Youth Advantage vs. Gender Penalty. Selecting and Electing Young Candidates

Young women and men are underrepresented in formal politics. While this may be a mere projection of their lack among voters and party members, this article investigates whether young candidates face specific structural disadvantages once they run for election. Why and how do the age and gender of candidates impact their electoral performance? The article answers these questions based on a mixed-methods study of the 2019 Irish local elections. In these elections, middle-aged male candidates fared best; followed by young male, young female, and middle-aged female candidate. Thus, age effects seem to play out differently for men and women. How can those hierarchies be explained? Drawing on 33 interviews with party members, local politicians, and election candidates, the article identifies access to political, dynastic, and financial resources as important criteria in candidate selection and election. The hypotheses derived from the interviews are subsequently tested on an original dataset of over 1880 local election candidates. The findings suggest that access to electoral resources significantly varies by candidate age and gender and mediates a good share of the latter’s impact on electoral performance: Young candidates have, on average, lower levels of political experience, but are more likely to profit from the positive effects of a known family name. The access to campaign funding does not vary by candidate gender and age. When controlling for access to electoral resources, being young can in fact provide a net electoral advantage to candidates. It does however only do so for young men. In contrast, young female candidates appear to be advantaged by their age but penalized by their gender. The article bridges the literatures on gender & politics and electoral studies to understand political inequality at the intersection of age and gender. It thereby contributes to a broader understanding of how gender interacts with other candidate characteristics in selection and election processes.