Are young candidates “sacrificial lambs”? Evidence from the 2012, 2017, and 2022 French legislative elections

Abstract

The underrepresentation of young adults is widespread in the parliaments of Western democracies. Yet evidence suggests that voters do not have a negative bias towards young candidates. In this article, we focus on another factor that may contribute to youth underrepresentation: the level of competitiveness in districts where political parties nominate young people. Using data on all candidates who ran for a major political party/coalition in the 2012, 2017, and 2022 French legislative elections, we attempt to determine whether young adults tend to be nominated in districts where they have little or no chance of winning. To do so, we use three different measures of district competitiveness. Our results show that young people – and especially young women – are more likely than others to be “sacrificial lambs”. Our analyses nevertheless indicate that men aged between 31 and 35 have become almost as competitive as older people in 2022.