A note from the Economic Analysis Council, a think tank attached to Matignon, explores the links between low participation and implementation of public policies.
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What if abstention was as much about economists as politicians? It is to develop the reasons for the desertion of the ballot boxes, and to explore the links between the low participation and the implementation of public policies, that the Economic Analysis Council (CAE), a think tank attached to Matignon, S ‘ is interested in the nature and reasons for this growing phenomenon. Begun over a year ago, this work, exhibited in a note published Wednesday, June 22, and that Le Monde was able to consult, take on a sense all the more acute after the second round of the legislative elections of the 12 and 19 June, again marked by record abstention (53.77 %).
“We talk a lot about abstention, but less inequalities of participation. However, the lower participation in a ballot, the stronger these inequalities,” said Jean Beuve, lecturer in Paris-I, and the ‘One of the three co -authors of the note, with Etienne Fize and Vincent Pons.
Based on the data of INSEE electoral surveys of the last twenty years, which identify voters by socio -professional category, age group and income level, the three economists illustrate these inequalities over a long period. Thus, the over-representation of the elderly (60-69 years) among the voters, to the detriment of younger (18-29 years), is much clearer in the “second-class” elections, like the legislative elections, which mobilize less the French, that during presidential elections.
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Ditto for executives, constantly over -represented. The example of 2017, where as this year followed one another in less than two months four opportunities to vote (the two towers of the presidential election and then the legislative elections), is striking. During the first round of the Elysée race, the weight among the voters of the 25 % the most modest (first quartile income) was 10 % lower than their real weight among the registrants. But it was 25 % lower in the second round of the legislative elections, when these two figures climbed respectively to 10 % and almost 30 % over -representation for the 25 % wealthiest French.
Why such disaffection? “Impossible to find only one manager,” said Mr. Beuve. But, with their economist cap, the authors identify “a bundle of arguments”. First, the benefit to be expected from the victory of a candidate is often weak in the minds of the French, in parallel with the feeling that the political offer is not diversified enough. “It is the famous” all rotten “which illustrates the crisis of confidence of voters”, explains Mr. Beuve. “During the triangular, there is often more participation,” he notes.
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