IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/sae/eeupol/v26y2025i1p45-65.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Do public attitudes on gender equality affect candidate selection in proportional representation systems? Evidence from European Parliament elections

Author

Listed:
  • Thomas Däubler
  • Maarja Lühiste
  • Mihail Chiru

Abstract

A shift in public attitudes towards gender equality may explain improvements we have witnessed in women’s descriptive representation. However, existing studies rely on cross-sectional comparisons, likely beset with confounding problems. To examine the causal effect of public attitudes on candidate selection, we draw on data from more than 10,000 candidacies across four European Parliament elections (1999–2014). Using a difference-in-differences approach, we compare nomination decisions in countries with major attitude changes between elections to those in the control group. We find no evidence that shifts towards more egalitarian gender attitudes lead to an increase in women candidates, neither overall nor in subgroups by electoral system or socio-cultural party positions. The heterogeneity of effects across time and space appears to be a plausible explanation for our findings.

Suggested Citation

  • Thomas Däubler & Maarja Lühiste & Mihail Chiru, 2025. "Do public attitudes on gender equality affect candidate selection in proportional representation systems? Evidence from European Parliament elections," European Union Politics, , vol. 26(1), pages 45-65, March.
    • Handle: RePEc:sae:eeupol:v:26:y:2025:i:1:p:45-65
    DOI: 10.1177/14651165241299111
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/14651165241299111
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1177/14651165241299111?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:sae:eeupol:v:26:y:2025:i:1:p:45-65. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    We have no bibliographic references for this item. You can help adding them by using this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: SAGE Publications (email available below). General contact details of provider: .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.