Recall Elections in America

PI: Brandon Rottinghaus, Professor, University of Houston

Grant Amount and Grant Fund: $2,000, Second Century Fund

Project Abstract: Recall elections allow citizens to remove incumbent elected officials at the state or local level.  Is this good or bad for democracy?  In one view, these recall elections are a corrective measure, used to remove a corrupt official or due to abuse of the public trust.  Incumbents who fail to represent their constituents’ best interests can be removed through a democratic process.  In another view, recall elections may circumvent the will of the voters by allowing a smaller group of citizens to remove an elected official already selected by a majority of the voting electorate.  This “excess of democracy” lessens the independents of elected officials and raises the possibility that special interest groups game the system.  Although the number of recall elections nationally is increasing, the political fallout from successful and unsuccessful recall elections is unknown.  If a small number of voters can overturn elections at the state or local level, the impact of recall elections will be profound as polarization spreads across the nation and even at the local (sometimes non-partisan) level.  This project charts recall rules across states and explores the impact of these elections.

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