Who Enters Politics and Why?

Author: Saad Gulzar

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Abstract

Despite the importance of politicians, empirical work rarely examines who decides to enter politics and why. This survey presents conceptual issues in measuring political entry; reviews work on individual, organizational, and institutional determinants of political entry; and summarizes the main findings and puzzles related to the representation/competence trade-off in recent microcensus studies on who runs for office. Fruitful directions for future work are highlighted throughout the article.