The Political Legacy of Entertainment TV
Ruben Durante, Paolo Pinotti, Andrea Tesei
American Economic Review · 2019 · Volume 109 · Issue 7
Abstract
We study the political impact of commercial television in Italy exploiting the staggered introduction of Berlusconi's private TV network, Mediaset, in the early 1980s. We find that individuals with early access to Mediaset all-entertainment content were more likely to vote for Berlusconi's party in 1994, when he first ran for office. The effect persists for five elections and is driven by heavy TV viewers, namely the very young and the elderly. Regarding possible mechanisms, we find that individuals exposed to entertainment TV as children were less cognitively sophisticated and civic-minded as adults, and ultimately more vulnerable to Berlusconi's populist rhetoric.
Keywords
Political Processes: Rent-seeking, Lobbying, Elections, Legislatures, and Voting Behavior, Entertainment, Media, Marketing, Economic Sociology, Economic Anthropology, Language, Social and Economic Stratification
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