Controlling the Share? Party Control and the Gap between Representative Ambition and Distributional Outcomes in Germany, the Netherlands, and Switzerland

Political parties have various political and representational ambitions. However, reality often reveals a gap between (representative) ambition (e.g. gender parity) and (electoral) outcome. Using gender quotas as example for an explicitly formulated ambition, we break new ground for the disentangled analysis of selection and election processes to show how key factors explain the size of this gap. We argue that the extent to which representative ambitions can be translated into electoral outcomes depends inter alia on the control of party elites over the selection as well as the election process. Using new detailed individual level data from all (N= ~40.000) candidates and elected MPs in Germany, the Netherlands and Switzerland (1982 - 2017) we first explain how gender quotas translate into selected candidates. Then we illustrate that the electoral system is a key factor explaining the difference between the candidates selected and the electoral outcomes.