We study if women and ethnic minorities face similar barriers to political representation and test if affirmative action for one group (gender) facilitates representation of the other. Our panel data come from electoral ballots in 290 Swedish municipal elections and covers the introduction of a zipper style gender quota in the largest political party. Before the quota, we find a positive correlation between female and ethnic minority shares of municipal legislators, driven by more women being elected in localities with larger ethnic minority populations. Regarding the quota we find no evidence of a direct impact. The proportions of ethnic minority individuals among the elected women – and men – remained the same after the quota was adopted. This is also true when assessing the effects after two election periods and for various measures of ethnic minority representation. Despite the small direct impact we however find evidence of an indirect effect whereby the gender quota facilitated the adoption of a soft quota on ethnic minority representation about a decade later in time.
The paper is co-authored by Lenita Freidenvall, Olof Folke and Johanna Rickne
