Countryside champions or urban allies? What rural and urban citizens want from elected representatives

Abstract

The rural-urban divide plays an increasingly clear role in many democracies. Theories suggest institutions and politicians are judged partially based on how people perceive them to represent their kinds of communities. However, the criteria they use for rural/urban representation, and the weight they give it in political choice, remain obscure. What do rural and urban citizens want from their elected representatives? Do rural voters prefer rural ‘champions’ as their representatives? Are urbanites equally drawn to ‘pro-urban’ politicians? We use a pre-registered candidate choice conjoint experiment in Britain with a large rural oversample (n=3270), varying politicians’ residential history, engagement with rural/urban interest groups, affective stance towards rural/urban areas, and advocacy on behalf of rural/urban areas beyond the constituency. Consistent with theory, ruralites generally place greater emphasis on place-based representation. They reward candidates with histories of rural residence (while urbanites do not value urban residence), and for advocating for similar areas outside the locality. They place greater value on politicians working with interest groups representing their area type. Ruralites are also more rewarding of positive in-group affect and unlike urbanites, do not punish candidates for negative, resentful affect about outgroup areas. These effects are pronounced among resentful ruralites, as they tend to favour candidates with an explicitly rural focus of representation.

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ORCID for Lawrence McKay: orcid.org/0000-0002-2071-3943

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