The Danish Candidacies Dataset

Legislatures emerge from a larger pool of candidates, most of whom never win a seat. Studying elected representatives alone therefore leaves important stages of political selection unobserved. We introduce the Danish Candidacies Dataset, assembled by the Origins of Descriptive Representation (ODER) project and covering Danish parliamentary elections from 1945 to 2022. The current working files contain 28,404 candidacy records across 29 elections. We combine information extracted from historical election reports with digital election records, bringing together candidate names, occupations, party affiliations, nomination information, electoral outcomes, and votes. We describe the collection and correction procedures, distinguish recorded attributes from classifications, and document the structure and limitations of the working data. We also outline applications to candidate recruitment and nomination placement. The dataset provides a basis for studying how representation develops before and at the ballot box, subject to the coverage and validation issues documented here.