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Abstract: Discussions around electability are central in election campaigns, often targeting minority candidates. This paper examines two related questions: Why do electability concerns strongly affect minority candidates? How can we contrast such concerns? Focusing on voters’ perspective, I argue that three main factors fuel electability concerns, including perceptions of lack of electoral support for minority candidates, voters’ own prejudice, and the scarcity of successful examples of minority candidates. I also explain that providing voters with information on actual public support for minority rights and candidates reduces electability concerns. I test my expectations on minority candidates by focusing on LGBTQ+ candidates. I rely on three original datasets: the largest survey to date of LGBTQ+ candidates, which includes about 500 candidates; and two voter surveys, each conducted with about 2,000 U.S. respondents, where I embedded conjoint and priming experiments. Reducing electability concerns is important to avoid that they become self-fulfilling prophecies.   

The Political Science Seminar Series is convened by Rachel Bernhard and Tarik Abou-Chadi. For more information on this or any of the seminars in the series, please contact politics.secretary@nuffield.ox.ac.uk.