Does municipal consolidation affect competitiveness and candidate quality? A Quasi-experimental study.

How does changing the size and nature of local governments affect political competition as well as who runs for office and who gets elected? Existing work on candidate selection and political competition in sub-national governments primarily identifies effects across potentially very different units. Using a large-scale municipal reform in Denmark, we provide quasi-experimental evidence on effects on political competition and candidate selection when unit consolidation is exogenous and treatment varies across pre-existing units.