Workers’ Descriptive Representation in the United Socialist Party, 1938–1968

Abstract

Workers are significantly underrepresented in party politics, a reality that both reflects and perpetuates economic inequality. However, workers’ political representation and economic inequality vary across time and place. Using a unique dataset of membership registers, supplemented and verified by archival data from non-party sources (N=2,374) and secondary data on Iceland’s working population, this study examines workers’ descriptive representation in the United Socialist Party (USP) from 1938 to 1968. The USP presents an intriguing case for studying workers’ descriptive representation for three reasons: 1) Iceland was arguably the world’s most egalitarian modern democracy during the study period; 2) the USP actively recruited and substantively represented workers; but 3) it was neither a dominant political party, nor did USP membership facilitate members’ advancement in a society characterized by intense political patronage. Overall, the results show that workers were relatively well descriptively represented in the USP compared to Iceland’s working population during the study period. Workers were also over-represented among USP’s founding members. However, the descriptive and substantive representation of workers in the USP declined after the party’s founding. Furthermore, workers’ underrepresentation relative to the over-represented middle class was consistent and increased alongside Iceland’s middle-class growth and the decline of the working class. Additionally, workers were slightly under-represented on the USP’s central committee, while the middle class was vastly over-represented. These results offer a more nuanced view of workers’ political representation over time and across national contexts.