The Risks of Knowing It All: Unequal Representation Caused by Political Expertise

• In Event: Political Elites, Economic Inequality and Unequal Representation

Abstract

Research has almost systematically shown that the preferences of richer citizens are better represented in parliament and policies than those of the poor. However, considering the increased emphasis on expertise on politics and policy-making, we argue that also education will play such a role, and that today education may be a more defining cleavage than income simply because the higher educated have also gained more access to politics over time. We will test this expectation by looking at citizen representative congruence across 10 different policy issues in Norway. Moreover, we examine which representatives are generally more (equally) congruent with citizen preferences, and whether parties are more (equally) congruent on issues they ‘own’ rather than issues that are more generally part of their portfolio.

Authors

• Yvette Peters, University of Bergen

• Troy Saghaug Broderstad

• Trajche Z. Panov, University of Bergen