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Jurisdiction Size and Local Democracy: Evidence on Internal Political Efficacy from Large-scale Municipal Reform

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  09 May 2011

DAVID DREYER LASSEN  and
SØREN SERRITZLEW
DAVID DREYER LASSEN*
Affiliation:
University of Copenhagen
SØREN SERRITZLEW*
Affiliation:
Aarhus University
*
David Dreyer Lassen is Professor of Economics, University of Copenhagen, Øster Farigmagsgade 5, Building 26, DK-1353 Copenhagen K, Denmark (david.dreyer.lassen@econ.ku.dk).
Søren Serritzlew is Professor of Political Science, Aarhus University, Bartholins Allé 7, DK-8000 Aarhus C, Denmark (soren@ps.au.dk).
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Abstract

Optimal jurisdiction size is a cornerstone of government design. A strong tradition in political thought argues that democracy thrives in smaller jurisdictions, but existing studies of the effects of jurisdiction size, mostly cross-sectional in nature, yield ambiguous results due to sorting effects and problems of endogeneity. We focus on internal political efficacy, a psychological condition that many see as necessary for high-quality participatory democracy. We identify a quasiexperiment, a large-scale municipal reform in Denmark, which allows us to estimate a causal effect of jurisdiction size on internal political efficacy. The reform, affecting some municipalities, but not all, was implemented by the central government, and resulted in exogenous, and substantial, changes in municipal population size. Based on survey data collected before and after the reform, we find, using various difference-in-difference and matching estimators, that jurisdiction size has a causal and sizeable detrimental effect on citizens' internal political efficacy.

Type
Research Article
Information
American Political Science Review , Volume 105 , Issue 2 , May 2011 , pp. 238 - 258
Copyright
Copyright © American Political Science Association 2011

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