Editing Political party (section)

===Uses for party funds===
There are many ways in which political parties may deploy money in order to secure better electoral outcomes. Parties often spend money to train activists, recruit volunteers, create and deploy advertisements, conduct research and support for their leadership in between elections, and promote their policy agenda.<ref name=fisher04/> Many political parties and candidates engage in a practice called [[clientelism]], in which they distribute material rewards to people in exchange for political support; in many countries this is illegal, though even where it is illegal it may nevertheless be widespread in practice.<ref>{{cite book |first=Daniel |last=Corstange |year=2016 |title=The Price of a Vote in the Middle East: Clientelism and Communal Politics in Lebanon and Yemen |publisher=Cambridge University Press |page=8 |isbn=978-1107106673}}</ref> Some parties engage directly in [[vote buying]], in which a party gives money to a person in exchange for their vote.<ref>{{cite journal |first=Cesi |last=Cruz |title=Social Networks and the Targeting of Vote Buying |journal=Comparative Political Studies |volume=52 |issue=3 |pages=382–411 |date=7 August 2018 |doi=10.1177/0010414018784062|s2cid=158712487 |doi-access=free }}</ref>

Though it may be crucial for a party to spend more than some threshold to win a given election, there are typically [[diminishing returns]] for expenses during a campaign.<ref>{{cite journal |author1=Chris W. Bonneau |author2=Damon M. Cann |title=Campaign Spending, Diminishing Marginal Returns, and Campaign Finance Restrictions in Judicial Elections |journal=The Journal of Politics |volume=73 |issue=4 |pages=1267–1280 |date=October 2011 |doi=10.1017/S0022381611000934}}</ref> Once a party has crossed a particular spending threshold, additional expenditures might not increase their chance of success.<ref>{{cite web |url=https://blogs.lse.ac.uk/usappblog/2020/11/27/the-2020-election-was-the-most-expensive-in-history-but-campaign-spending-does-not-always-lead-to-success/ |title=The 2020 election was the most expensive in history, but campaign spending does not always lead to success |publisher=[[London School of Economics]] |date=27 November 2020 |first=William |last=Horncastle |access-date=22 January 2021 |archive-date=16 January 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210116041427/https://blogs.lse.ac.uk/usappblog/2020/11/27/the-2020-election-was-the-most-expensive-in-history-but-campaign-spending-does-not-always-lead-to-success/ |url-status=live }}</ref>