The Political Glass Cliff: Understanding How Seat Selection Contributes to the Underperformance of Ethnic Minority Candidates

This is the author accepted manuscript. The final version is available from SAGE Publications via the DOI in this record.An archival study of U.K. General Election results from 2001, 2005, and 2010 revealed that Conservative black and minority ethnic (BME) candidates were less successful than their white counterparts. However, mediation analyses demonstrate that this lack of success can be explained by the lower winnability of BME candidates’ seats, such that the opposition candidate held a seat with a significantly larger majority compared with white candidates’ opponents. Results and implications are discussed in the framework of the “glass cliff,” previously demonstrated for women, in the sense that the seats minority groups contested were harder to win compared with majority groups.The author(s) disclosed receipt of the following financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article: This project was supported by the European Social Fund (Ref: 4130) and by a grant from the Economic and Social Research Council (RES 062 23 0135)