| This dissertation explores, both theoretically and empirically, the impact of democratic institutions, such as presidentialism and electoral rules, on the incentives, abilities, and constraints of elected officials to extract corrupt rents. Corruption is defined as the misuse of public office for private gain. Theoretically, I provide a general rational-actor framework in which politicians are interested in maximizing their odds of re-election and the spoils from office. Voters' utility is diminished by corrupt acts of the incumbents, but they punish the incumbents electorally only if they are able to learn about the latter's corrupt practices. In Chapter 2, I argue that inherent features of presidential systems relax many of the constraints on politicians' malfeasance. Further, in Chapter 3, I argue that proportional representation (PR) electoral systems make it more difficult for both voters and opposition politicians to monitor corrupt acts of the incumbents. In the same chapter, I explore the interaction effects between presidentialism and electoral rules. Finally, in Chapter 4, I model formally a particular mechanism by which voters learn about the incumbents' malfeasance: the revelation by opposition. I show that whether opposition chooses to expose corruption of the incumbent critically depends on the value of holding office for the incumbent and the baseline probability of opposition winning office. I argue that these features are combined in PR and presidential systems. As an empirical contribution, I test the theoretical propositions of each chapter empirically on multiple cross-sections of up to 100 democracies, controlling for other economic, social, and political determinants of corruption. I discuss in detail various ways of measuring corruption across countries and make a case for the use of subjective corruption indices, which are better suited for exploration of the questions at hand than objective measures. The empirical findings strongly support the main hypotheses that presidential systems, especially together with PR electoral system, are associated with higher levels of corruption. |
