Abstract Prior research on election deposit refunds has often focused on national-level elections or used broad candidate classifications. This paper provides new evidence from the local level in Taiwan’s single non-transferable vote council elections, where party institutionalization is high. Using a regression discontinuity design, the paper finds that receiving a refund increases the probability of re-contesting by 4 percentage points. Although the main effect is not robust across specifications, we further examine heterogeneity across candidates’ gender and party affiliation. The results indicate that the positive and significant effect of refunds on re-contesting is concentrated among independent candidates. These findings suggest that election deposit refunds help mitigate disparities in party resources, thereby lowering barriers to re-entry into electoral competition.
The impact of politically irrelevant events on government responsibility attribution and political support has long intrigued political science scholars. This study examines whether non-political events cause attribution errors, focusing on the dramatic victories of Japanese athletes winning their first and second gold medals in judo, a key Olympic sport for Japan. Using data from 1,347 Japanese participants surveyed before and after these victories, we estimate the sharp average treatment effect and conduct extensive robustness checks, including unexpected events during survey design (UESD). Our findings indicate that these medal victories had no measurable effect on political support, suggesting that voters can differentiate between external sporting successes and political accountability. These results underscore the context-specific nature of how such events influence political attitudes.
This study proposes an integrative typology of popular support for democracy by combining acceptance of democracy, rejection of authoritarianism, and understanding of democracy. Applying the typology to waves 5 (2005-2008) and 7 (2017-2022) of the World Values Survey, the study reassesses the cultural legitimacy of democracy across 30 countries in five regions. Empirically, it reveals that public support for democracy has significantly weakened over the last two decades, especially in non-Western countries. Analytically, it shows that additional qualifications for democratic citizenship demonstrate relations between citizens' support for democracy and the level of liberal democracy, partially confirming the congruence thesis of political culture. Substantially, these results suggest that democratic backsliding and authoritarian change are more severe and rapid in non-Western countries than in Western democracies.
To what extent are procedural evaluations among migrants associated with democratic institutional exposure? This study examines ethnic Korean Chinese migrants (Joseonjok) in South Korea who were raised under China's authoritarian system yet participate in Korean local elections. Using an original survey with an embedded vignette experiment, the analysis draws on naturally occurring variation in cumulative electoral participation to evaluate its association with procedural evaluations. Individuals reporting higher levels of participation assign more favourable evaluations to participatory and representative decision rules and impose larger penalties on non-participatory procedures. These patterns are observed consistently across measures of legitimacy, fairness, trust, and acceptance. The findings suggest that electoral participation is associated with sharper procedural differentiation among migrants exposed to contrasting institutional contexts, providing insight into how political attitudes may vary across regime environments.
While studies based on the civic voluntarism model generally suggest that stronger party identification increases electoral participation, other studies report mixed findings on the relationship between partisan strength and voter turnout. This study argues that the participatory effect of party identification depends on whether voters' partisan identity is consistent with the party affiliation of their preferred candidate. Drawing on conflicted voter theory, we argue that when voters identify with one party but prefer a candidate nominated by another party, the psychological costs generated by betrayal aversion reduce their likelihood of voting. Using pooled survey data from the Taiwan Election and Democratization Study (TEDS) for Taiwan's presidential elections from 2008 to 2024, our binary logistic regression results support this argument. This study contributes to the literature by showing that conflicted voter status should be incorporated into future studies of voter turnout. It also suggests that political parties should pay closer attention to conflicted voters in closely contested elections, because turnout differences within a small segment of the electorate can have notable political consequences.
This paper investigates the contamination effect in Japan's mixed-member majoritarian (MMM) electoral system by examining whether the presence of a party's candidate in a single-member district (SMD) increases its vote share in the proportional representation (PR) tier. While mixed systems are designed to combine the benefits of majoritarian and proportional rules, scholars have debated whether these systems operate independently across tiers or whether contamination occurs. Using panel data from Diet elections in Japan between 2013 and 2025, I analyse how the changing candidacy status for Japanese parties impacted their PR vote share. The results from propensity score-weighted two-way fixed effects models indicate a significant contamination effect for some parties: minor parties tend to gain higher PR vote shares in districts where they field SMD candidates, creating incentives to nominate non-viable candidates. Also, candidates with prior political or professional experience were more effective in boosting their party's PR vote share. This study highlights how the interplay between tiers in MMM systems affects party strategies and disproportionality, and underscores the strategic dilemma faced by parties under Japan's increasingly fragmented party system.
With Interpretation No. 748 officially recognizing the legality of same-sex marriage in Taiwan in 2017, a referendum war between pro- and anti-LGBT groups began the following year. This article aims to analyse how Taiwan, which has long been considered LGBT-friendly, suddenly became a place where anti-LGBT sentiments surged. We argue that anti-LGBT groups successfully aroused doubts among the Taiwanese public about same-sex marriage by highlighting traditional stereotypes of gender roles and the importance of reproduction for family succession. Furthermore, by emphasizing the potential impacts on social order caused by same-sex marriage, they successfully persuaded supporters of the Democratic Progressive Party to vote against same-sex marriage. Our hypotheses are further confirmed through an analysis of the post-referendum World Values Survey data.
In an era marked by pervasive political distrust, individuals exhibit a spectrum of responses, ranging from political disengagement to assertive forms of participation, often expressed through populist movements. Drawing on data from the Japanese Electoral Studies (JES) between 2009 and 2024, this study integrates attitudinal and behavioural measures to examine why some individuals retreat from political life while others remain politically engaged under similar conditions of distrust. Focusing on economic insecurity and nationalist sentiment as moderating grievances, the analysis shows that nationalist sentiment is consistently linked to both populist attitudes and electoral participation, whereas economic insecurity displays more limited and context-dependent associations. Overall, the findings indicate that identity-based grievances are more consistently linked to politically engaged responses to distrust than material concerns. This study provides novel insights into how political discontent is expressed in contemporary Japan, demonstrating that its patterns of populist engagement, particularly those associated with nationalism, exhibit important parallels with trends observed in other advanced democracies.
What repressive strategies do dictators use to maintain regime stability as anti-government movements rise under conditions of economic growth? We investigate the changing function of authoritarian repression and the ways in which dictators accommodated rising opposition during Taiwan's period of authoritarian rule. Using time-series data spanning 39 years (1949-1988), this article analyses the relationship between economic development, opposition movements, and shifts in repression strategies under the Kuomintang (KMT) rule. Drawing on historical documents and statistical analysis, we argue that economic development influences patterns of repression. With economic growth, autocrats tend to adopt selective repression rather than indiscriminate violence (e.g., mass killings), as the latter risks inciting greater social unrest and endangering regime stability. Using an additive dynamic linear model (ADLM), our findings suggest that economic development, when coupled with rising social movements, compels dictators to rely on less severe yet more targeted forms of coercion. While this adaptation may temporarily bolster regime control amid economic growth and social unrest, it may ultimately undermine the foundation of long-term authoritarian resilience. This work bridges the gap between repression literature and modernisation theory by demonstrating that authoritarian decision-making in repressive policies plays a crucial role in shaping the fate of both dictatorships and opposition movements.
Recent research highlights the crisis-driven approach for regional institution-building, suggesting that crises enhance the utility of regionalism. This study questions the applicability of crisis-driven regionalism in Northeast Asia, emphasising why certain crises catalyse regionalist efforts while others do not. We clarify the working mechanisms of critical juncture approaches and identify three variables influencing the effectiveness of crisis-driven regionalism, each operating at different stages - pre-crisis, in-crisis, and post-crisis. First, exogenous crises are more likely to trigger cooperation than endogenous ones, as the latter provoke disputes over the origins and responsibilities of the crisis. Second, crises should foster collective action and shared agendas among states, rather than being confined to respective domestic efforts of individual states. Lastly, we focus on the continuity of cooperative policies in the post-crisis period. This study examines the global financial crisis, environmental pollution, and COVID-19 as three illustrative cases - including both positive and negative instances - of crisis-driven regionalism, analysing why these crises have generated, or failed to generate, substantive cooperative outcomes.
Extending the concept of economic interdependence to the subnational level, this paper explores how the foreign commercial ties of non-state actors can introduce geopolitical risks to advanced democracies. We examine this phenomenon through the lens of US-China higher education partnerships. Facing budget constraints, public universities in the United States often rely on revenue from international tuition and fees. Due to trade barriers in China, American universities frequently recruit fee-paying Chinese students through joint degree programs (JDPs) established with Chinese partner institutions. These transnational partnerships create asymmetric market dependencies that the Chinese government can exploit. Using newly compiled panel data from the United States, we find that the extensive pre-existing JDP network is significantly correlated with the proliferation of Confucius Institutes (CIs) - a flagship soft power initiative of the Chinese government - on American college campuses. Preliminary evidence from other countries aligns with the patterns observed in the USA. Our findings highlight how China employs a decentralized approach to advance its soft power strategy through higher education ties.
China's growing technological power and the resulting US-China rivalry prompted various countries, including Japan, to adopt necessary countermeasures. This study examines Japan's strategic approach to economic security and technology policy under the framework of policy emulation and vested interests. The US-China technology competition urged Japan to reformulate its technological strategies with the aim of reducing economic dependence on China. Japan's policy reactions are characterized by policy emulation with two orientations: rational emulation to follow the US policy developments and symbolic imitation as a way of reverting to the previous industrial policy. Concurrently, Japan's policy initiatives were constrained by vested interests to maintain stable economic relations with China and past cooperative practices formed by the Japanese business group.
How and to what extent can populism emerge in a new democracy where strong populism politics has not previously existed? Contrary to earlier findings that the effects of populism on voting have been minimal in South Korea, the 2022 presidential campaigns were marked by populism rhetoric and mobilisations, raising questions about the sudden rise of populism politics. This paper argues that even in a new but consolidated democracy that has been relatively free from the threat of populism, populism can influence elections when politicians mobilise economic grievance and political dissatisfaction, and when voters with latent populist attitudes resonate with such appeals. To support this argument, this paper analyses all official campaign speeches and assesses their level of populist rhetoric with holistic grading methods. Quantitative analysis of pre- and post-election surveys shows that, while populist attitudes did not significantly influence vote choice before the campaign, voters with stronger populist attitudes were more likely to vote for the candidate who delivered more populist speeches after the campaign began. These findings demonstrate that populist voting can be activated even in political contexts without a strong historical presence of populism.
Can international organizations (IOs) effectively shape attitudes held by individuals? Under what conditions does the public perceive information supplied by IOs as more trustworthy than information provided by other authorities? With the exponential growth of social network platforms, many IOs utilize them to engage individuals directly. Building on the growing literature on IOs' engagement with the public, we examine if and under what conditions such effort is effective. We adopt insights from the literature on information source effect to theorize that the information disseminated by IOs is more effective than that by domestic health officials in shaping individuals' attitudes when the IOs are portrayed as impartial and equipped with expertise in the relevant issue area. We test the hypotheses in the context of the World Health Organization (WHO) and the COVID-19-related measures. Our analysis of the survey experiment with a sample of 2865 Americans shows that political independents trust COVID-19-related information provided by the WHO more than information supplied by domestic public health officials, especially when the professional expertise the WHO staff commands is highlighted. In comparison, our analysis indicates that the information source effect is muted when information is delivered to individuals with strongly held existing attitudes, Democrats and Republicans in the case of COVID-19-related information in the United States.
Courts and judicial institutions are often overlooked in armed conflict research. Before the rebel group is formed and initiates armed confrontation, states and their allies - directly and indirectly - mobilize the court to prosecute selected individuals to deter political opposition and establish state legitimacy. This article argues that the state can directly prosecute potential political challengers through criminal cases, deterring aspiring political leaders from organizing a rebellion at the local level. Similarly, the state can indirectly use its local collaborators to prosecute potential civilian supporters in court by filing civil cases, intensifying local discontent, and exacerbating underlying grievances against the state and its local collaborators. The state's direct and indirect involvement in generating legitimacy affects the subnational risk of conflict onset differently. Analyses of original data for all 75 district-level courts in Nepal between 1991 and 2006 and the onset of the Maoist conflict show robust support for the arguments.
The global COVID-19 pandemic has changed how elected officials govern, campaign, and present themselves. One key change is that politicians across the world often wear face masks when in public. To what extent does this practice influence how the public perceives politicians? We investigate this question in Japan, a country where people - though not politicians - often wore face masks even before the novel coronavirus outbreak. Conducting a survey experiment with a nationally representative sample of about $1500$ Japanese residents, we find that masks do influence public perceptions and that women politicians lose more public support when wearing masks than men. Given the nature of political campaigns in the COVID-19 world, we think that our results have broad implications for women politicians competitiveness, specifically, and for politics and gender, more generally. We outline these in the conclusion along with several new research directions.
Political control is pervasive in authoritarian contexts; however, the use of economic instruments as a means of political repression has been underexplored. Embedded in Hong Kong’s political upheavals triggered by the 2019 extradition bill, this paper underpins the erosion of Hong Kong’s political environment by analysing economic pressure exerted on businesses, or ‘economic repression’, to eliminate, convert, and/or silence their dissenting behaviour. Drawing on Earl’s repression typology, it distinguishes between two forms of repression: economic channelling and economic duress. The former involves covert actions that increase the operational costs of targeted businesses, including administrative inspections and the severance of economic ties, while the latter embodies overt actions that disrupt their operations, such as asset freezes and vandalism of shop premises. Although both businesses and individuals may be subject to economic repression, this paper pays special attention to businesses, as their responses have far-reaching implications for the political and economic landscape. Employing the cases of Cathay Pacific, Taipan Bakery, Apple Daily , and Chickeeduck, which were well-known players in their respective industries in 2019–2021, it is observed that economic channelling was usually deployed at a defiant company first, followed by economic duress if the target did not conform to the new political norms. Economic repression not only stifles political resistance in the marketplace but also hampers the competitiveness of the international financial city.
While it is widely accepted that watching televised presidential debates helps voters stay informed about candidates and campaign issues, voters are increasingly turning to the media to learn about televised debates rather than watching them directly. Coupled with this trend is growing criticisms over presidential debates' focus on negative attacks on opponents at the expense of policy discussions. We examine whether media outlets systematically bias the content of presidential debates, potentially amplifying their perceived negativity in presidential debates. Specifically, we theorize that the media outlets overemphasize non-policy aspects of presidential debates, because such coverage can help them draw viewer attention and is perceived to have greater news value. We further expect the continued exposure to media coverage of debates to weaken policy-related considerations in voters' decision-making. We test these theoretical expectations using the case of the 2022 presidential election in South Korea. Using keyword-assisted topic model (keyATM), we first compare candidates' speeches during the presidential debates with newspaper coverage of the debates. We find that non-policy topics, including personal attacks on the opponent and scandals, appeared more frequently in the newspaper coverage than in the actual debates. Next, we show that the continued exposure to media's election coverage can reinforce voters' tendency to base their voting decisions on non-policy issues through post-election survey data. Our findings offer significant insights into understanding media campaign coverage and its electoral significance in today's media environment.
This article explores the institutional conditions behind the electoral rise of regional parties in Indian states. I argue that in regions where national parties are less organized, voters are more likely to support regional parties. This organizational weakness is initially affected by regionally based social cleavages, which undermine the internal cohesion of national parties. A nationalized party platform requiring all regional branches to coordinate under a shared agenda struggles to address these cleavages. Finally, regional-level politicians may defect from national parties and align with regional parties that better represent their constituents. Using path analysis, I test these claims, and the results support my hypotheses.
The COVID-19 pandemic profoundly disrupted societies worldwide, creating not only a global health emergency but also a severe test of governance. Governments were required to mobilise resources with unprecedented urgency, under conditions of uncertainty and limited oversight. In this setting, politicians and bureaucrats exercised unusually broad discretion over resource allocation. We argue that these conditions created opportunities for corruption – what we term crisis-induced corruption – the misuse of public resources that emerges in crisis contexts where urgent spending collides with fragile oversight. Drawing on Afrobarometer Round 9 surveys from 39 African countries, we examine how perception of crisis-induced corruption (COVID-19 corruption) shaped citizens’ evaluations of government mismanagement and whether these effects varied with institutional quality (control of corruption). Results from multilevel models show that citizens who perceive higher levels of COVID-19 corruption are more likely to judge their governments as mismanaging the pandemic. However, contrary to expectations, we do not find evidence that stronger corruption control buffers governments from these negative perceptions. Instead, in countries with higher corruption control, corruption perceptions are linked to a sharper increase in perceived government mismanagement of the pandemic. Robustness checks – including disaggregating government mismanagement into pandemic management and relief distribution, and employing alternative outcomes such as trust in vaccine safety and satisfaction with relief provision – confirm the stability of these results. The findings highlight not only the damaging impact of corruption during global emergencies but also the critical importance of effective crisis management for sustaining public trust.
