I am an applied microeconomist specializing in political economy and behavioral economics. My work is defined by two primary research tracks:
Political Economy: I focus on public procurement, public service delivery, and distributive politics.
Behavioral Economics: I study the role of beliefs, social norms, and complexity in decision-making.
My research agenda specifically regarding the role of complexity in decision-making has recently been granted funding by the EU Horizon Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions PF Grant and the International Fellowship for Early Stage Researchers Program of the Scientific and Technological Research Council of Türkiye (TÜBİTAK).
Call for Applications: I am seeking a PhD student to collaborate on this funded project regarding complexity in decision-making. Interested candidates are encouraged to contact me at mkaba@ku.edu.tr.
Using data from over 2,000 professionals in 24 large corporations in Turkiye, we explore the relationship between female leadership and the relational culture in the workplace. First, we document that while male and female leaders possess equal cognitive capacity, they diverge in socio-emotional characteristics. Next, we show that the relational dynamics in the workplace are different under male or female leadership. Male employees form homophilic professional ties under male leadership, whereas we observe less gender-segregated networks under female leadership where both males and females establish more links with their female colleagues. Female employees receive more support from their leaders and are less likely to quit under female leadership. However, female employees working under female leaders report worse workplace satisfaction and meritocracy. Delving into the mechanisms reveals that female employees depict a gloomier workplace climate in the absence of social support from their female leader. Overall, our findings highlight the influential role of social support from leaders and suggest that increasing supportive female presence in leadership positions may be an effective way to foster a more inclusive relational culture in the workplace.
Social Norms, Political Polarization, and Vaccination Attitudes: Evidence from a Survey Experiment in Turkey, European Economic Review, 2024. (with Murat Koyuncu, Sebastian Schneider and Matthias Sutter) Paper
This paper examines vaccination as a descriptive social norm in the context of the Covid-19 pandemic. Using a large-scale survey experiment in Turkey, we first elicit respondents' vaccination attitudes and show that political affiliation is a strong predictor of it. We then use economic games to measure the extent of outgroup discrimination induced by respondents' attitudes towards vaccination. We find that while both pro- and anti-vaxxers discriminate against each other substantially, the pro-vaxxers discriminate more than the anti-vaxxers do. This polarization intensifies when pro- and anti-vaxxers perceive a political difference between them. Using randomized informational treatments, we show that a reminder or priming of external threats, appealing to a broadly shared social identity, might mitigate such outgroup discrimination.
Who Buys Vote-buying? How, how much, and at what cost?, Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, 2022. Paper
In this paper, I estimate the causal effect of a local food-subsidy program on electoral outcomes. I exploit the variation in voters’ walking distances from the program stores to identify their accessibility to the program. I find that a distributive spending of ~5% of GDP per capita buys an additional vote for the incumbent. I then investigate who –based on partisanship– responds to the subsidy, and how much and how they respond. The findings indicate that all types of voters respond to the distributive spending in line with the reciprocity rule; however, they respond through different channels and in different magnitude. Importantly, the salient channel for opposition voters is abstention-buying, whereas incumbent supporters respond by an increased turnout.
This paper investigates the impact of authoritarian takeovers on the rule of law and economic efficiency in local jurisdictions. Authoritarian takeovers refer to the replacement of elected officials with centrally appointed representatives. Using the universe of state contracts in Turkey and a staggered Difference-in-Differences (DiD) design, we show how authoritarian takeovers deteriorate the rule of law and reduce economic efficiency in public procurement. Notably, centrally appointed mayors use competitive auctions at a rate nearly half that of elected mayors and instead exploit legal provisions almost three times as often. Such practices inflate contract prices by 24% and reduce value for money by 40%, causing waste equivalent to 6% of procurement spending in the affected municipalities. These results are robust to various tests, including Regression Discontinuity (RD) estimation. Probing the underlying mechanisms, we find evidence for diminished local accountability driving these effects. By contrast, we do not find evidence for either the coordination benefits from a more centralized governance or politicians' discretion leading to quality improvements in procurement. In an era of global autocratization, our sub-national evidence on authoritarian takeovers underscores the instrumental value of democracy.
Class Voting and Economic Policy Preferences: A Machine Learning Approach Working Paper
Policy preferences are assumed to have become less anchored in social class due to rising living standards, the broadening reach of education, and increased social mobility. However, there has yet to be a systematic approach to gauging the extent of class-based distinctions in economic policy preferences and their evolution across time and space. In this study, using predictive modeling, I introduce a novel metric for assessing class distinctiveness in economic policy preferences and estimate it for 18 European countries at three different points in time. I then validate this innovative measure and delve into its implications for class-based voting.
Work in Progress
Decisions under Narrative Complexity (with Cavit Görkem Destan and Simay Küçükkolbaşı
Local Responses to a Global Crisis: Public Service Delivery in Turkish Municipalities Amidst Migrant Influx (with Serkant Adiguzel and Murat Koyuncu)
Is Seeing Believing? How Public Service Visibility Influences Local Government Spending and Procurement Policies (with Serkant Adiguzel, Asli Cansunar and Murat Koyuncu)
Social Identity and Policy Preferences: Evidence from a Large-scale Survey Experiment in the U.S. (with Matthias Sutter)
