One Vote or Many Mexicos? Income, Heterogeneity, and the 2006–2012 Presidential Elections*

Abstract

Objective This article investigates the role of income and income heterogeneity on voters’ preferences for the conservative party. Methods Fitting a series of logistic regressions on exit poll data from the 2006 and 2012 Mexican presidential elections. Results We find that heterogeneity mediates the effect of income on the probability of voting for the conservative candidate. Conclusion In more heterogeneous places, rich voters are more likely to support the candidate on the right than their counterparts in more homogeneous places, while poorer voters are more likely to vote for Partido Accion Nacional in less heterogeneous places. In more heterogeneous states, voters are more likely to encounter members of other socioeconomic groups who prompt them to vote for the party that better represents their group's interests.

Campaign externalities, programmatic spending, and voting preferences in rural Mexico: The case of Progresa-Oportunidades-Prospera programme

“…18 Such a massive media campaign generated-in the form of information 'externalities'-uncertainty and untrustworthiness among the poor, who already received POP in treatment localities, or were promised to receive the benefits in control localities. Second, the conservative Fox administration moved to the left and adopted an active antipoverty policy strategy, spending more on social policies than previous PRI administrations (Cortina and Lasala-Blanco, 2016). It also emulated PRI's old electoral tactics and began to mobilize members of POP's Community Development Committees to campaign in favour of PAN's presidential candidate, highlighting his commitment to continue the programme, and expand it to those communities that had not been reached yet (Hevia de la Jara, 2008).…”