Strategic entry and strategic voting in majoritarian systems

Electoral rules impact the need for and ability of voters to coordinate around a candidate or candidates. In this paper, we examine two commonly used majoritarian electoral systems—the multiple nontransferable votes (MNTV) and single-member districts decided by plurality (SMDP). We look at strategic entry by elites and strategic voting by citizens. Coordination failures at either stage could keep teams of candidates out of office who might have otherwise been chosen to govern and could prevent voters from putting in office the candidates who would best represent them. For causal identification, we leverage the design of Brazil’s senate, where both systems are alternately used. Using a difference-in-differences approach, we find that elites do not coordinate well under SMDP but do relatively better under MNTV while voters coordinate equally (well) across both systems.