The political cost of sanctions: evidence from COVID-19

Fazio, Andrea, Reggiani, Tommaso ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-3134-1049 and Sabatini, Fabio 2022. The political cost of sanctions: evidence from COVID-19. Health Policy 126 (9) , pp. 872-878. 10.1016/j.healthpol.2022.06.008

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Abstract

We use survey data to study how trust in government and consensus for the pandemic policy response vary with the propensity for altruistic punishment in Italy, the early epicenter of the pandemic. Approval for the government’s management of the crisis decreases with the size of the penalties that individuals would like to see enforced for lockdown violations. People supporting stronger punishment are more likely to consider the government’s reaction to the pandemic as insufficient. However, after the establishment of tougher sanctions for risky behaviors, we observe a sudden flip in support for the government. Higher amounts of the desired fines become associated with a higher probability of considering the government’s policy response as too extreme, lower trust in government, and lower confidence in the truthfulness of the officially provided information. These results suggest that lockdowns entail a political cost that helps explain why democracies may adopt epidemiologically suboptimal policies.

Item Type:	Article
Date Type:	Publication
Status:	Published
Schools:	Business (Including Economics)
Subjects:	J Political Science > JN Political institutions (Europe)
Uncontrolled Keywords:	COVID-19; Lockdown; Law enforcement; Altruistic punishment; Survey data
Publisher:	Elsevier
ISSN:	0168-8510
Funders:	MUNI/G/0985/2017
Date of First Compliant Deposit:	1 July 2022
Date of Acceptance:	22 June 2022
Last Modified:	14 Dec 2023 11:35
URI:	https://orca.cardiff.ac.uk/id/eprint/150794

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