EXPRESSIVE VOTING

Abstract

For more than 40 years, rational choice theorists have noted that some voters may be expressively motivated. Their approaches generally have lacked a theoretical foundation with which such expressive motivation could be justified, and formalization typically has not gone beyond adding a non-instrumental utility term in a model of instrumental returns. I draw on social theory and anthropology to provide a microfoundation for expressive voting and propose an `economy' of expressive incentives, seeking out equilibrium conditions. This approach generates predictions about voter choice and turnout that are consistent with empirical evidence of electoral behavior.

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