Relation between electoral advertising, money and government evaluation in the performance of candidates in the majority elections in Brazil

Abstract This article presents an analysis of the electoral performance of 1,281 candidates who disputed elections for president, governors and mayor of capitals between 2002 and 2014 in Brazil. To do so, we used a set of variables in a multiple linear regression model to describe the combined effects of electoral advertising, campaign spending, and government evaluation of candidate performance. The results show that the impact of the variables will depend on the type of candidate. For example, electoral advertising more effectively explains votes for opposition candidates, while positive government evaluations are the strongest predictive variable for re-election candidates. With this, we hope to contribute to the literature on elections in Brazil, showing the importance of distinguishing between incumbents seeking re-election from opposition candidates.