Announcing Local Government Relief Aid - Electoral Effects During a Pandemic

ABSTRACT

Government relief aid policies are vitally important in response to disasters. Based on the literature on the politics of natural disasters, this article examines the effect on the election results of local governments’ policy announcements in response to a pandemic. Using data from the 2020 Korean general election with the Instrumental Variable methodology, both the announcement and the provision of relief aid contributed to the victory of the ruling party’s candidates. Management of both supply-side and demand-side relief aid policies affects election results. Lastly, the relationship between the announcement and the election is also affected by the characteristics of local governments (e.g. population size and partisanship).

KEYWORDS:

• Relief aid policy
• local government
• election
• announcement effect

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Supplementary material

Supplemental data for this article can be accessed online at https://doi.org/10.1080/00323187.2022.2128832

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Seungwon Yu

Seungwon Yu, PhD, is an associate professor in the Department of Public Administration, Korea National Police University, Korea. Prior to conducting research at a university, he worked for the Korea Ministry of Finance and Economy, primarily in the field of public finance. His research covers a broad range of topics, including public management, policy analysis and evaluation, and state-owned enterprises. Recently, he published an article in the International Review of Administrative Sciences. [email protected]

Suhee Kim

Suhee Kim, PhD, is an assistant professor in the Department of Urban Administration, University of Seoul, Korea. Her research focuses broadly on public management, local government, Korean politics, policy analysis & evaluation, and state-owned enterprises. Her recent article was published in International Review of Administrative Sciences. [email protected].

Yeonwoo Sim

Yeonwoo Sim is a PhD candidate in the Department of Public Administration, Korea University, Seoul, South Korea. Her research focuses broadly on public management, including policy analysis and evaluation, policy experiment, and quantitative methodology. She recently published an article in Asian and Pacific Migration Journal. [email protected]