Magnifying Minority Voices: Rise of Ethnic Minorities MPs/Candidates in the West

• In Event: Minority Representation and Reaction

Abstract

How can we explain the rising nomination and election of non-Western origin ethnic minority candidates despite the rising anti-immigration attitudes and violence across the West? Recent works argue that as the ethnic minority population rises and becomes electorally important, parties are more willing to nominate ethnic candidates. It cannot explain why despite having electorally influential non-Western origin populations since the 1990s and early 2000s ethnic minority candidates and MPs remain low in Australia, only recently rose in France, and declined in the Netherlands. Others argue that parties avoid nominating ethnic candidates in districts where anti-immigration attitudes and conflict are or are expected to be high. With rising anti-immigration attitudes across society, it would predict that a decline in ethnic candidates and MPs are more likely than a rise despite evidence to the contrary. The problem is that the analyses overlook where decisions about the nomination of ethnic candidates are made—inside parties. It is the internal rules and internal dynamics and struggles within the parties over anti-immigration policy and the nomination of ethnic candidate that determine when and where non-Western ethnic minority candidates and MPs rise and decline. Increases in ethnic candidates and MPs are most likely to rise when parties seek to balance an increasingly anti-immigration policy with an increase in ethnic candidates to appeal to both groups. This paper uses an original database of ethnic candidates, ethnic violence, and internal party rules in twenty-one Western countries including the U.S., Europe, Canada, New Zealand, and Australia to show that when and where ethnic candidates rise and decline depend only indirectly on rising ethnic conflict and directly in the internal rules and dynamics of parties.

Author

• Kimberly L. Shella, Southern Illinois University Carbondale