Essays on Political Institutions Under Dominant Party Rule 公开
Miric, Sinisa (Summer 2025)
Abstract
This dissertation investigates the institutional mechanisms underpinning dominant
party regimes, with a focus on intraparty dynamics and their implications for
democratic erosion. Drawing on the case of Serbia and its dominant party, the Serbian
Progressive Party (SNS), the three essays unpack how internal party struggles,
central-local power relations, and leadership charisma shape regime stability and political
outcomes.
The first essay examines how incumbent executives curb potential threats from local
elites. It argues that foreign direct investment serves as a tool of political control, disproportionately
targeted to party strongholds to weaken rival clientelist networks. A
difference-in-differences design using original municipal-level data (2012–2019) demonstrates
that central authorities use FDI allocation to consolidate control and manage
intraparty hierarchies.
The second essay explores the ability of international election monitoring in detecting
and deterring electoral fraud. Focusing on Serbia’s 2022 elections, it contrasts the
findings of international and domestic observers. It finds that reports produced by international
mission of reduced ruling party vote share stem from non-random precinct
assignment, while domestic mission’s randomized approach detected no fraud. The
study calls for improved methodological rigor in observer deployment to enhance the
credibility of electoral assessments.
The third essay investigates whether voter loyalty in dominant party regimes is
directed more toward the party or its leader. Through an original endorsement experiment
embedded in a national survey, the study finds that charismatic leadership
plays a pivotal role in shaping public opinion, enabling central leaders to maintain
elite support and marginalize internal rivals. This highlights how personalism and
elite-leader bargains sustain dominant party rule.
Together, these essays contribute to our understanding of authoritarian institutions,
the micro-foundations of party dominance, and the internal logic of regime durability
in competitive authoritarian settings.
Table of Contents
1 Introduction 1
1.1 Motivation and research questions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
1.2 Case Study: Serbia . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
1.3 Overview of the Dissertation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6
1.4 Personalism as Regime Backbone: Insights from the Serbian Case . . 8
2 Beware of Greeks Bearing Gifts: FDI as a Tool of Intraparty Power
Consolidation in Serbia 11
2.1 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
2.2 Challenges of Center-Local Coalitions for Dominant Parties . . . . . . 17
2.3 The Serbian Context . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 20
2.4 FDI as a Device for Consolidation of Power in Serbia . . . . . . . . . 25
2.5 Identification Strategy and Data . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 28
2.6 Findings . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 32
2.7 Robustness Checks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 35
2.8 Alternative Explanations–Successful Undermining or Reward? . . . . 37
2.9 Discussion and Conclusion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 42
3 Evaluating International and Domestic Electoral Observers: Evidence
from Serbian Election 46
3.1 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 46
3.2 Electoral Fraud and the Role of Election Observers . . . . . . . . . . 51
3.3 Argument and Empirical Implications . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 53
3.4 Serbian Electoral Context . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 57
3.5 Natural Experiment and Data Description . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 62
3.6 Randomization Checks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 66
3.7 Analysis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 69
3.8 Additional Analysis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 74
3.9 Conclusion and Discussion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 77
4 Master of Puppets: An Endorsement Experiment on Party Presidents’
Ability to Shape Citizens’ Policy Preference 83
4.1 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 83
4.2 Dominant Parties: Contested Rule between Parties and Leaders . . . 87
4.3 The Effects of Parties and Party Leaders on Opinion Formation . . . 88
4.4 The Case of Serbia . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 93
4.5 Empirical Implications . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 98
4.6 Research Design . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 102
4.7 Results . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 112
4.8 Discussion and Conclusion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 118
Appendix A Supplemental Appendix for Chapter 2 123
A.1 Serbia and Foreign Direct Investments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 123
A.2 Figures . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 125
A.2.1 FDI Allocation Trends . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 125
A.2.2 Sensitivity Analysis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 126
A.3 Tables . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 127
A.3.1 Robustness Checks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 127
A.3.2 Different Outcomes (SNS Stronghold 1) . . . . . . . . . . . . 128
A.3.3 Different Outcomes (SNS Stronghold 2) . . . . . . . . . . . . 129
A.3.4 Different Types of Transfers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 130
A.3.5 Core, Swing and Deputy Hypotheses . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 131
A.3.6 Core (alternative) , Swing and Deputy Hypotheses . . . . . . 132
A.3.7 Stronghold Distribution . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 133
A.4 Data Description . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 134
Appendix B Supplemental Appendix for Chapter 3 137
B.1 Tables . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 137
B.1.1 Balance Check I . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 137
B.1.2 Balance Check II . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 139
B.1.3 Results (H1)–Figure 3 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 141
B.1.4 Results (H2) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 142
B.1.5 Spillover Effects (No Belgrade District) . . . . . . . . . . . . . 143
B.1.6 Opposition Results . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 144
B.1.7 Coalition Partner Results . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 145
B.1.8 Main Results (systematic differences–without Belgrade District) 146
B.1.9 Mission Allocation (Subsample) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 147
B.2 Figures . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 148
B.2.1 Observers’ Allocation - Subotica . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 148
Appendix C Supplemental Appendix for Chapter 4 150
C.1 Tables . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 150
C.1.1 Balance Test . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 150
C.1.2 Multinomial Regression: Balance Test . . . . . . . . . . . . . 152
C.1.3 Main Findings (Robust SE) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 153
C.1.4 Individual Questions (Robust SE) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 155
C.1.5 Balance Test: SNS Supporters vs No Voters . . . . . . . . . . 156
C.2 Coding scheme: Covariates for Effect Heterogeneity . . . . . . . . . . 157
C.3 Power Analysis . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 157
C.4 Survey Questionnaire . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 159
References 192
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