Trustees, delegates and responsiveness: An interpretive case study of Chinese New Zealanders’ participation in representative politics

Political representation is vital for democracies, and responsiveness lies at the heart of representation. Ethnic minorities’ assessments of elected representatives’ responsiveness reflect their participation in representative politics. Chinese New Zealanders are the largest Asian community in New Zealand. Based on 38 semi-structured, in-depth interviews, I explored how Chinese New Zealanders understood their relationships with elected representatives and their assessments of representatives’ responsiveness. For multiple reasons, interviewees adopted the delegate, trustee or dynamic representation models. I observed the age-based and homeland-based divergencies regarding interviewees’ preferred representation models. Interviewees of each ilk adopted different criteria to evaluate representatives’ responsiveness.