Elections and change of power in Rio Grande do Sul: analysis in the municipalities of the state

Abstract

The importance of reelection in the electoral process is due to the possibility of a governor to conduct his mandate well, in order to obtain greater chances of remaining in power and carrying out larger projects, and benefiting a larger group of people. Considering the importance of reelection, the present study seeks to analyze the impact of the elections and change of power in the municipalities of Rio Grande do Sul, verifying the change of the development variables according to the alternation or not of power by regions of the state. The research is characterized as descriptive and quantitative, and takes advantage of electoral data between 1992 and 2016 of the municipalities of Rio Grande do Sul and related to development variables. It can be noticed that the state presents some oscillations between the number of parties that remain in power, besides that it is verified that the development variables influence both negatively and positively. In total there were reelections in only 36.23% of the analyzed cases. It is also possible to notice that there are parties that stand out more in one region than another, and the reelection rates follow the same logic, because in some regions there are more reelections than in others. Therefore, it is necessary to understand these differences, and that the preference for a party is made due to the actions carried out in the management, influenced by historical issues, since some municipalities are one or two party constituencies, as well as the degree of caption to the causes and issues related to the population.