Voting for Environmental Policy but against Green Parties: Evidence from Ecuador

• In Event: The Environment and Electoral Connections

Abstract

Why do voters prioritize environmental protection over economic development in some instances but not in others? The literature on environmental and climate voting posits that environmental policies create public diffuse benefits with concentrated local costs, these distributive effects then translate into votes for or against parties supporting these policies. However, I argue that voter incentives and party allegiance nuance this expectation by creating distinct voting mechanisms at the national and local level. I leverage recent Ecuadorian elections that took place in August 2023 which had two important votes. First, voters were tasked with deciding whether oil drilling would begin in the Yasuní national park, situated in the Amazon Rainforest - extraction supported by one of Ecuador’s strongest parties, the Movimiento Revolución Ciudadana (MRC) since President Correa’s decade long presidency. Second, voters were also electing a new president. In the first round of elections, the MRC gained the most votes while 59% of Ecuadorians voted against drilling in the Yasuní park. As such, this paper seeks to understand how voters choose to protect a national park while supporting the party that has favored its extraction. By using electoral data, revenues from extractive activities and spatial measures of environmental damages, I find that exposure to the local costs or benefits of environmental policies helps explain the Yasuní vote while the history of local party strength mediates this effect on the presidential vote. These results provide suggestive evidence that different mechanisms are at play when individuals are participating in the election of politicians or in support of a policy.

Author

• Ella Bayi