You can represent the others, but you can’t represent their positions: Partisan effects on the link between descriptive and substantive representation

In the burgeoning literature on descriptive and substantive representation the role and effect of institutions remains comparatively understudied. In our paper we look at parties and ask how they affect the link between descriptive and substantive representation. We start from the assumption that representation unfolds along a multistage, multidimensional process. Parties are central institutions shaping this process at the different stages of recruitment, elections or parliamentary practices. And while we know that there are ideological differences between parties when it comes to the representation of different groups, we lack empirical insights in how this affects the link between descriptive and substantive representation. In a survey experiment with 400 respondents, we described a fictitious race between an - identical - Green Party candidate and a person with varying characteristics running for the CDU. Respondent were asked to imagine that he or she had moved to a constituency where there was a close race between these two individuals. Here, the person running for the CDU is male or female, homosexual or heterosexual, and has a policy focus on tax policy, gender equality policy, or LGBTQI policy. After the brief portraits of the two individuals, respondents are asked to indicate the extent to which they think the individuals are credible, how they rate the individuals overall on a -5/+5 scalometer, how well the individuals fit with their respective parties, and which of the two they would vote for. Our results show that the fit question in particular is massively affected by experimental variation-as opposed to the other characteristics. Compared to a heterosexual man with a focus on tax policy, already descriptive characteristics (woman, homosexuality) reduce the fit. The values collapse dramatically when policies in the sense of equality are added to these descriptive characteristics. Our paper thus underlines the importance of party context as factor mediating how strongly descriptive representation translates into substantive representation. Heterogeneity in descriptive characteristics of representatives might be increasingly accepted for almost all parties, but heterogeneity in substantive positions is not.