention to treat

LATE local average treatment effect

RDD regression discontinuity design

SPLAT! Signal Propagation, Loss, and Terrain analysis tool

1
1 Introduction

Widespread vote buying poses a grave threat to the functioning of democracies in the developing world. The

provision of money or goods in exchange for electoral support restrains public goods provision [1], limits political

accountability [2], and perpetuates corruption [3]. In consequence, the practice erodes trust in the democracy

and impedes economic growth [4].

In view of the strain that vote buying puts on developing countries, economic literature has taken up the

challenge of identifying its causes. In line with the recent literature on the role of institutions in development,

one may attribute large parts of the cross-country variation to historically rooted differences in the rules and

functioning of the political system [5]. As empirical studies show, changes to the electoral and economical system

[6], as well as to the institutions providing public service delivery [7] therefore represent one potential channel

to diminish the incidence of vote buying.

A second potential channel is to reduce susceptibility of voters at the individual level. This requires analyzing

the conditions under which people are prone to receiving payment for their votes and modifying them accordingly.

Based on the findings of empirical literature, poor, uneducated, young men who reside in a semi-rural area

would be the most vulnerable target. Poverty matters since it increases the relative value of the cash or good they

receive in return for the vote [8]. Less educated individuals tend to be more approving towards vote buying as

they are less aware about its long-term harm [9]. Finally, Larreguy et al. (2016) argue that the area of residence

matters: brokers prefer rural voters who need incentives to turn up, but are still connected well enough to reduce

the cost of monitoring them [10].

This paper attempts to lay the foundation for analyzing the impact on vote buying of another factor; that of

mass media. If one finds that access to mass media does indeed reduce the incidence of vote buying, it would

endow policy makers with a capable tool of fighting its prevalence. In contrast to the factors discussed before,

which are either immutable (location, gender, age) or must be addressed with comprehensive changes (poverty

and education), access to mass media could be extended with direct, cost-effective measures. For example,

provided one finds that radio coverage is beneficial to reduce vote buying, one simple policy suggestion would

be allowing greater radio transmitter strengths as this increases radio coverage at no additional cost to the

government [11].

Existing literature makes ambiguous predictions about the direction of the effect of mass media on vote

buying. One intuitive narrative is that vote buying arises due to a lack of information on the parties. If a voter is

entirely undecided about who to vote for, they might consider the campaign gifts as the best signal available on

the party’s capabilities and vote for the one offering most. By providing the electorate with knowledge about the

performance and alignment of parties via mass media, they may be able to make more educated voting decisions

and reject vote buying [12]. Empirical support for this rationale is provided, for example, by a randomized radio

experiment in India after which treated voters shunned parties that engaged in vote buying [13].

Cruz et al. (2016) offer a counter-argument to this [14]. They refer to the results of an experiment in the

Philippines in which villages were randomly selected to receive radio information on the (ab)use of a fund for

2
public goods provision. Villages which were given the disappointing news on the waste of resources were subject

to more vote buying rather than less. The authors hypothesize that incumbents had to compensate for the loss of

popularity from the radio program with more election gifts. They develop a model which finds that better access

information therefore leads to increased vote buying, contrary to the previous prediction. In a follow-up paper,

Cruz (2019) argues that well-informed and well-connected individuals make a more suitable target for party

brokers, so that within villages one may expect citizens with access to mass media to be more involved in vote

buying than their unconnected neighbors [15].

One reason for the seemingly opposing results of the aforementioned studies is that they may depend on

the local setting. Both use an experimental approach that lends strong support for a causal interpretation, but

produces results that are in many cases not directly transferable to other country contexts. Another caveat should

be expressed about the content of the information, which was in both cases determined by the researchers. If

stations decide independently, they may broadcast less beneficial messages. It therefore remains unanswered

how freely operating media agencies affect attitudes towards and occurrence of vote buying in much of the

developing world.

This paper introduces a non-experimental approach that could help close this knowledge gap. It relies on

existing survey data on Africa, but could also be adopted to other continents. A cross-sectional analysis provide

support for Cruz’ hypothesis: individuals with greater access to mass media are particularly targeted for vote

buying. Also in line with Cruz’ argumentation, extending access in a region appears to increase the incidence

of vote buying there. However, these findings may not be entirely causal. I therefore suggest a regression

discontinuity design (RDD) as a more credible identification strategy, but leave its implementation up to further

research.

The rest of the paper is structured as follows: in section 2, I perform the basic estimations with the available

data under the caveat that the results may not be entirely causal due to endogeneity concerns. In section 3, I

propose an RDD to address these concerns. I explain the motivation, the required data, the methodology, and

remaining caveats. I conclude in section 4.

2 Empirical Estimation

2.1 Data

All data comes from the Afrobarometer survey, which interviews a representative sample of African citizens every

few years about their economic status and their political viewpoints [16]. I mainly use round 5, which was issued

from 2011 to 2013, and additionally include round 3 for the panel analysis, which is from 2005. The fifth round

covers 34 African countries (see Figure 1) while the third comprises 18. I am most interested in the questions on

experiences with vote buying and the consumption of media and include further variables on demography and

political involvement as controls.

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 Figure 1: The extent of vote buying in the survey countries (own illustration)

The question on vote buying is given as “In the last presidential election, did a candidate offer you something,

like food or a gift or money, in return for your vote?”. I convert the responses into a dummy variable taking on 0

for the response ”never” and 1 for all positive responses (“once or twice”, “a few times”, and “often”). This is the

dependent variable in all specifications. As Figure 1 shows, there is large variation in the share of respondents

reporting incidents of vote buying among the survey countries1 . In some Western and Southern African countries,

less than 10% report they received election incentives while in Benin, Kenya, and Uganda, more than 30% do.

Overall, vote buying appears to be present in every survey country at least to some extent.

The main regressor is provided by the responses to four questions on media consumption. These are expressed

as “How often do you get news from the following sources: xxx?”, where the sources are (1) radio, (2) TV, (3)

newspapers, and (4) the internet. Again, I convert the responses into dummy variables taking on 1 for every

respondent who receives information from that source at least once a month. I merge the four resulting dummy

variables into a single one on media consumption which takes on 1 if the respondent consumes at least one mass

medium at least once a month.

1 Note: the island states Cape Verde and Mauritius are also included in the survey, but do not appear on the map. Their share of

respondents reporting vote buying is 6.4% and 1.8%, respectively.

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 The survey offers a wide range of potential control villages. Following the findings of earlier literature on

determinants of vote buying, I use a categorical variable on educational attainment, an index for the poverty

level, an urban/rural-dummy, and country and region fixed effects (FE) to capture institutional differences.

2.2 Cross-Sectional Analysis

2.2.1 Empirical Strategy

I first employ a logistic regression on the cross-sectional data from survey round 5 with the indicator for vote

buying as the dependent variable. The estimation equation is the following2 :

D.votebuyirc =α + β ∗ D.mediairc + γ ∗ ageirc + δ ∗ D.f emaleirc + θ ∗ D.employedirc +

(1)
ζ ∗ C.educationirc + η ∗ povertyirc + ψ ∗ D.ruralirc + φ ∗ Xirc + irc

The main coefficient of interest, β, captures the difference in the likelihood that one has received election

incentives between those getting news from the media and those who do not. To interpret the results as causal

one must assume that the regressor is uncorrelated to the error term. This is a strong assumption since individuals

who consume mass media are very different from those who do not – they are richer, more educated, and more

likely to be employed. While I can hold these differences constant with control variables, additional endogeneity

still remains. For example, certain social groups may be more likely to follow the news while also eschewing vote

buying for cultural reasons. One should therefore understand the results as correlation, not causation.

2.2.2 Main Results

Table 1 presents the result of the logit regression. Column (1) largely confirms the empirical predictions for

the control variables: young age, male sex, high poverty and a rural location are all associated with a higher

likelihood of reporting experiences with vote buying. The indicator for getting news from any mass medium is,

perhaps surprisingly, significantly positively correlated with the probability of having experienced vote buying. A

person who gets news from mass media is, all else being equal, 33.2% more likely to be subject to vote buying. If

one compares only individuals in the same region by including FEs, the size of the coefficient decreases but the

strong significance remains. This is in line with the predictions by Cruz [15].

As Cruz argues, consumers of mass media are targeted for vote buying because they are often also the ones

who have larger social networks and a greater interest in politics. To test whether these factors drive the result, I

include three additional indicators: one on whether the respondent says they discuss politics at home, one for

having voted in the last election, and one for being an active community group member or leader. As column (3)

shows, all controls are positively significant and the size of the coefficient indeed shrinks to 16.5%. Nevertheless,

it stays significant on the 0.1-percent level, indicating that the positive correlation with media consumption

comes not only from greater political interest and standing in the community.

2 The subsets i, r, and c stand for individuals, regions, and countries, respectively. The prefixes D. and C. signal dummy variables and

continuous variables, respectively. The vector X represents additional controls.

5
 Table 1: Cross-Sectional Analysis of the Determinants of Vote Buying

(1) (2) (3)

Dep.var: Indicator for vote buying Logit Logit Logit
Indicator for getting news from any medium 0.332∗∗∗ 0.256∗∗∗ 0.165∗∗
(0.0545) (0.0582) (0.0592)
Age in years -0.00761∗∗∗ -0.00426∗∗∗ -0.00729∗∗∗
(0.00103) (0.00118) (0.00125)
Indicator for female respondent -0.216∗∗∗ -0.232∗∗∗ -0.185∗∗∗
(0.0295) (0.0321) (0.0324)
Indicator for being employed 0.101∗∗ 0.0726∗ 0.0276
(0.0316) (0.0366) (0.0370)
Indicator for primary education -0.269∗∗∗ 0.0424 0.00241
(0.0410) (0.0496) (0.0500)
Indicator for secondary education -0.257∗∗∗ 0.0174 -0.0474
(0.0431) (0.0528) (0.0533)
Indicator for post-secondary education -0.0515 0.141∗ 0.0275
(0.0553) (0.0649) (0.0656)
Lived Poverty Index (0–5; higher=poorer) 0.263∗∗∗ 0.224∗∗∗ 0.214∗∗∗
(0.0152) (0.0192) (0.0194)
Indicator for rural HH 0.313∗∗∗ 0.0189 0.000431
(0.0315) (0.0402) (0.0405)
Indicator for discussing politics 0.371∗∗∗
(0.0371)
Indicator for having voted in last election 0.317∗∗∗
(0.0400)
Indicator for a community group member 0.232∗∗∗
(0.0450)
Country FE 3 3
Region FE 3 3
Constant -2.327∗∗∗ -0.620∗ -0.937∗∗∗
(0.101) (0.259) (0.262)
Observations 49268 46236 46236
Standard errors in parentheses. Significance levels: ∗ p < 0.05, ∗∗ p < 0.01, ∗∗∗ p < 0.001

2.2.3 Effects by Media Type

Aside from the overall mass media effect, it may also be interesting to see which type of mass media drives the

positive correlation. To do so, one can run either run equation 1 separately for radio, TV, internet, and newspaper

each, or include all four indicator variables i jointly:

D.votebuyirc = α + β1 ∗ D.radioirc + β2 ∗ D.tvirc + β3 ∗ D.internetirc + β4 ∗ D.newspaperirc + φ ∗ Xirc + irc (2)

The results for the estimation with single media coefficients are largely similar to table 1 and are thus

not reported here. The results of including all four (equation 2) are reported in the truncated table 2. When

interpreting these findings, one must keep in mind that the there is strong multicollinearity between the regressors

– a person who reads the newspaper probably also has an interest in listening to news on the radio. Consequently,

the four coefficients lose some significance compared to their joint indicator. Nevertheless, the coefficients for

radio and TV news remain sizeable and significant at the 5-percent level.

These findings hold valuable insights for the later research extension. They show that there is not only a

6
 Table 2: Separating the Effects of Different Media

(1)
Dep.var: Indicator for vote buying Logit
Indicator for getting news from the radio 0.116∗ (0.0493)
Indicator for getting news from the TV 0.113∗ (0.0443)
Indicator for getting news from the newspaper 0.0455 (0.0445)
Indicator for getting news from the internet 0.0930 (0.0515)
Controls 3
Country FE 3
Region FE 3
Constant -0.985∗∗∗ (0.263)
Observations 45339
Standard errors in parentheses. Significance levels: ∗ p < 0.05, ∗∗ p < 0.01, ∗∗∗ p < 0.001

positive correlation of general mass media consumption with vote buying, but also one with the separate types.

For the following panel data analysis and the research strategy proposed in section 3, it is sensible to to restrict

the analysis to measuring the effect of a certain mass medium. Based on the results in table 1, one could focus

either on radio or TV as they appear to be the most important media for the targeting of vote buying. Since a

lack of literacy and electricity limits access to print media, television, and the internet in many poor countries, I

choose to look only at the effect of radio in the following analyses.

2.3 Panel Analysis

2.3.1 Empirical Strategy

For the second empirical strategy, I create a panel dataset by adding survey round 3 to round 5. This enables me

to perform an FE regression, which uses only variation over time within observations rather than that across

observations. Since I do not observe the same individuals over time, I pool data on the regional level and compare

changes over time in those 97 regions in 11 countries which were contained in both survey rounds. After pooling,

all previous indicator variables must be interpreted as the share of respondents who responded to this question

with the equivalent of “yes”, given in percentage points by region. The estimation equation is as follows:

∆votebuyrt = α + β ∗ ∆radiort + γ ∗ ∆ruralrt + δ ∗ ∆employedrt + φ ∗ i.countryr + rt (3)

The coefficient of interest β shows the effect of regional changes over time in average radio consumption on

changes in average vote buying. Due to modifications to the surveys, I can only add controls on the change in the

share of rural residents and that in the share of employed people. These serve to hold constant other economical

developments in the region that may explain the radio diffusion while also affecting changes in the incidence of

vote buying. I also add country fixed effects to account for national variation in vote buying over time.

7
2.3.2 Results

Ex ante, one may expect that low variation in the main variables and the drastic reduction in the sample size

make it unlikely to find any significant results. If anything, one would think that better information would

reduce the incidence of vote buying. Quite the contrary, the coefficient on the effect of changes in radio access

on changes in the share of people who reported vote buying is positive and strongly significant. In a region in

which the share of people who get news from the radio increases by 1 percentage point over the 6-8 years from

round 3 to round 5, the share of residents who report vote buying is raised by 0.54 percentage points on average.

One potential way to understand this positive link is that incumbent parties may compensate for the harm in

popularity caused by the news on mass media with more vote buying.

Table 3: Panel Analysis of Regional Changes in Vote Buying

(1)
Dep.var: ∆ in the share of people who reported vote buying Fixed Effects
∆ in the share of people who get news from the radio 0.544∗∗∗ (0.147)
∆ in the share of people living in a rural area 0.0715 (0.0424)
∆ in the share of employed people -0.233∗∗ (0.0781)
Country FE 3
Constant 0.0680 (0.0395)
Observations 97
∗
Standard errors in parentheses. Significance levels: p < 0.05, ∗∗ p < 0.01, ∗∗∗ p < 0.001
Note: Unit of observation in this estimation are regions, not individuals.

2.3.3 Threats to Identification

The FE estimation has the advantage of eliminating all bias caused by time-invariant unobserved effects. This

helps alleviate many of the concerns of the previous cross-sectional regression concerning pre-existing differences

in cultural, economic, and political factors. Nevertheless, FE is still flawed if changes in the explanatory variable

are related to variation that has a direct effect on the dependent variable. This is easily conceivable here: changes

in local attitudes could explain both an increased media consumption and an increase in vote buying without

there being a causal effect of the former on the latter. The following chapter will discuss how to deal with this

endogeneity issue and propose a strategy for the identification of a causal effect.

3 Research Extension

3.1 Introduction

To convincingly identify a causal relation, one therefore needs to find a (quasi-)random source of variation in

mass media consumption. The arguably “cleanest” way of doing so is with an experimental study that randomly

assigns access to media information. However, as such studies require extensive financial resources even if

conducted on a small scale, this does not present a viable option for me.

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 A feasible alternative is the use of an RDD, which compares locations just inside coverage areas with those

just outside. This approach relies on the assumption that apart from access to radio, there are no meaningful

differences between villages just inside and just outside coverage zones. In general, this is unlikely to hold since

radio stations place their transmitters strategically to maximize their potential audience. Locations just inside the

coverage will therefore be more populous and might differ in characteristics that affect their interest in listening

to the radio, such as wealth and political interest.

Fortunately, recent economic literature has come across a source of exogenous variation in radio access: the

elevation profile of the area. Gaps in mountainous areas permit radio waves to travel to some distant locations

but not to others. While the decision on the location of the radio mast certainly depends on nearby areas, it is

are arguably unaffected by those “coverage streaks” to distant places. Therefore, it is as good as random whether

a location lies at the inside or at the outside of the border of a streak.

The use of variation in radio and TV signals through elevation levels has been pioneered in a study on

social capital investment in Indonesia by Olsen [17]. The strategy has since been adapted and applied to

different contexts, such as the use of propaganda in the Rwandan genocide [18]. Walsh [11] further refined the

methodology in a study on development outcomes in Ghana. Walsh’s paper serves as an inspiration for much

of what follows. While I do not add anything new to the literature with using an existing empirical strategy, I

demonstrate the promise it holds for applying it to a wider range of hitherto underexplored questions.

3.2 Data Requirements

Comparing respondents on both sides of the border of the coverage streak requires precise information on their

location. Thankfully, the Afrobarometer survey grants access to GPS data on respondents upon request [16]. I

therefore solicit geo-coded data for round 3 and 53 .

The more cumbersome part of the procedure is the computation of radio coverage maps. For most countries,

the location and strength of radio transmitters can be obtained from government sources such as the national

telecommunications authority. I take data on elevation levels from the Shuttle Radar Topography Mission [19],

which is a worldwide elevation map at three arc seconds (roughly 90m×90m). I feed this data into the Signal

Propagation, Loss, and Terrain analysis tool (SPLAT!), a program to calculate the effective radio coverage strength

from the Federal Communications Commission [11].

Figure 2 from Walsh [11] illustrates the result of such a computation. The left panel indicates the location of

an example transmitter with a red dot and highlights elevated areas with brighter colors. The right panel then

displays the radio coverage strength in the surrounding area as calculated by SPLAT!. All places with coverage of

at least 60 decibel-microvolt per meter (dBµV/m) are expected to have a stable connection. This holds mostly for

the territory immediately surrounding the transmitter, which was presumably its intended target area. However,

coverage also extends in some streaks towards far-away places, for example in the North-West and South-East.

These provide the basis for my analysis.

3 RDD can also be performed on a cross-sectional dataset. However, including two survey rounds increases efficiency and could be used to

identify how quickly changes in coverage have an effect.

9
 I perform the computation of the coverage areas for 2005 and 2012, corresponding to the year of the survey

rounds4 . I then conflate the two main variables on vote-buying and radio coverage into a grid-based map. For

each tile, they indicate the share of respondents reporting vote buying and the share of the land receiving radio

coverage (as defined by having a connection stronger than 60 dBµV/m).

Figure 2: Example radio coverage strength computation (source: Walsh [11])

3.3 Empirical Method

I need to restrict my analysis to those areas in which the location of the coverage border is arguably random.

To do so, I follow the three criteria used by Walsh [11]: (i) the coverage-land ratio shall be low (ii) it shall be

located far from any transmitter (iii) nearby elevation changes shall be small. The first two criteria are selected

to guarantee that the radio waves reaching the area are indeed only a by-product and not targeted by the station.

The third makes sure that there is no direct effect of local elevation levels on villages inside the coverage area. I

base the choice of the parameters for each criterion on earlier studies and adapt it to my own data.5

The result of the coverage-land ratio computation for an example station in Ghana is shown in Figure 3a. The

area defined as receiving random coverage based on the three aforementioned criteria is presented in blue in

Figure 3b. The empirical analysis compares locations in the blue area with those in the white area at the borders

between the two. The estimation equation is then:

votebuylt = α + β ∗ D.coveragelt + γ ∗ Xlt + f (distlt ) + lt (4)

where l stands for the grid tiles and t for the time period. The dependent variable is the share of respondents

in the tile at that time period who say they have received vote buying. The main explanatory variable is the

indicator for coverage, which takes on 1 for locations on the interior of the coverage streak border. Its coefficient

β then reports the causal effect of radio coverage on vote buying. Additional controls could include the elevation
4 Round 5 was rolled out from 2011 until 2013. I should choose the year 2011, 2012 or 2013 depending on when it was implemented in

that country, to be more precise.

5 Walsh [11] uses (i) a coverage-land ratio of below 0.2, (ii) a distance of at least 10km, and (iii) no more than fifty meters of elevation

changes in a 9km-radius.

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 Figure 3: Identifying random coverage areas (source: Walsh [11])

(a) Coverage-land ratio computation (b) Random and non-random variation

level and the distance to the nearest road. A flexible polynomial of the distance to the nearest coverage streak

border distit controls for any direct effect of location relative to the streak. Only tiles within a certain, predefined

distance from the border are included in the estimation.

3.4 Remaining Caveats

3.4.1 Measurement Error

The gravest issue that arises when studying vote buying is the inability to accurately measure its occurrence.

Most respondents are either aware that offering electoral gift is a criminal offense, or at least recognize that the

practice is frowned upon. They also often suspect that surveys are not truly anonymized, that they are conducted

by government bodies and that “wrong” responses may later be used against them. In consequence, people tend

to underreport vote buying when asked directly [20].

This poses a problem in two ways: first, it will systematically underestimate the incidence of vote buying.

Second, if measurement bias is distributed heterogeneously, it also invalidates the estimates of the mass media

effect. For example, hearing about vote buying on the radio may encourage people to be frank about their own

experiences with it. One would then erroneously assume that mass media increases vote buying, though it really

just increases the likelihood of people admitting to it. This may explain the positive effects found in section 2.3.

Changes to the survey questions could partly mitigate social desirability bias. One way to hide sensitive

topics within surveys is to ask respondents not about their own experience, but that of close friends. Since they

would not incriminate themselves with “bad” answers, they might be more inclined to answer truthfully. Another

method to address sensitive topics is using a list experiment. For this, the sample is randomly subdivided into

two groups. One is presented a number of yes/no questions, while the other is presented the same amount

of questions plus the sensitive question (here about their experiences with vote buying). Instead of asking

respondents to answer every question separately, they need to state only how many of them they would answer

11
“yes” to. The incidence of vote buying is then calculated by subtracting the number of reported “yes”-answers in

the group without the vote-buying question from that in the group with the vote-buying question.

As these methods would require rolling out a new survey, they do not provide a realistic option for me.

Alternatively, I could use the existing data and correct for the overall tendency of the respondent to answer

“socially desirable” rather than truthfully. One indicator for this could be if their reported income levels are far

higher than their reported job would suggest. Another valuable information could be derived in the Afrobarometer

from the question “Who do you think sponsored this survey?” - if they suspect that the government is behind it

(which most people did), they might be inclined to give more positive answers and underreport vote buying.

3.4.2 Effect Channels

Another weakness of the survey question is that it only asks whether they had been offered a bribe for their vote.

However, successful vote buying takes not one but three steps: (i) receiving the offer, (ii) accepting it, and (iii)

voting for the party which made the offer. In a world with perfect information, election brokers target those

who are most willing to accept their gift and vote accordingly. If targeting perfectly identified interested vote

sellers, measuring the offers would be sufficient to measure the incidence vote buying. In reality, though, election

brokers do not have that information. They therefore offer bribes to many who either refuse them or accept them

but still do not vote accordingly.

It follows that the true effect of access to mass media on the susceptibility of voters to vote buying would

likely be underestimated if one only looks at the offers. Those who have more access to information might be

(i) less targeted, (ii) less willing to accept, and (iii) more likely to renege after accepting. Of this, only the first

would be measured. Blattmann et al. [4] provide empirical evidence of the diverging effect between these steps.

Measuring the effect of an anti-vote-buying program in Uganda on both (i) offers for vote buying and (iii) voting

outcomes, they find that only the latter is affected by the program. Voters were less likely to elect parties that

engaged in vote buying, but the parties did not change their illicit campaigning practices. This corroborates the

argument that vote buying may effectively be reduced through channel (ii) and (iii), even if parties still target

voters to the same extent as before (or more).

To find out whether the respondent accepted the election incentives they were offered, one could add a

question on this to the survey. Since this question is even more sensitive than the existing one, it would need

to be presented in a way as mentioned before. Figuring out whether the respondent actually changed their

voting behavior because of the election gift is even trickier due to secrecy of the ballot. The most straightforward

solution would be not asking people on the individual level on their vote, but instead looking at changes in the

actual election results disaggregated at the local level.

3.4.3 Interpretation of Treatment Effects

Lastly, one must be mindful of what sort of treatment effect one is estimating when interpreting the results.

The use of respondent’s media consumption in section 2 is different to looking at coverage in general, since

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not everyone who has access to mass media also uses it. One may understand the effect for the former as a

local average treatment effect (LATE) of media coverage, which is only valid for compliers. In the RDD strategy,

villages with radio coverage are given treatment but do not necessarily use it, i.e. listen to it. Therefore, one

may understand the RDD effect as an intention to treat (ITT) effect of media consumption on vote buying – or

alternatively, as the average treatment effect (ATE) of media coverage.

Importantly, the RDD is still local, but in a spatial way rather than regarding compliance. All effects would be

valid only for locations in the random-coverage-zone. This zone mostly comprises semi-rural areas, as they must

be in proximity to an urban area that warrants the construction of a radio transmitter, but still far enough away

to be considered as receiving the coverage randomly. As vote buying occurs to a stronger extent in these locations

[10], the identified effect is probably exaggerated if one interprets it for the country as a whole. This represents

a general drawback of the RDD method that could only be fixed by using a different identification strategy.

4 Conclusion

Vote buying is a scourge for fledgling democracies in the developing world. The search for a remedy inevitably

leads to one poorly understood determinant: the access to information via mass media. Previous literature makes

two seemingly opposing hypotheses: one asserts that mass media alleviates vote buying while the other argues

that it worsens it.

My empirical analysis finds evidence for the second hypothesis. A simple ordinary logit regression points to

a positive correlation between the news consumption of a voter and the probability of being targeted for vote

buying. When looking at changes in the consumption of mass media in regions over time, the same positive

correlation can be found. This could be some indication for the compensatory mechanism explained by Cruz.

However, these findings far from conclude the debate. Properly establishing a causal relationship requires a

credible identification strategy. For this purpose, I outline an RDD strategy that would be fully implementable

with publicly accessible data. While this method would alleviate endogeneity concerns, important caveats

regarding the measurement of vote buying remain. I suggest some ways to address these in my study, but

acknowledge that further research is necessary to fully address these concerns.

Pending the results of the RDD strategy, policy makers in developing countries can gain important lessons on

the use or disuse of extending mass media to wider parts of the country. Finding a positive effect would be in

line with growing literature on the economic benefits and rise in democratic accountability thanks to mass media,

while identifying a negative effect would connect to studies on the risks it poses to democratic elections. Since

the information and communication technology sector depends heavily on public investment and government

regulation, developing countries have the ability to make practical use of the research findings to support their

democracy. In conclusion, the information effect on vote buying remains a relevant topic and one can only hope

that future studies will lift the fog that it is currently surrounded in.

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