Voter participation in nineteenth century British parliamentary elections

A rational voter will vote only when the expected benefits outweigh the costs of voting. The costs of voting include not only transportation costs and wages forgone, but also any bribe to abstain. The product of the probability of affecting the outcome and the utility difference between the alternatives (measured in dollars) is the expected benefit of voting. The probability of affecting the outcome is affected by the voter's estimate of the closeness of the election and the number of voters. Bribery was quite common in nineteenth century British elections. Before the secret ballot was introduced, votes of an individual were public record, making it easy to monitor votes case by a paid voter. After the secret ballot was introduced, monitoring paid voters was difficult, but it was still easy to monitor paid abstainers. This dissertation examines evidence from British elections from this period, testing the assertion that the secret ballot decreased voter turnout along with other hypotheses concerning the effects of the costs and expected benefits on turnout. Multi-seat districts (but a single election) during this period of British elections necessitate an extension of the calculus of voting to include these cases.

Name thesis:degree_name

Ph. D.

Level thesis:degree_level

doctoral

Discipline thesis:degree_discipline

Economics

Department dc:contributor.department

Economics

Grantor dc:publisher

Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University

Year dc:date.issued

1983

Author dc:creator

• Coats, R. Morris

Statement dc:rights

• In Copyright

Licence dc:rights.uri

• http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/

Language dc:language.iso

en

Handle dc:identifier.uri

http://hdl.handle.net/10919/106324

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:vtechworks.lib.vt.edu:10919/106324