Linking Pre-Parliamentary Political Experience and the Career Trajectories of the 1997 General Election Cohort’, Parliamentary Affairs, Advance Access published 11

This article uses empirical data to establish and analyse the links between pre-parliamentary political experience and career trajectory once elected to the House of Commons. It suggests a move away from the existing occupation focused frameworks towards a broader ‘political experience ’ approach which distinguishes between traditional and non-traditional routes into Parliament. The framework is validated using data focusing on the 1997 cohort of newly elected Members of Parliament. It tracks the political careers of these individuals, asking who reaches the top positions, at what speed and whether there is a relationship between career trajectory and pre-parliamentary political experience. Classifying, analysing and discussing the pre-parliamentary lives of Members of Parliament (MPs) has been a sustained focus of scholars in recent decades (Norris and Lovenduski, 1995; Cairney, 2007). Patterns of pre-parliamentary pol-itical experience amongst MPs are changing, with traditional backgrounds in elected service giving way to professionalised, full-time paid and unelected roles, often within political party structures (Cowley, 2012). Following th