Group Formation and Voter Participation

Joint with: Helios Herrera

We present a model of participation in large elections with endogenous formation of voter groups. Citizens decide whether to be followers or become leaders (activists) and try to bring other citizens to vote for their preferred party. In the(unique) pure strategy equilibrium, the number of leaders favoring each party is a function of the cost of activism and the importance of the election. Expected turnout and winning margin in the election are, in turn, a function of the number of leaders and the

strength of social interactions. The model predicts a non monotonic relationship between expected turnout and winning margin in large elections.

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