Doctoral Dissertation Research in DRMS: The Psychology of Political Risk in Repressive Regimes

美国政府每年在外国的民主和治理援助上花费数十亿美元。然而，自1990年以来，非洲每五次选举中就有一次受到严重暴力的影响，这阻碍了公民自由投票给他们喜欢的候选人。查明强制性暴力如何以及何时影响选民，对于有效减少其对选举质量的影响至关重要。这项研究利用津巴布韦的案例来理解公民在面临暴力威胁时如何做出政治决定。更广泛地说，它试图了解暴力威胁的情感影响如何影响对风险的看法和对支持民主的集体行动的参与。这项研究的结果有助于改进监督选举的努力，并鼓励美国国家民主研究所、卡特中心和美国国际开发署等机构参与民主政治。具体地说，这意味着监督选举的努力不仅应该集中在最有可能发生胁迫的地方，也应该集中在最有可能影响行为的地方。其次，预防和缓解暴力的干预措施应该考虑选民的心理韧性。这项研究结合了对津巴布韦暴力和投票模式之间关系的历史分析，测试情绪对政治风险感知的因果关系的现场实验，以及测试情绪是否可以用来动员公民行动的现场实验。这项历史分析使用选民和个人层面的数据来测试暴力是否会对更容易受到恐吓的选民的行为产生更大的影响。这项现场实验室实验是通过对津巴布韦反对派支持者的家庭调查进行的，使用了面部表情的照片，并回忆了过去情绪引发愤怒和恐惧的经历。然后，它衡量这些诱发情绪如何影响参与者对他们个人将面临镇压暴力的可能性的看法，以及他们参与一些政治行动的意愿。它使用基于政治性和非政治性回忆的刺激来诱发情绪，以评估情绪的背景重要程度。最后，实地试验利用与一个非洲政党的独特伙伴关系，测试在风险更高的政治环境中，负面的竞选信息是否更有效地动员行动。

The US government spends billions per year on democracy and governance assistance in foreign countries. Nevertheless, one in five elections in Africa since 1990 has been afflicted by significant levels of violence, which impedes citizens from freely voting for their preferred candidates. Identifying how and when coercive violence influences voters is critical to effectively reducing its impact on the quality of elections. This study uses the case of Zimbabwe to understand how citizens make decisions about politics when faced with the threat of violence. More generally, it seeks to understand how the emotional impact of the threat of violence affects perceptions of risks and participation in pro-democracy collective action. The results of this study can help improve efforts to monitor elections and encourage participation in democratic politics by US institutions such as the National Democratic Institute, Carter Center, and USAID. Specifically, it implies that efforts to monitor elections should be focused not only on where coercion is most likely to occur but also on where it is most likely to impact behavior. Second, interventions to prevent and mitigate violence should take into account the psychological resilience of voters.This study combines a historical analysis of the relationship between violence and voting patterns in Zimbabwe, lab-in-the-field experiments that test for the causal effect of emotions on perceptions of political risks, and a field experiment to test whether emotions can be used to mobilize citizen action. The historical analysis uses constituency and individual level data to test whether violence has a bigger impact on the behavior of voters who are more physically and psychologically vulnerable to intimidation. The lab-in-the-field experiment, conducted through a household survey of opposition supporters in Zimbabwe, uses photos of facial expressions and recalled past experiences of emotions to induce anger and fear. It then measures how these induced emotions affect how participants perceive the likelihood that they personally will face repressive violence as well as their willingness to engage in a number of political actions. It induces emotions using both political and apolitical recall-based stimuli to assess the extent to which the context of the emotions matters. Last, the field experiment leverages a unique partnership with an African political party to test whether negative campaign messages are more effective in mobilizing action in riskier political environments.