This summer I spent several weeks in Maharasta, India, studying the nature of elections to village councils. The project I am working on is exploring the shift from indirect to direct elections. When a politician is indirectly elected, she is selected by a group of other politicians, who were themselves elected by citizens. Direct election is when a politician is chosen by the broader electorate that she represents. While direct elections are supposed to allow citizens a direct say in selecting who will represent their interests, indirect elections are thought to produce well-qualified politicians who can bring about effective change. So the question my research hoped to address was interested do direct elections lead to better governance? There are many debates among political scientists about the best methods to use to answer such a question but I took the approach a “policy experiment” in over 600 Maharastan village councils, some of which were elected directly, and others indirectly. To do so I shadowed and conducted interviews with hundreds of rural politicians and citizens. I left Maharasta with two main and somewhat surprising takeaways. First, I discovered that leaders that were directly elected by voters were actually more efficient while in office. Compared to their indirectly elected counterparts, they scored higher on authority and participation in governance . However, a big catch is that at the same time, these leaders come from more advantaged backgrounds. Directly elected leaders are more likely to be men, politically experienced, and landowners. That is to say they were socially further removed from those who elected them. These findings were not just surprising they have important implications for policymakers undertaking electoral design. In short, which type of electoral system is best equipped to achieve dual goals of effective government and the representation of diverse groups? Do we always have to sacrifice one goal in pursuit of the other? ~Alyssa Heinze
