Is Clarity of Responsibility Important for Economic Voting? Revisiting Powell and Whitten's Hypothesis

The objective was to retest Powell and Whitten's 1993 hypothesis that the relationship between aggregate economic indicators and aggregate election outcomes is stronger in political contexts when there is greater clarity of responsibility. The data include alternative indicators of the variables discussed by Powell and Whitten, and more recent election results that were not contained in the original dataset. The purpose of this article was to evaluate the robustness of Powell and Whitten's initial findings. The data allow for a near-replication of their work, as well as a retesting of their basic model using different specifications, economic indicators, and vote variables. The impact of aggregate economic indicators on vote percentages for governing parties and the impact of political context (e.g., one-party vs. multi-party government) on government accountability for economic performance are examined.