This paper analyzes the influence of social identity on voters' decisions. In a theoretical model, we show that social identity concerns induce a preference to vote for individuals with similar characteristics as oneselve. We then test our model's predictions using data from low information...

Political agents often attempt to influence elections through "troll farms" that flood social media platforms with messages from fake accounts that emulate genuine information. We study the ability of troll farms to manipulate elections. We show that such disinformation tactics is more effective...

We explore how public opinion polls affect candidates' campaign spending in political competition. Generally, polls lead to (more) asymmetric behavior. Under a majority rule there always exists an equilibrium in which the initially more popular candidate invests more in the campaign and thereby...

We propose a model of political persuasion in which a biased newspaper aims to convince voters to vote for the government. Each voter receives the newspaper's report, as well as an independent private signal. Voters then exchange this information on social media and form posterior beliefs,...

I study a model of electoral competition where two parties that care about both the spoils of office and policy compete by announcing policy platforms. Parties are characterized by their valence on the one hand and by their policy platforms on the other. Unlike in the extant literature, I assume...