Rudolph, Lukas and Kuhn, Patrick M. (2018) 'Natural disasters and political participation : evidence from the 2002 and 2013 floods in Germany.', German politics., 27 (1). pp. 1-24.
Abstract
How do natural disasters affect electoral participation? The existing social science literature offers contradictory predictions. A considerable body of research in sociology and psychology suggests that traumatic events can inspire pro-social behaviour, which might increase turnout. Yet, political science has long held that even minor changes to participation costs of low benefit activities can lead to considerable drops in civic engagement. Consequently, natural disasters should reduce electoral participation. We show how these distinct views can be jointly analysed within the Riker–Ordeshook model of voting. This paper then reports results on the impact of the 2002 and 2013 floods in Germany on turnout in federal and state elections in Saxony and Bavaria, conducted few weeks after the floods. Analysing community level turnout data, and drawing on a difference-in-differences framework, we find that flood exposure has a consistent negative effect on turnout. This indicates that the increase in the costs of voting outweighed any increase in political engagement in our case and stands in contrast to findings from developing contexts, where flood management was convincingly linked to electoral participation.
Item Type: | Article |
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Full text: | (AM) Accepted Manuscript Download PDF (2797Kb) |
Status: | Peer-reviewed |
Publisher Web site: | https://doi.org/10.1080/09644008.2017.1287900 |
Publisher statement: | This is an Accepted Manuscript of an article published by Taylor & Francis Group in German Politics on 06/03/2017, available online at: http://www.tandfonline.com/10.1080/09644008.2017.1287900. |
Date accepted: | 06 March 2017 |
Date deposited: | 07 March 2017 |
Date of first online publication: | 06 March 2017 |
Date first made open access: | 06 March 2019 |
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