630987

research-article2016
POL0010.1177/0263395716630987PoliticsSevers et al.

Special Section Article

Politics

Power, privilege and 2016, Vol. 36(4) 346­–354

© The Author(s) 2016
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DOI: 10.1177/0263395716630987
theory and political pol.sagepub.com

representation

Eline Severs
Vrije Universiteit Brussel, Brussels, Belgium; University of Antwerp, Antwerp, Belgium

Karen Celis
Vrije Universiteit Brussel, Brussels, Belgium

Silvia Erzeel
Université catholique de Louvain, Louvain-la-Neuve, Belgium; University of Antwerp, Antwerp, Belgium

Abstract
This article critically reviews the extant literature on social group representation and clarifies
the advantages of intersectionality theory for studying political representation. It argues that the
merit of intersectionality theory can be found in its ontology of power. Intersectionality theory
is founded on a relational conception of political power that locates the constitution of power
relations within social interactions, such as political representation. As such, intersectionality
theory pushes scholarship beyond studying representation inequalities – that are linked to
presumably stable societal positions – to also consider the ways in which political representation
(re)creates positions of privilege and disadvantage.

Keywords
intersectionality, political representation, power, privilege, social categories

Received: 16th February 2015; Revised version received: 30th September 2015; Accepted: 19th October 2015

Introduction
The emergence of intersectionality as a major research paradigm (Hancock, 2007: 63) has
had a profound effect on studies of social group representation. The understanding that
systems of domination, such as patriarchy, heteronormativity, colonialism, racism, and
ageism are interdependent sensitised scholars to the limitations of studying single

Corresponding author:
Eline Severs, Vrije Universiteit Brussel, Pleinlaan 5, 1050 Brussels, Belgium.
Email: Eline.Severs@vub.ac.be
Severs et al. 347

markers of inequality (McCall, 2005: 1771). The notion that racism affects minority
and white women differently revealed the need to treat women as a heterogeneous
group and to consider the power relations between privileged and disadvantaged mem-
bers of this group. The additional insight that women of colour are discriminated against
as ‘women of colour’ and not merely as ‘women’, or ‘people of colour’, challenged
additive approaches to inequality that argue that each system of domination has an
independent effect on individuals’ status (King, 1988: 47). Instead, intersectionality
promotes approaches that consider how systems of domination interact and impact
individuals’ identity and subject formation in ways that exceed the mere simultaneity of
systems of domination.
This article discusses the implications of intersectionality theory for studying politi-
cal representation. It draws attention to the ontology of power of intersectionality theory
and argues that this ontology calls for a critical reconsideration of the ways in which we
study political representation and conceptualise its relation to political power. To date,
studies on social group representation have predominantly invoked intersectionality
theory as a means to include previously overlooked sub-groups, such as ethnic minority
women, into their analyses (Hughes, 2011; Strolovitch, 2006). These studies are mainly
concerned with the outcomes of political representation (such as the number of seats
obtained in parliament or the types of groups and interests represented) and predomi-
nantly explain these intersectionally unequal outcomes by making reference to prevail-
ing power structures. Because of this particular focus on representation outcomes, the
relation between political representation and power is conceived in terms of mimesis:
political representation is believed to reflect positions of privilege and disadvantage
within society.
Intersectionality theory, by contrast, conceptualises the relation between political rep-
resentation and power in terms of constitution and draws attention to the part of represen-
tation in (re)shaping positions of privilege and disadvantage. In a manner resemblant of
Foucault’s (1978) treatment of power, intersectionality theory rejects possessional
accounts that reduce political power to the exercise of oppression and that exclusively
locate power in (privileged) social locations or institutions. The observation from inter-
sectionality theorists that ‘we dominate and are dominated’ (hooks, 1989: 20 in Lloyd,
2013: 123) dissolves rigid distinctions between the so-called powerful and powerless
(Squires, 1999: 36) and draws attention to the productive aspects of power, namely, the
ways in which the exertion of power also produces possibilities for resistance.
Intersectionality theorists’ emphasis on the coextensive character of oppression and
resistance (Baca Zinn and Dill, 1996; Dhamoon, 2011; hooks, 1989) warrants attention to
the unstable character of power relations and the ways in which positions of privilege and
disadvantage are reproduced through forms of social interaction.
The ontological stance of intersectionality theory has important implications for the
study of political representation. More specifically, it demonstrates the epistemological
limitations of treating representational inequalities as outcomes of societal power strug-
gles, and reveals the need for considering the ways in which political representation is
implied in broader sequences of social interaction that (re)create the meaning and charac-
ter of positions of privilege and disadvantage. Because of their public character, represen-
tations invariably engage themselves in broader sequences of social interaction1: they
invoke audiences and, in turn, elicit reactions from them. As a consequence, the ways in
which political representations depict the political world may promote change just as
much as they may reinforce prevailing power relations.
348 Politics 36(4)

Our approach to political representation as a dynamic process in which power is per-

formed and social positions of privilege and disadvantage are (re)constituted invites
scholars to consider the causal autonomy of structure and agency when studying political
representation. Because of its analytic dualism that considers the sequential impact of
agency and structure (Archer, 1995), this approach has the capacity to enhance our under-
standing of how and why particular intersections of power systems become salient and
generate inequalities. Closer attention to representation’s constitutive force may prove
particularly helpful to uncovering (changes in) discursive repertoires on inequality and
difference.
Our argument continues over three sections. First, we review the extant literature on
social group representation. Next, we offer a critical reading of intersectionality theory
and explain its ontology of power. Following that, we advance an approach to studying
social group representation that is in accordance with this ontology. In the conclusion, we
elaborate on the avenues for scholarly inquiry opened up by this approach.

The extant literature on social group representation

The scholarship on social group representation has greatly welcomed and explored the
concept of intersectionality. Within this body of literature, the implications of intersec-
tionality theory have, first and foremost, been understood in terms of the challenges it
raises to scholars’ traditional demarcations of social groups and their interests. The under-
standing that systems of domination are interdependent gave rise to critical debates on the
essentialist tendency within the scholarship to treat social groups as homogeneous entities
with a clearly delineated and stable set of interests (e.g., Smooth, 2011; Squires, 2008).
As a result of these debates, studies on social groups’ descriptive representation (e.g.
their numeric presence in political bodies) and social groups’ substantive representation
(the representation of their interests) have displayed an important opening to previously
overlooked (sub)groups and considerations on the interaction effects of multiple systems
of domination (Ruedin, 2013; Saalfeld and Bischof, 2013). Contemporary studies on
descriptive representation are, for instance, characterised by greater attention to the gen-
dered aspects involved in the recruitment of ethnic minority candidates (Celis et al.,
2015; Hardy-Fanta, 2007) and the ways in which combined systems of gender quotas and
reserved seats for ethnic minority groups affect the type of politicians who enter parlia-
ment (Hughes, 2011; Krook and O’Brien, 2010).
Studies on the substantive representation of women are also displaying greater atten-
tion to the kind of (sub)groups and interests that are represented in parliament (Smooth,
2011) and civil society (Strolovitch, 2006; Weldon, 2011). Reflecting the insight that
seemingly unchallenged conceptions of the character and boundaries of social groups
may mask within-group status hierarchies (Dovi, 2002; Strolovitch, 2006), contemporary
scholars (e.g. Disch, 2011) have advanced the diversity of sub-groups and interests repre-
sented as a key criterion to assess the quality of social group representation.
These innovations notwithstanding, scholarly debates on the implications of intersec-
tionality theory for studying political representation seldom move beyond considerations
on the multidimensionality of social group identities (for noteworthy exceptions, see
Lépinard, 2014; Smooth, 2011). While scholars’ call for adding more variables or includ-
ing previously overlooked (sub)groups offers an adequate response to essentialist tenden-
cies within the scholarship, this response tends to occlude attention from another critical
issue, namely, the determinist bias of structure-based explanations (Archer, 1995).
Severs et al. 349

As demonstrated from the foregoing, contemporary studies on social group represen-

tation are primarily concerned with mapping and explaining the intersectionally unequal
outcomes of political representation, such as the number of seats obtained in parliament
or the types of groups and interests represented. In their studies, scholars often explain
these outcomes by making reference to pre-existing and supposedly stable power struc-
tures in society. When scholars, for instance, find that women’s descriptive representa-
tion varies for different sets of women categorised by ‘race’2, ethnicity or age, they
readily attribute this difference to the power systems that are associated with these
grounds of inequality. Alternatively, when they detect no variation, they conclude that
variables such as ‘race’, ethnicity, or age played no role in representation outcomes
(Bowleg, 2008: 321–322).
Clearly, we do not question the insight that individuals’ social locations matter and that
prevailing power structures work to the disadvantage of historically marginalised groups.
However, by grounding their explanations on causal mechanisms that can be conceived
as sufficient for producing intersectionally unequal representation outcomes, scholars are
currently only grasping part of the broader puzzle (Waldner, 2002: 20). The focus on suf-
ficient conditions not only limits our insights into the complexity of inequality, it equally
thwarts the development of thick descriptions that may help us understand the mecha-
nisms – including chance, habit and actors’ intentionality – that underpin representational
inequalities. In order to gain insights into such mechanisms, research that focuses on the
interaction between human agency and systems of domination is needed. Interviews or
life-narratives that allow scholars to understand the ways in which representatives make
sense of their political environments may help balance and complement macro-based
explanations of representational inequalities (Hayward, 2013; Prins, 2006). Even when
micro-studies of this kind reveal the resilience of power structures, they remain crucial to
understanding how and why particular intersections of power structures remain salient.
Such insights are necessary for advancing democratic alternatives.
Because of their limited attention to the interaction between structure and agency,
scholars also risk misrepresenting the representation successes of historically disadvan-
taged groups as exceptions that somehow confirm the rule and that need to be explained
by extraordinary circumstances (such as parliamentarians’ exceptional profiles) and/or
as facilitated by particular contexts (such as moments of heightened social solidarity).
Such emphasis on exceptionality inadvertently reifies power relations and reduces the
members of historically disadvantaged groups to incidental figures (Choo and Ferree,
2010: 132). It also obscures the ways in which they exercise power and (re)negotiate,
through their public appearances and representative activities, the meaning of their
social locations.
In sum, structure-based explanations impair this scholarship’s capacity for grasping
and, therefore, explaining the complexity of representational inequalities. Because politi-
cal power is routinely located outside of political representation – as somehow unaffected
by it – there is little opportunity for considering the contingency of power or the part of
human agency in constituting power. Closer attention to the ways in which representation
(re)shapes power positions seems, however, crucial to furthering scholarship in this area.
A recent study on party candidate selection (Celis and Erzeel, 2015) offers a clear illustra-
tion of the contingent and relational character of political power. The finding that ethnic
minority women more easily gain access to power than ethnic minority men challenges
expectations regarding their double impairment (on the basis of their ethnicity and gen-
der). Celis and Erzeel (2015) explain this counter-intuitive finding by making reference to
350 Politics 36(4)

the attempts of party elites to increase their parties’ representativeness without jeopardis-
ing their electoral effectiveness. To this end, party elites prefer electoral profiles that are
complementary and, therefore, least threatening to incumbent candidates (who are pre-
dominantly male and white). The notion of complementarity indicates that power posi-
tions cannot unequivocally be located outside of political representation: these positions
obtain meaning in the very process of representation itself.

Intersectionality theory: ontology of power

A profusion of structure-based explanations of political power is not limited to studies on
social group representation. It also features strongly within other social science research
on inequality (Choo and Ferree, 2010: 134; Prins, 2006). Invoking Crenshaw’s (1989)
metaphor of the intersecting roads, many scholars working within the field of gender and
diversity have invested in identifying points of intersection, classifying and locating indi-
viduals in a matrix of domination (Hill Collins, 1990). The tendency to pin individuals to
their social locations reflects scholars’ long-standing aspirations for uncovering the com-
plexity of inequality (e.g. Mügge and de Jong, 2013). Some scholars have, for instance,
set out to give voice to groups at previously neglected points of intersection and have
invested in moving the experiences of multiply disadvantaged (sub)groups to the centre
of scholarly concerns (Hancock, 2007; hooks, 1989; McCall, 2005). Others have, then
again, uncovered how systems of domination interact and affect social groups differently
(McCall, 2005).
Without wanting to detract from the value of these contributions, their shared aspira-
tion for uncovering the complexity of inequality diverts, somewhat paradoxically, atten-
tion from the broader phenomenon of political power that is central to intersectionality
theory. As Dhamoon (2011: 232) has argued, the evocative language of Crenshaw’s
(1989) intersecting roads ‘has come to falsely suggest that there are separable, pure,
containable ways to analyse subject formation and power’. The dissociation of power
from subject formation downplays the agency of members of historically disadvantaged
groups and obscures their capacity for resistance when confronted with oppression. This
stands in sharp contrast to the ways in which intersectionality theorists – not seldom
black women – have resisted so-called universal categories of ‘womanhood’ or ‘citizen-
ship’ (e.g. Crenshaw, 1989; hooks, 1989). Their critiques have located power within his-
torical processes of routinised action through which human relationships gain meaning
and particular social locations become cloaked with privilege.
In a manner resemblant to Foucault’s (1978) treatment of power, intersectionality the-
ory rejects possessional accounts that reduce political power to oppression and that exclu-
sively locate power in privileged social locations or institutions. Although intersectionality
theorists do not deny the fact that men enjoy greater political power than women, they
routinely argue that such observations ‘should not obscure the reality that women can and
do participate in politics of domination, as perpetrators as well as victims – that we domi-
nate and are dominated’ (hooks, 1989: 20 in Lloyd, 2013: 123). Put differently, the suc-
cessful enforcement of power depends as much on a coercer’s force as on others’
acquiescence to it. At all times, both parties – privileged and disadvantaged – are simul-
taneously undergoing and exercising power. In a similar vein, intersectionality theorists’
observation that ‘one is never just privileged or oppressed’ (Baca Zinn and Dill, 1996:
326–327; Hill Collins, 1990: 234) dissolves rigid distinctions between the so-called pow-
erful and the powerless (Squires, 1999: 36). It draws attention to the productive aspects
Severs et al. 351

of power, namely, the ways in which the exertion of power invariably also produces pos-
sibilities for resistance.
Intersectionality theorists’ emphasis on the coextensive character of oppression and
resistance warrants attention to the unstable character of power relations and the ways in
which positions of privilege and disadvantage are reproduced through forms of social
interaction. This account ties systems of domination and human agency together and
acknowledges the causal autonomy of both. It, more specifically, suggests that systems of
domination – as temporal fixations of power – can affect individuals and vice versa.
Intersectionality theory’s ontology of power thus challenges possessional accounts that
treat political power as the attribute of privileged groups and as readily observable in their
behaviour of oppression, force or persuasion (Lukes, 1974: 16–17). Although intersec-
tionality theory accounts for the existence of overt conflicts and acts of oppression, it does
not conceive of them as constitutive of the broader phenomenon that is power and war-
rants attention to the more tacit processes through which power relations are (re)created.
Although other branches within the social sciences (in particular, sociology) have ren-
dered the use of analytical categories suspect and have invested in studying the feedback
loops between human agency and structure (Choo and Ferree, 2010: 146), such approaches
remain largely absent within studies on political representation. As outlined in the previ-
ous section, this impairs the scholarship’s capacity for understanding and explaining the
complexity of intersectional inequalities in representation.

Representation as process: understanding power, privilege

and disadvantage
As a means to gain further insights into the interaction between political representation
and systems of domination, we advance an approach that treats representation as a pro-
cess in which intersectional powers are performed and positions of privilege and disad-
vantage are constituted. A process-oriented approach is useful because it draws attention
to the constitutive character of political representation and uncovers the role of audiences
in political representation (e.g. Squires, 2008). While doing so, it accounts for both the
repressive aspects of political representation (i.e. representational inequalities) and its
productive aspects (i.e. group members’ capacity for objection).
The simultaneity of repression and production in political representation may most
comprehensibly be explained through Michael Saward’s (2006) concept of the ‘repre-
sentative claim’. The conceptualisation of political representation in terms of ‘claim-
making’ builds from the insight that the political world is not objectively given but needs
to be named and explained to relevant audiences (see also, Manin, 1997). This insight
attributes political representation – like other acts of naming – a selective character.
Representations select features of the political world that are both understandable and that
appear relevant to the audiences before which they are made (e.g. society, those repre-
sented, other representatives). The interaction between claim-maker and audiences
defines the outcomes of political representation. In order to be considered meaningful –
that is, to be conceived as standing for or being about others (Severs, 2012: 173–174) –
claims have to tap into audiences’ familiar contextual frameworks (Saward, 2006: 303).
While this suggests that habitual repertoires related to gender, ‘race’, class, and sexual-
ity are likely to structure representative inequalities, it does not exclude the possibility
that audiences will contest the representations offered to them. As Saward (2006: 302)
states, there is no claim ‘that does not leave space for its contestation or rejection’. In
fact, the formulation of claims may be conceived as the very act that induces others to
352 Politics 36(4)

think about the political world and articulate their (potentially opposing) views thereof
(cf. Disch, 2011). A recent study on claim-making in debates over the Islamic headscarf
(Severs et al., 2013) confirms this insight. It demonstrates how the introduction of head-
scarf bans induced Muslim women to manifest themselves as interlocutors within policy
debates. Although Muslim women had been a category of policy-making before, it was
only following the introduction of headscarf bans and their promotion as forms of protec-
tion against gendered oppression that Muslim women began to organise themselves and
publicly articulated alternative views on Islam, Muslim women, and emancipation.
Although their counter-claims did not radically alter the outcomes of the public debate,
they made it more difficult for political actors – including women – to claim to speak for
Muslim women in an absolute or definitive way.
The understanding of representation in terms of processes in which power is simulta-
neously exerted by representatives and the audiences they stand before reorients our
attention to the simultaneous operation of oppression and resistance. This opens up new
avenues for research, in particular with regards to actors’ referential strategies. Closer
attention to these referential strategies and the ways in which they interact with other
political strategies may generate novel insight into the multiplicity of pathways to reach
more egalitarian representational outcomes. The study of how representatives (do not)
define particular societal problems, the kind of questions they (do not) raise, the solutions
they (do not) consider, and the kind of voices they (do not) listen to may, in addition, help
us come to terms with the mechanisms (of intentionality and habit) that are involved in
the reproduction of intersectional inequalities.

Conclusion
This article has made a contribution to the literature by clarifying the implications of
intersectionality theory to the study of political representation. It extended scholarly
debate beyond the multidimensionality of social identities and the interdependency of
systems of domination and drew attention to the ontology of power of intersectionality
theory. It demonstrated that intersectionality theorists’ relational account of political
power calls for expanding scholarly agendas from studying representational inequalities
(that are linked to presumably stable social locations) to researching the ways in which
political representation (re)creates positions of privilege and disadvantage.
Although this account does not preclude the relevance of studies on representational
inequalities, it suggests that closer attention to the constitutive force of political represen-
tation is needed to alleviate the danger of macro-political determinism. The conception of
representation as a process through which power relations are constituted challenges the
stability of social locations and makes their reproduction in representation a question of
empirical investigation. By acknowledging the analytical causality of human agency and
structure, it accounts for both the contingency of political power and the routinised char-
acter of resistance. The focus on constitution allows, moreover, for new research ques-
tions to be formulated, including questions related to the impact of representation on the
subject formation of social group members.

Acknowledgements
We wish to thank Liza Mügge, co-editor of the special issue ‘Intersectionality in Political Science Research’,
for her rigorous reviews and helpful comments for improving our argument. We also wish to thank the
editorial board of Politics and the anonymous reviewers whose perceptive remarks significantly improved
this work.
Severs et al. 353

Funding
This work was supported by the Research Council of the Vrije Universiteit Brussel – Strategic Research
Programme on Evaluating Democratic Governance in Europe (EDGE) (Eline Severs) and the Belgian Fund for
Scientific Research (F.R.S.-FNRS) (Silvia Erzeel). Earlier versions of this article have been presented at the
workshop ‘Intersectional substantive representation: ethnic minority women’s interests in European democra-
cies’ organised by Silvia Erzeel and Liza Mügge (University of Amsterdam, Amsterdam, 15 February 2013),
the panel ‘Feminist politics and policy’ at the Sophia Colloquium (Sophia, Brussels, 17 October 2013), the
panel ‘Intersectionality and political representation’ at the Conference for Europeanists organised by the
Council for European Studies (Washington, DC, 14–16 March 2014) and the panel ‘Intersectional representa-
tion: race, gender and identity in elected office’ at the Annual Meeting of the American Political Science
Association (APSA) (Washington, DC, 28–31 August 2014). We are grateful to the participants in these panels
for their generous and insightful comments on earlier versions of this article.

Notes
1. We define ‘social interaction’ as dynamic sequences of social actions between individuals (or groups)
within a particular socio-political and cultural context.
2. We place the term ‘race’ in inverted commas to indicate that it is socially constructed – as opposed to an
objective biological marker. We find the concept problematic but consider it key to studying, explaining
– and thereby rendering less powerful – processes of racialisation (cf. Lutz et al., 2011: 3).

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Author biographies
Eline Severs is a postdoctoral researcher at the Department of Political Science, Vrije Universiteit Brussel
(VUB) (Research Programme ‘Evaluating Democratic Governance in Europe’ – EDGE). She is an affiliated
member of RHEA, the VUB Centre on Gender and Diversity. She is also the scientific coordinator of the Policy
Research Centre on Equality Policies in Belgium (University of Antwerp).

Karen Celis is research professor at the Department of Political Science, Vrije Universiteit Brussel (VUB). She
is co-director of RHEA, the VUB Centre on Gender and Diversity.

Silvia Erzeel is a postdoctoral researcher of the Belgian Fund for Scientific Research (F.R.S.-FNRS) at the
Institut de sciences politiques Louvain-Europe (ISPOLE), Université catholique de Louvain. She is also a guest
professor at the Political Science Department, University of Antwerp.
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