Migration and Economic Voting Outcomes: Theory and Empirics from Moldova

Abstract

The focus of the present research is to explore several dimensions and their interconnections: migration, election results and implemented policies. It will analyse how emigration is affecting the elections results and voting patterns, of both, migrants and non-migrants, thus influencing the undertaken policies and institution development in the home country. This thesis is based on evidence from Republic of Moldova, an Eastern European country with a Soviet Union heritage. The study covers the years 1998-2010 using data for 6 election results in Moldova and data about emigration during the corresponding years. The key assumption, confirmed in this thesis is that with increase of number of emigrants to the West countries, especially countries of European Union, the percentage of votes offered to Communist Party decreases, while there is a positive connection between the number of emigrants to eastern countries, namely Russia, and the number of votes given to Communist Party. Therefore, the migrants have different voting patterns from non-migrants, which with time are passed to their families and connections in the home country, using the spillover effect and hence being able to change the political and economic institutions in the home country. Data is modelled using OLS and GMM. Powered by TCPDF (www.tcpdf.org)