How Voters Evaluate Candidate Gender: Experimental Evidence from Malawi

• In Event: Experimental Studies on the Grassroots Participation and Representation of Women

Abstract

How does gender interact with other candidate characteristics to affect voter bias? Whereas considerable research has sought to identify whether voters’ express taste-based or statistical discrimination against female candidates across various contexts, little work has sought to determine how gender intersects with other candidate features as voters evaluate candidates. We design a conjoint experiment varying candidate profiles from Malawi’s local elections to examine which candidate features in conjunction with gender lead to greater voter support. Our candidate profiles vary such features as party and party support, political experience, ethnicity, campaign financing, and religion. The results will allow us to analyze if and how voters evaluate female candidates with distinct features relative to how they evaluate male candidates with the same characteristics. Additionally, the profiles vary the candidate’s chosen policy focus – a gendered area (e.g. domestic violence) or a non-gendered area (e.g. education) - allowing us to assess how candidate gender interacts with voters’ policy preferences to affect candidate support.

We will field our survey experiment in two locations in Malawi in summer 2017. In particular, we will sample respondents in rural, northern Kasungu District and in the town of Kasungu, the district capital. We focus on Kasungu because it includes both matrilineal and patrilineal ethnic groups, and we can compare urban and rural settings. We currently have the complete list of candidates from the 2014 local elections from the Malawi Electoral Commission (MEC), which identifies the gender, party affiliation, and vote share associated with each candidate – and are currently collecting additional candidate biographical information to inform the experimental candidate profiles. The results of this project will add insight into work related to voter bias and women’s underrepresentation, and we envision the results will inform the design of future experimental interventions aimed at reducing citizen bias towards female candidates in the lead up to the 2019 local elections in Malawi.

Authors

• Amanda Clayton, Vanderbilt University

• Martha C. Johnson, Mills College

• Ragnhild Louise Muriaas, University of Bergen

• Amanda Lea Robinson, Ohio State University