In India it is common for politicians to have criminal convictions. Why do voters vote for criminals?
One plausible explanation offered by political scientist Milan Vaishnav is that voters tend to care less about their representative’s ability to bring about broad improvements or write good laws, and more about the success of helping them access said limited resources. Therefore, a corrupt or criminally accused politician may be seen as effective because he can bring benefits to his community.
…In a loud voice, the voters are known as: Haan, goonda hai, magar hamara goonda hai (Yes, he is a gangster, but he is our gangster.)
From Karthik Muralidharan’s excellent book on improving state capacity in a failing state.
Addendum: See also my post No Such Thing as Development Economics.
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