Success Denied: Social Class and Perceptions of Political Success

Abstract

The working class are poorly represented in democratic institutions across the world, despite substantial evidence that the public do not discriminate against working-class candidates and view them more positively across numerous character traits. We propose a novel explanation: a pragmatism bias where working-class individuals are perceived as less likely to achieve political success. We provide experimental evidence that this bias may operate at multiple stages of the political process. We go beyond existing work by using a multidimensional operationalization of class to show that contemporary class has the largest effects on perceived chances of political success. Finally, we show that this cannot be remedied by social mobility, and high-income individuals are more likely to display this belief.