The Role of Economic Development in Voting Behavior: Evidences from Iran's Presidential Elections

Document Type : Research Paper

Authors

1 Department of Political Sciences, Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences, Ardakan University, Ardakan, Iran.

2 Department of Economics, Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences, Ardakan University, Ardakan, Iran.

10.22099/ijes.2026.55099.2087

Abstract

This research examines the relationship between economic development and the voting behavior of eligible voters in the presidential elections of the I.R.I. As well as analyzes the impact of development levels in Iranian regions on political participation. This study is applied in terms of its objective and analytic considering its subject matter. To this aim, the data and information required to examine the above relationship for the country's provinces in 9th to 13th presidential election periods were extracted from statistical yearbooks and reports of the Statistical Center of Iran. The panel data econometric method was used to determine this relationship. The independent variables of this research included the average composite index of economic development,  average of infrastructure index,  average of coefficient, and  average of inflation rate for 30 provinces of the country during the periods 2001-2005, 2006-2009, 2010-2013, 2014-2017, and 2018-2021. Also, the average of participation rate in presidential elections for each province was also considered as a dependent variable. The results of this study revealed that among the independent variables, the impact of the economic development index on the political participation rate was statistically positive and significant with a coefficient of 0.31, while the inflation rate had a negative and significant effect with a coefficient of -0.62. In other words, the negative influence of the inflation rate on the political participation rate was estimated to be twice the positive impact of economic development on the political participation rate in the country's provinces. This suggests that voters gave more value and weight to immediate and short-term factors (such as inflation). Further, the results of the one-way ANOVA indicated that although the level of provincial development creates a significant difference in the average participation rate of provinces in presidential elections, being a border province is not a significant factor in the average participation rate of provinces in elections.

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Main Subjects

References

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History

  • Receive Date: 04 December 2025
  • Revise Date: 22 January 2026
  • Accept Date: 24 January 2026

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