Do Disabled Candidates Represent Disabled Citizens?

Stefanie Reher

doi:10.1017/s0007123420000733

Abstract

AbstractWhether citizens are better represented by politicians ‘like them’ has been the subject of much debate and analysis. Yet, this scholarship has largely ignored the 1 in 5 people who are disabled and experience economic, social and political marginalization. Linking voter and candidate data from the 2015 British general election, this study examines whether disabled citizens are better represented by disabled elites. It analyses the effects of disability on both preferences and preference congruence. The findings reveal that disabled citizens and candidates are more supportive of healthcare and general public spending, even within parties. At the same time, the views of disabled citizens are rarely more congruent with the positions of disabled candidates than those of non-disabled candidates, except on healthcare spending. The study provides ground-breaking insights into the role of disability in policy preferences and political representation while also highlighting broader implications of how the descriptive–substantive representation link is analysed.

Highlights

Disability preference gaps among both candidates and citizens exist across political parties but remain significant when controlling for party affiliation, which suggests that the interests of disabled people have not been fully integrated into party politics
Many disabled people have common experiences that are not shared by non-disabled people, leading to distinct political preferences and priorities, as this study has confirmed in the UK context
Gastil 2000; Mattila et al 2017; Schur and Adya 2013). This raises the question of whether comparable disability gaps exist in the political preferences of political elites, and whether disabled citizens are as a result better represented by disabled politicians

Summary

Introduction

Preference congruence could be considered a direct translation of the concept of substantive representation: politicians whose views are more similar to those of a group of citizens should be more likely to promote the policy positions of that group. Given that the number of disabled candidates in the sample is fairly small, we can still consider this finding as a likely indication of parallel preference gaps among citizens and elites both across and within parties.

Results

Conclusion