Knowledge of Campaign Finance Regulation and Attitudes towards Politics

Abstract

We use an experimental design to measure how campaign (political) finance regulation influences perceptions of political corruption and trust in politicians when citizens are actually exposed to information about regulation. Unlike most of the observational studies in the literature, results of this experimental study suggest that knowledge of campaign finance regulation substantially reduces citizens’ perceptions of corruption but has only limited effect on trust in politicians. Our findings regarding the positive effect of knowledge of campaign finance regulation on perception of political corruption have crucial and urgent implications for public policy, as well as for informing the public about campaign finance regulation. At a time when public cynicism about politics is high, a significant reduction in perceptions of political corruption through successful dissemination of campaign finance regulation would be a boost to the legitimacy of democracies. The findings, however, suggest that the effect of information on regulation could be dependent on the context.