Economic Intimidation in Romanian Elections

How prevalent is electoral pressure perpetuated at the workplace in new democracies and what accounts for the variation in the use of such pressure? What is the relative importance of this phenomenon in the broader portfolio of clientelistic strategies used by politicians at times of elections? We examine these questions in two East European countries – Romania and Bulgaria. We assess empirically the incidence of various illicit electoral strategies by taking advantage of List Experiments, which allow us to elicit unbiased and truthful responses to sensitive political topics.  We find that in both countries, private electoral pressure is an important part of the repertoire of non-programmatic mobilization used by parties at times of election. Employer intimidation plays an especially prominent role in localities dominated by a small number of large employers. The importance of economic intimidation in the portfolio of clientelistic strategies declines, as the economic heterogeneity of the locality increases.