Evolution of Government’s Performance Through Yardstick Competition in the Spatial Game of Gubernatorial Elections

Yardstick Competition is a unique feature of gubernatorial elections and may have a paramount role in the development of democracy and local government’s performance. This paper investigates the behaviours of governors and voters in an evolutionary game of gubernatorial election by introducing the spatial simulation process where voters can make comparisons between the incumbent and neighboring politicians. Based on the model, we portray the evolutionary process and topologies of local governments’ performances in federal systems. In the baseline model, we find that the variance of governor candidates’ performances, as well as the intensity of the yardstick competition, are positively related to the overall performance of governments. To study the relationship between elections and foreign policies, we employ an evolutionary Public Good Game in which governors can affect the welfare of neighbours by determining whether to invest in cross-provincial constructions. In the extended simulations where governors and voters are assigned to various characters, we find that asymmetry between candidates’ potentials and voters’ perception increases the uncertainty of the electoral results, and selfless voters will lead to lower performances of governments.