Evaluating the Minority Candidate Penalty with a Regression Discontinuity Approach
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evaluating-the-minority-candidate-penalty-with-a-regression-discontinuity-approach.pdf
Description
Published version
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299.37 KB
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Adobe PDF
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Author(s)
White, Ariel
Shah, Paru
Juenke, Eric Gonzalez
Fraga, Bernard L
Date Issued
January 8, 2024
Journal
British Journal of Political Science
Publisher
Cambridge University Press
Citation
White A, Shah P, Juenke EG, Fraga BL. Evaluating the Minority Candidate Penalty with a Regression Discontinuity Approach. British Journal of Political Science. 2024;54(3):1006-1013.
Version
Final published version
Abstract
Do parties face an electoral penalty when they nominate candidates of colour? We employ a regression discontinuity design using state legislative election data from 2018, 2019, and 2020 to isolate the effect of nominating a candidate of colour on a party's general election performance. Utilising this approach with real-world data heightens external validity relative to existing racial penalty studies, largely supported by surveys and experiments. We find no evidence that candidates of colour are disadvantaged in state legislative general elections relative to narrowly nominated white candidates from the same party. These findings challenge the leading explanations for the underrepresentation of racial/ethnic minority groups, with implications for candidate selection across the United States.
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DOI of Published Version
https://doi.org/10.1017/S0007123423000583
