Candidate Qualifications and Out-Group Support: Evidence From Afghanistan

Can qualifications help candidates from historically marginalized groups win over out-group voters? We help answer this question with an original conjoint experiment fielded on a face-to-face survey conducted in three Afghan provinces between 2016 and 2017. The conjoint asked over 2,400 Afghan respondents to rank and choose between profiles of hypothetical candidates with varying gender, ethnic and educational attributes. We explore whether candidate qualifications – as measured by educational attainment – can amplify respondents’ support for hypothetical candidates from two social groups traditionally underrepresented in Afghan politics: women and Hazaras, a predominately Shi’a ethnic minority group. We find that higher qualifications consistently increase male (non-Hazara) respondents’ ranking and likelihood of choosing profiles with female (Hazara) candidates. These gains, however, do not completely offset male (non-Hazara) respondents’ in-group biases. Qualifications help but are not enough to dismantle voter preferences for in-group candidates.