Suchergebnisse

Most academic research into minorities who run for office has been focused on African-Americans and Latinos. But how does race affect the electoral chances of Asian- Americans? In new research, Neil Visalvanich examines how voters support for candidates changes depending on whether or not the candidate is white, foreign born, or Asian-American. He finds that across all ideologies and information levels, voters prefer Asian-American candidates.

Racial stereotyping has been found to handicap African American and Latino candidates in negative ways. It is less clear how racial stereotypes may change the fortunes of Asian candidates. This paper explores the candidacies of Asian Americans with an experiment run through Amazon Mechanical Turk as well as real-world evaluations of Asian American candidates using the Cooperative Congressional Elections Study. In my experiments, I find that Asian candidates do significantly better than white candidates across different biographical scenarios (conservative, liberal, and foreign). I find that, contrary to expectations, Asian candidates are not significantly disadvantaged from being immigrant and foreign born. My experimental results mirror my observational results, which show that Asian Democrats are significantly advantaged even when compared with whites. These results indicate that Asian candidates in America face a set of racial-political stereotypes that are unique to their racial subgroup.

In what many view as a "post-racial" world, does race still have a significant influence the political behavior of whites? I argue that an increasingly racially diverse America necessitates a more dynamic look at how race might effect perceptions of minority candidates and influence public policy outcomes. In chapter 1, I test the relative role race plays in the evaluation of white voters for black, Asian, and Latino candidates of both major parties, examining observational data on Latinos and Asian candidates for the first time. I find that even after accounting for non-racial variables, white voters are less likely to vote for Hispanic and black Democrats because they are viewed as less competent and more ideologically extreme than similar white candidates. Meanwhile, I find that Asian candidates and minority Republicans are largely unaffected by these biases. In chapter 2, I examine the willingness of individuals to write their member of Congress in support of a non-racial political cause, which I experimentally treat with racial cues. I show that whites with higher levels of racial resentment are less likely to act politically in support of a policy perceived as benefiting ethnic and racial minorities. In chapter 3, I place an Asian candidate in a bi-racial electoral contest with a white candidate in three different informational contexts - a low-information context, with few political cues, an ideological context, featuring left -right ideological cues, and a foreign information context, featuring cues that emphasize an immigrant/foreigner status. I find that in a low-information context, Asian candidates do significantly better than white candidates. This advantage is largely diminished by placing Asian candidates in an ideological contest, however. And finally, I find that, contrary to expectations, Asian candidates are not significantly disadvantaged from being immigrant and foreign born

Primary elections in the United States have been under-studied in the political science literature. Using new data to estimate the ideal points of primary election candidates and constituents, we examine the link between the ideological leanings of primary electorates and the ideological orientation of US congressional candidates. We use district-level data from the Cooperative Congressional Election Study and ideal point estimates for congressional primary election candidates to examine the role of primary electorate ideology in the selection of party nominees. We find that more extreme Republicans are more likely to win their party's primary and that Republican and Democratic candidates are responsive to different electoral constituencies.

South Asians have seen an increase in representation at all levels of US government, from Congress to the Vice Presidency, yet a paucity of work has been done examining South Asian candidates in America. The distinct nature of South Asian candidacies allows us to examine the intersection between race and religious identity and how emphasizing different social and political identities impact minority candidate evaluations. We theorize the potential effects of racial-political stereotyping of South Asians, focusing specifically on how a Hindu or Muslim background may negatively influence candidate evaluation. Additionally, we consider whether military service has any effect on evaluations of South Asian candidates as dangerous or deficient. We test this theory with a survey experiment that varies both South Asian religious identity, political ideology, and military service. Our findings indicate that white respondents are more hostile to South Asian candidates when compared to white candidates with similar biographies, and that respondents are particularly hostile to Muslim candidates. Cueing military service alleviates this handicap for Muslim candidates, but further analysis reveals that military service only improves perceptions among Democratic respondents.

AbstractParty support has a strong influence on candidate success in the primary. What remains unexplored is whether party actions during the primary are biased along racial and gender lines. Using candidate demographic data at the congressional level and measures of party support for primary candidates, we test whether parties discriminate against women and minority candidates in congressional primaries and also whether parties are strategic in their support of minority candidates in certain primaries. Our findings show parties are not biased against minority candidates and also that white women candidates receive more support from the Democratic Party than do other types of candidates. Our findings also suggest that parties do not appear to strategically support minority candidates in districts with larger populations of minorities. Lastly, we also find no significant differences in the effects of party support on the likelihood of success in the primary by candidate race or gender.