Eroded Unity and Clientele Migration. Explaining The Demise of the PRI Regime

DateApril 14, 2014

Time5:15am to 6:45am

Location
4357 Bunche Hall

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Sebastián Garrido de Sierra is the 2012 recipient of The Swarr Prize. Abstract: This paper offers a new explanation of the demise of the PRI regime. I argue that by late 1995 the PRI was able to remain as Mexico’s dominant party because its elite still had strong incentives to remain united. This, in turn, allowed the party to maintain the control over its unparalleled clientelistic machine, and, consequently, to keep its advantage over voters’ mobilization in order to win elections. The 1996 electoral reform drastically transformed this situation. By changing the structure of incentives for many PRI faction leaders, the reform triggered the rapid erosion of this party’s elite unity, leading to the migration of experienced cadres and the valuable clientelistic machines under their control to other parties. This soon translated into significant electoral defeats for the PRI, including the loss of the presidency in 2000. Using evidence of two new datasets, the statistical results indicate that the 1996 reform increased almost four times the probability that a mid- or high-ranked PRI member defected the party, even after controlling for socioeconomic levels, economic performance and, importantly, the PRI’s electoral results in the previous state and federal elections.

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