The political effects of female representation: A regression-discontinuity approach

Does the election female politicians foster female political participation? While it is often argued that representation can promote the participation of minorities and women in particular, research on this has provided mixed results. While some studies find strong effects for female participation, others find null effects. In addition, most of these studies have failed to causally identify this effect, and our understanding of the mechanisms behind this effect is still limited. In this paper, I contribute to this literature by identifying the effect of female representation on female political participation. Specifically, I use a regression-discontinuity design with close elections to test whether electing a female MP increases women’s participation in local politics in the UK. In addition to that, I make use of a panel survey to explore the mechanisms driving my results. These results are particularly important for a better understand of female and minority participation and thus have important implications.