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leadership and by the shadow of future careers8. Every time the principals (governors,
local leaders) want a piece of legislation passed, the majority party should act as a Cartel
Qones and Hwang 2005)9. The price of defection would not only be the individuals'
removal from positions of power within the House and the party; but also strong
constraints for their careers' progression under the same subnational coalition of power.
In sum, if it is true that current legislators care about the future of their careers, they
should be responsive to the desires of their leaders during their legislative tenure.
Additionally, given the characteristics of the electoral rules (closed party lists,
proportional representation, thresholds and moderate to low district magnitudes), most
of the theoretical literature (Taagepera and Shugart 1989, Carey and Shugart 1995,
Mainwaring and Shugart 1997, Crisp et al 2005) would predict considerable levels of
party discipline in Argentina- a claim verified by the empirical literature on the
Argentine Congress (Mustapic 1998, Jones 1997, 2002). Leaders controlling a small set of
fixed positions in party ballots are likely to have control of candidates' expected future
behavior; in contrast with the higher degrees of freedom of individuals chosen in open
lists. Electoral thresholds and small district magnitudes also reduce the incentives for
running outside the party. If parties matter (as no serious study in the literature has
denied) and labels are cues for voters (Popkin 1991), running outside the party lowers
the chances of winning a spot; which might be different if district magnitude was high
and parties with minimal shares could get a seat. All these rules and dynamics reinforce
the strength of subnational leaders and their control over current national legislators,
8 Iflegislators are likely to continue in politics, leaders can enforce discipline by punishing defectors at
further stages of candidate selection or executive branch appointment process. Anticipating those future
vetoes for their careers, legislators should stay responsive to the leaders in equilibrium.
9 The question of how would a dispute among principals with different preferences be solved deserves a
separate analysis.