Hate is in the airThe effect of the Czech and German radio on the elections in prewar

Czechoslovakia

B. Baranek, K. Krotil & S. Skoda

June 26, 2014

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Motivation

Media matters. Right?I Which outcomes are most affected?I How powerful is media?I Is really a watchdog of democracy?

Initial studies find small or nil effectsI Self-selection problem!I People follow media according their prior beliefs and preferencesI Prior beliefs only reinforced by media

Need for exogeneous variation

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Our setting

Effect of radio on 1935 elections in CzechoslovakiaI Stable democratic institutionsI Almost one third of the population is German

Advance of the radioI In 1935 roughly 40% of households owned a receiverI Both Czech and German radio available

German radio becomes strongly pro-Nazi in 1933I Nazis restrict access to radio for political opponentsI ”I consider radio to be the most modern and the most crucial

instrument for influencing the masses.” – Joseph GoebbelsI Broadcasts from rallies and demonstrations

Czech radio stays apolitical

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Three questions

I Does Nazi propaganda affect electoral outcomes in Czechoslovakia?

II Does an apolitical radio hinder the effects of Nazi propaganda?

III Which parties are most affected by the radio? Nazi propaganda mightbackfire...

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Empirical strategy

We use geography as a source of exogenous variation

Irregular Terrain Model (as in Adena et al., 2014)I we want to recover spatial radio availability in 1930s CzechoslovakiaI historical data on transmitters in Czechoslovakia and Germany

F geographical location, antenna height, transmitter power, frequency

Physics of broadcasting26 AMERICAN ECONOMIC JOURNAL: APPLIED ECONOMICS OCTOBER 2009

This “predicted signal strength” captures both the effects of topography as well as the facts that some subdistricts are simply closer to transmission locations than others. To isolate the effect of topography, I do an analogous exercise, also using the ITM model, to get the “predicted free-space signal strength” for each channel in each subdistrict (i.e., the signal strength that would have been obtained in that sub-district if there was a direct line of sight between the transmitter and the receiver). By controlling flexibly for the “predicted free-space signal strength” of each chan-nel, I can isolate the variation in signal strength that is due only to topographical idiosyncrasies and the curvature of the earth.

To examine whether the model of signal transmission accurately predicts televi-sion reception, Figure 3 shows the relationship between predicted signal strength and actual reception. For each channel, I plot the results of a Jianqing Fan (1992) non-parametric, locally weighted regression, where the dependent variable is whether the village head reports that the channel can be received in the village and the indepen-dent variable is the predicted signal strength (labeled “Power” in the Figure). The dashed lines indicate bootstrapped 95 percent confidence intervals. Figure 3 shows a strong, positive, and tightly estimated relationship between predicted signal strength and the percent of villages that report being able to receive the channel for each of the 11 channels I examine. Moreover, the S-shape relationship between signal strength and television reception appears virtually identical for all channels.

Given that the model predicts reception, the next question is whether there is sig-nificant statistical power to identify the residual impact of television using only the variation in signal strength caused by topography. To investigate this, I estimate the following model:

(4) NUMCHANNELSsd = αd + γ1SIGNALsd + γ2FREEsd + X sd δ1

+ δ2 GEOGRAPHYsd + εsd,

1,000

750

500

250

0

Aerialheight

Height ofground

0 20 40 60 80 100

Distance d/km

Height/m

Sea level

Figure 2. The Physics of Broadcasting

Notes: The dotted areas denote reduced reception; the hatched areas show regions of almost nil reception. In the mountain to the left, the area of no reception is caused by the tight angle of refraction required. In the mountain to the right, the area of no reception is caused by double-refraction off the primary and secondary peak. The figure and description are reproduced with permission from Ellington, Addinall, and Hately (1980).

Source: Ellington, Addinall and Hately (1980)

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Availability of radio

Relative signal strength of German (left) and Czech radio (right)

best signal worst signal best signal worst signal

Share of German population

100% 70% 50% 30% 20% 10% 0%

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Model

To estimate the effect of exposure to radio on electoral outcomes weuse:

Specification

vote shareij = β0j + β1jCzech signali + β2jGerman signali + β3jXi + εij

vote shareij is vote share of party j in judicial county i

Czech signali and German signali are measures of radio signalstrength in county i

Xi is a set of county-specific controls

εij is an idiosyncratic error

Identification:

Cov(Czech signali , εij |Xi ) = Cov(German signali , εij |Xi ) = 0

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Results

(1) (2) (3) (4) (5) (6) (7) (8)pAB pBdL pCSDSD pCSL pCSNS pCSZOSS pDCV pDSDAP

5050powerA 0.000499 0.000180 -0.000766 -0.0000638 0.000887 0.00000252 -0.00185⇤ -0.00108(.) (0.00127) (0.00216) (0.00191) (0.00129) (0.000578) (0.00102) (0.00134)

N 10 181 181 181 181 181 177 181adj. R2 . 0.549 0.512 0.588 0.655 0.862 0.485 0.696

Standard errors in parentheses⇤ p < 0.10, ⇤⇤ p < 0.05, ⇤⇤⇤ p < 0.01

(1) (2) (3) (4) (5) (6) (7) (8)pHSD pKKSMNSW pKSC pNarSj pNOF pNSjUZ pRSZML pSDP

5050powerA 0.0000710 -0.000293⇤ 0.000522 0.000131 -0.00219⇤⇤ 0.000130 0.00117 0.00304(0.000189) (0.000161) (0.00145) (0.000891) (0.00107) (0.000119) (0.00229) (0.00198)

N 100 167 181 181 167 50 181 181adj. R2 0.178 0.421 0.300 0.605 0.228 0.381 0.760 0.948

Standard errors in parentheses⇤ p < 0.10, ⇤⇤ p < 0.05, ⇤⇤⇤ p < 0.01

Table 1: Main results

CSDSD (CZ) DSAP (DE) KSC (CZ) NarSj (CZ) RSZML (CZ) SdP (DE)mainstream mainstream communist nationalist mainstream nationalist

Czech signal strength -0.00018 0.00059⇤⇤⇤ 0.00031⇤ -0.00039⇤⇤⇤ 0.0001 -0.0014⇤⇤

(0.00017) (0.00018) (0.00017) (0.00014) (0.00017) (0.00057)

German signal strength -0.00061⇤⇤⇤ -0.000174 0.0005⇤ 0.00034⇤ -0.00041⇤ 0.0019⇤⇤

(0.00021) (0.00028) (0.0003) (0.00021) (0.00023) (0.00084)ethnicity controls yes yes yes yes yes yesvoting controls yes yes yes yes yes yespopulation controls yes yes yes yes yes yeseconomic controls yes yes yes yes yes yesdemographic controls yes yes yes yes yes yesreligion controls yes yes yes yes yes yesN 328 328 328 328 328 328adj. R2 0.928 0.912 0.839 0.744 0.967 0.951

Note: Standard errors clustered by political county in parenthesis. *** p < 0.01, ** p < 0.05, * p < 0.1.

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In sum

German radio availability associated with voters’ radicalizationI increase in signal strength by one standard deviation yields additional

1.1 percentage point for SdPI increase in support for Czech nationalists and communistsI detrimental impact on the vote shares of Czech mainstream parties

Moderating effect of Czech apolitical radioI increase in signal strength by one standard deviation leads to a

decrease in the vote share of SdP by 1.5 percentage pointsI decrease in support for Czech nationalistsI positive effect on the vote share of pro-democracy, pro-government

DSAP

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Placebo test

Table 2: Placebo test with 1929 elections

CSDSD (CZ) DSAP (DE) KSC (CZ) NarSj (CZ) RSZML (CZ) SdP (DE)mainstream mainstream communist nationalist mainstream nationalist

Czech signal strength -0.00016 0.00029 -0.00039⇤ -0.00031 0.001⇤ -0.00036(0.00027) (0.00023) (0.00023) (0.0002) (0.00056) (0.00092)

German signal strength -0.000087 0.00037 0.00022 0.00013 -0.000031 -0.000099(0.00035) (0.00028) (0.00029) (0.00034) (0.00051) (0.00098)

ethnicity controls yes yes yes yes yes yesvoting controls yes yes yes yes yes yespopulation controls yes yes yes yes yes yeseconomic controls yes yes yes yes yes yesdemographic controls yes yes yes yes yes yesreligion controls yes yes yes yes yes yesN 328 328 328 328 328 284adj. R2 0.921 0.948 0.813 0.485 0.807 0.489

Note: Standard errors clustered by political county in parenthesis. *** p < 0.01, ** p < 0.05, * p < 0.1.

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Three conclusions

I German broadcast had significant effect on elections in Czechoslovakia

II However, Czech apolitical radio alleviated Nazi propaganda

III German radio was beneficial for extremists on both sides of thespectrum

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Thank you for your attention!

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