Descriptive Elections: Empowering the American Electorate

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Elections are in trouble with general low levels of interest and turnout; Jeanette Morehouse Mendez and Rebekah Herrick suggest that if candidates looked more like America does, these problems would decrease. They call these elections where candidates differ in key social demographic traits descriptive elections. They predict that races that have candidates of different race and/or gender will see higher voter turnout out, because voters will be more interested in these races and will have less alienation and indifference. In addition, they predict that voters stereotypes/gender preferences, as well as elite behavior, can contribute to greater voter engagement. They also predict that campaigns in these elections will discuss a wider variety of issues, and the media will do likewise. They test their expectations by examining the gender mix of candidates in gubernatorial, congressional, and state legislative races. The results suggest that voters in mixed-gender and women-only elections have less alienation, less indifference, and greater interest. They also are more likely to vote. The results offer more modest evidence that campaigns and media coverage differ in these races. Thus the authors conclude that voters gender stereotypes and preferences have a larger effect on voters engagements in descriptive elections.

Reviews

Mendez and Herrick offer a fresh perspective on diversity and U.S. elections. With new data and a host of analyses, they advance the notion of descriptive elections and identify the significance of different types of elections for voter engagement and turnout. They show that mixed-gender contests can alter attitudes and behavior, providing important evidence of how voters use gender as a cue. With attention to multiple levels of office and a focus on electoral contestsrather than candidatesthis book advances representation research in interesting ways. -- Kira Sanbonmatsu, Rutgers University
Jeanette Morehouse Mendez and Rebecca Herrick provide a novel framework for analyzing elections based on the demographic characteristics of candidates and modeled on the concept of descriptive representation. Focusing on the gender composition of opposing candidates in races at congressional, gubernatorial, and state legislative levels, they find that gender diversity has its strongest effects, leading to higher levels of both engagement and turnout, in races where a Democratic woman runs against a Republican man. The authors' research provides convincing evidence for the utility of their descriptive elections framework, underscores the importance of gender as a category of analysis in understanding election results, and bolsters the authors' contention that diverse candidates are good for democracy. -- Susan J. Carroll, Co-author of A Seat at the Table: Congresswomens Perspectives on Why Their Presence Matters, Rutgers University

Author Bio

Jeanette Morehouse Mendez is professor and head of the Political Science Department at Oklahoma State University. Rebekah Herrick is professor of political science at Oklahoma State University.