Top-Down Representation: How State Politicians Impact Local Elections in India

• In Event: Elections, Parties, and Representation in Non-Western Democracies

Abstract

Can descriptive representation of marginalized identity groups at higher levels of office influence their political prospects at the local level? A large body of research studies the reverse, highlighting how the local representation of marginalized groups can improve subsequent higher-level electoral outcomes by improving candidate supply, career progression, and grassroots organization. Much of this research focuses on the Indian context and studies groups such as Scheduled Castes and women who have political reservations that help bring them into office. In this paper, we focus on Indian Muslims, a theoretically distinct marginalized group who are not targetted by institutional protections to help them gain power at any level of government. We collect a new dataset of local panchayat (village council) elections across ten years in India’s largest state, code candidate religion, and use several administrative datasets to match each panchayat to a state assembly constituency. Using descriptive and quasi-experimental analysis, we consistently find that Muslim state-level representation increases Muslim candidacy and likelihood of winning in village councils, but primarily for the least-marginalized Muslims. We study the mechanisms underlying the effects through qualitative interviews with voters, candidates, and elected politicians in two sets of paired assembly constituencies that are similar across many dimensions except for the identity of their higher-level politician. Overall, this project contributes to our understanding of descriptive representation, particularly for groups who gain representation without institutional protections.

Authors

• Feyaad Allie, Harvard University

• Rahul Verma, University of California, Berkeley