There are such people: the role of corruption in the 2021 parliamentary elections in Bulgaria

Figures & data

Figure 1. Theoretical decision tree on corruption and elections (Stages 1–3 based on De Vries and Solaz 2017).

Figure 2. Theoretical voting decision tree.

Table 1. Parliamentary election results 2017 and 2021.

		2017			April 21			July 21			November 21
Type	Party	Votes	%	MP	Votes	%	MP	Votes	%	MP	Votes	%	MP
Established/Main Stream	GERB	1,147,292	33.54	95	837,707	26.18	75	642,165	23.51	63	596,456	22.74	59
	BSP	955,490	27.93	80	480,146	15.01	43	365,695	13.39	36	267,817	10.21	26
	MRF	315,976	9.24	26	336,306	10.51	30	292,514	10.71	29	341,000	13	34
Other/Hybrid	Volia	145,637	4.25	17	75,926*	2.13*	0	85,795*	3.14*	0	7,067	0.27	0
	RB+/DB	107,407	3.14	0	302280	9.45	27	345331	12.64	34	166968	6.37	16
	DaBG/DG	101,177	2.96	0
New Parties/Protest Parties	ITN				565,014	17.66	51	657,829	24.08	65	249,743	9.52	25
	ISMV				150,940	4.72	14	136,885	5.01	13	60,055	2.29	0
	PP										673,170	25.67	67
Nationalist/PRR	IMRO	318,513	9.7	27	116,434	3.64	0				28,322	1.08	0
	NFSB				75,926*	2.13*	0	85,795*	3.14*	0	8,584	0.33	0
	ATAKA				15,659	0.49	0	12,585	0.46	0	12,153	0.46	0
	Revival	37,896	1.11	0	78,414	2.45	0	82,147	3.01	0	127,586	4.86	13

Source: National Electoral Commission cik.bg.

*Running in a coalition together

Table 2. Questions asked in the survey.

Variable Name	Variable Description
Dependent Variables
Voteapril	Which party/coalition did you vote for in the parliamentary election on 04 April 2021?
Votejuly	Which party/coalition did you vote for in the last parliamentary election on 11 July 2021?
Vote	If the next general election for Parliament was next Sunday, how would you vote?
Corruption Variables
Q1	Corruption is often considered to be present in Bulgarian politics these days. On a scale from 1 to 5 how clean or corrupt would you perceive party [XX], the party you voted for, to behave in the next Bulgarian parliament?
Q2	How much do you dislike corruption on a scale from 1 to 5 (1 being I greatly dislike corruption to 5 - I don't mind corruption). Transformed: 1 don’t mind corruption and 5 greatly dislike corruption.
Q3	How much did your perception of corruption of party [XX] play a role in your decision to vote for the party [XX]? My perception of corruption for party [XX] 1 - affect my voting decision a lot to 5 - My perception of corruption for party [XX] did not affect my voting decision at all. Transformed: 1 did not take corruption into account when voting to 5 corruption affected my voting decision a lot.
Control Variables
age	Age of respondent varies between 18-87.
edu	Education: “University/college, High school, Elementary school and lower”
sex	Gender: “Male, Female”
income	Income: “Monthly income per HH member”

Figure 3. Voting decisions in April, July and future based on survey data collected¹².

Figure 4. (a) Voters that have a high dislike of corruption and their voting intention for parties. (b) Voters that have a low dislike of corruption and their voting intention for parties.

Table 3. Main model: single effect - July 2021.

	Other Parties and No Voters	GERB	There is Such People Reference	BSP for Bulgaria	MRF	Democratic Bulgaria	Stand Up! Mafia Out!
	0	1	2	3	4
Party perceived to be corrupt	0.14	0.01		−0.10	0.35**	0.11	−0.06
	(0.12)	(0.10)		(0.12)	(0.13)	(0.11)	(0.15)
Voters dislike corruption	−0.29+	−0.44**		−0.17	−0.38*	−0.08	−0.05
	(0.16)	(0.13)		(0.15)	(0.15)	(0.15)	(0.18)
Perception of corruption played a	−0.33**	−0.41**		−0.24**	−0.47**	−0.16*	0.08
role in voting decision	(0.07)	(0.07)		(0.07)	(0.09)	(0.07)	(0.08)
Income distributed on each family	−0.04	0.25**		0.02	0.05	0.19*	0.12
member	(0.09)	(0.08)		(0.08)	(0.10)	(0.08)	(0.09)
Age	0.03**	0.03**		0.07**	0.02**	0.02**	0.04**
	(0.01)	(0.01)		(0.01)	(0.01)	(0.01)	(0.01)
Sex	−0.30	0.17		0.50**	0.10	0.14	0.01
	(0.20)	(0.17)		(0.18)	(0.22)	(0.18)	(0.22)
Education	−0.48**	0.02		0.01	0.77**	−0.58**	−0.32+
	(0.15)	(0.14)		(0.14)	(0.19)	(0.15)	(0.17)
Constant	1.56	0.37		−2.73**	−1.10	−0.78	−2.64*
	(1.05)	(0.95)		(1.04)	(1.17)	(1.05)	(1.26)
Observations	773
Count R^2	.
Adj. Count R^2	.
AIC	2360
BIC	2611

Note:+significant at 10; *significant at 5; **significant at 1. Robust standard errors are in parentheses. Estimations performed using Stata 15.

Figure 5. (a). Perception of Corruption and voting for GERB. (b) Perception of corruption and voting for BSP. (c) Perception of corruption and voting for “There is such People”. (d) Perception of corruption and voting for MRF.

Figure 6. (a) Perception of corruption played a role in voting decision for GERB. (b) Perception of corruption played a role in voting decision for “There is such People”. (c) Perception of corruption played a role in voting decision for MRF. (d) Perception of corruption played a role in voting decision for “Stand up!”.

Table 4. Main model: interaction effect - July 2021.

	Other Parties and No Voters	GERB	There is Such People	BSP for Bulgaria	MRF	Democratic Bulgaria	Stand Up! Mafia Out!
	0	1	2	3	4	5	6
Party perceived to be corrupt	1.34*	0.40		0.49	0.94	1.40*	0.13
	(0.60)	(0.53)		(0.61)	(0.66)	(0.57)	(0.63)
Voters dislike corruption	0.39	1.69*		0.06	1.54	2.31*	−0.12
	(1.22)	(0.77)		(0.99)	(1.11)	(0.92)	(0.89)
Party perceived to be corrupt *	−0.67	−0.36		−0.17	−0.51	−1.19**	−0.07
Voters dislike corruption	(0.48)	(0.33)		(0.43)	(0.45)	(0.44)	(0.35)
Perception of corruption played a	0.39	0.71*		0.11	0.43	0.46	−0.29
role in voting decision	(0.35)	(0.27)		(0.34)	(0.36)	(0.30)	(0.35)
Party perceived to be corrupt * Perception of	−0.28+	−0.08		−0.07	0.01	−0.20	0.01
corruption played a role in voting decision	(0.16)	(0.14)		(0.18)	(0.16)	(0.14)	(0.20)
Voters dislike corruption * Perception of	0.10	−0.23		0.24	−0.03	−0.33	0.20
corruption played a role in voting decision	(0.29)	(0.19)		(0.25)	(0.26)	(0.23)	(0.21)
Party perceived to be corrupt * Voters dislike	0.12	0.06		−0.04	0.03	0.20*	−0.03
corruption * Perception of corruption played a role in voting decision	(0.11)	(0.07)		(0.11)	(0.10)	(0.10)	(0.09)
Income distributed on each family member	−0.05	0.27**		0.00	0.02	0.18*	0.12
	(0.09)	(0.08)		(0.08)	(0.10)	(0.08)	(0.09)
Age	0.03**	0.03**		0.07**	0.02**	0.02**	0.04**
	(0.01)	(0.01)		(0.01)	(0.01)	(0.01)	(0.01)
Sex	−0.36+	0.15		0.49**	0.14	0.12	0.01
	(0.19)	(0.17)		(0.18)	(0.22)	(0.18)	(0.22)
Education	−0.48**	0.06		0.01	0.80**	−0.57**	−0.32+
	(0.15)	(0.14)		(0.14)	(0.19)	(0.15)	(0.17)
Constant	−2.62+	−6.31**		−5.52**	−7.50**	−4.51**	−2.36
	(1.54)	(1.21)		(1.41)	(1.62)	(1.31)	(1.56)
Observations	773
Count R^2	.
Adj. Count R^2	.
AIC	2405
BIC	2740

Note:+significant at 10; *significant at 5; **significant at 1. Robust standard errors are in parentheses. Estimations performed using Stata 15.

Figure 7. Voters that dislike/bothered about corruption; (a): voting for GERB (b): voting for there is such people (c): voting for BSP (d): voting for MRF (e): voting for Democratic Bulgaria.

Figure 8. Voters that do not dislike/not bothered corruption; (a): voting for GERB (b): voting for there is such people (c): voting for BSP (d): voting for MRF (e): voting for Democratic Bulgaria.

De Vries, Catherine E., and Hector Solaz. 2017. “The Electoral Consequences of Corruption.” Annual Review of Political Science 20: 391–408.

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Data availability statement

Data set and replication files are available on the corresponding author’s university website.