Fraud-Proofing Beyond Election Monitors: An Institutional Design Approach

• In Event: Models of Electoral Competition

Abstract

Electoral fraud happens frequently. An emerging literature focuses on election monitors to counter it. We propose an unexplored complementary approach: institutional design. We build on Rundlett and Svolik's (2016) insight that fraud requires coordination among agents who participate only when they are optimistic about the incumbent’s chances. We show: if a large electorate is divided into almost identical districts, we can nearly eliminate election fraud and simultaneously preserve the winner of majority-rule election in a world without the possibility of fraud. In this design, the incumbent wins the election if she wins nearly all districts, and she wins a district if she receives the majority of the district's votes. Requiring the incumbent to win a large super-majority of districts amplifies her agents’ coordination problem by inducing mutual fear that others will abandon the incumbent. We highlight multiple directions for future research on institutional design to mitigate election fraud.

Authors

• Germán Sergio Gieczewski, Princeton University

• Mehdi Shadmehr, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill