Female Presidential Candidate Research Articles

Do Voters Vote For Female Leaders in the General Election in 2024?

The study aimed to obtain empirical data regarding public perceptions related to female leadership and public acceptance of female presidential candidates in 2024, considering that the previous female leadership were not accepted. The research approach used was quantitative, using surveys. The survey was conducted in 34 provinces in Indonesia. The results of the research showed that women tend to support female candidates as leaders, while some men were still doubtful of women’s abilities as leaders. The younger generation was more open to women as leaders, while the older generation was more conservative. Support for female candidates was also associated with higher earnings. The potential to overcome gender stereotypes and old norms emerges through shifting the views of the younger generation, increasing gender awareness and better education. In conclusion, society’s view of women in leadership is influenced by gender, age, and economy. Efforts to change this view are important for achieving gender equality and assessing leaders based on quality and potential, independent of gender. Keywords: Perception; Leaders; Women; 2024 General Election

Face-work in North American Presidential Debates: A Corpus-based Multi-theoretical Approach

As inherently confrontational contexts, North American presidential debates compel politicians to engage in image restoration efforts when targeted by a face-threatening act. Since the first televised debates in 1960, presidential campaigns have become increasingly mediatized and the need to defend against face-damage has increased, for there is still a need to uphold a favorable presidential image despite the prominence of impoliteness in these events. Although a longstanding tradition, there is still no framework for the combined analysis of threatening and defensive face-work in presidential debates. This paper presents a corpus-based three-fold analysis blending qualitative, quantitative and statistical methodologies to observe the evolution of facework in this context, focusing on impoliteness and image restoration manifestations. The selected corpus comprises the presidential debates of seven North American elections —one per decade—, providing an overview of the evolution of both phenomena. This methodology also allows insight into the frequency of specific strategies. The analysis adopts a multi-theoretical approach to demonstrate the effectiveness of integrating Impoliteness theory (Culpeper, 1996) and Image restoration theory (Benoit and Wells, 1996) to create a comprehensive new approach to the study of face-work in presidential debates. Supported by results from Pearson’s Chi-square test, the combination of these theories was shown to be possible. The recurrence of attack-defense pairings integrating strategies from both theories also pointed to their necessary combination. While the recent incorporation of a female presidential candidate hinted at the potential gender variation of face-work in the debates, further data is needed to obtain conclusive results.

Donald Trump’s and Hillary Clinton’s Interruptions In Presidential Debates

The present research aims to investigate the types and functions of interruptions of Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton during the US presidential debates in 2016. Data collected from Donald Trump's and Hillary Clinton's speech in the debates were transcribed and analyzed to find types and functions of interruptions by both of the candidates. The results of the Conversational Analysis display that Donald Trump dominates the interruptions by applying a substantially greater number of interruptions consisting three different types of interruptions. Butting-in Interruptions were applied by both as the biggest number of interruptions. Data analysis also demonstrates that intrusive functions appear much more frequently compared to the collaborative functions of interruptions applied by the male and female presidential candidates. Discussion as to why such phenomena are noticeable in the data concludes the paper.

Donald Trump’s and Hillary Clinton’s Interruptions In Presidential Debates

The present research aims to investigate the types and functions of interruptions of Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton during the US presidential debates in 2016. Data collected from Donald Trump's and Hillary Clinton's speech in the debates were transcribed and analyzed to find types and functions of interruptions by both of the candidates. The results of the Conversational Analysis display that Donald Trump dominates the interruptions by applying a substantially greater number of interruptions consisting three different types of interruptions. Butting-in Interruptions were applied by both as the biggest number of interruptions. Data analysis also demonstrates that intrusive functions appear much more frequently compared to the collaborative functions of interruptions applied by the male and female presidential candidates. Discussion as to why such phenomena are noticeable in the data concludes the paper.

Race, Gender, and the U.S. Presidency: A Comparison of Implicit and Explicit Biases in the Electorate.

Recent U.S. elections have witnessed the Democrats nominating both black and female presidential candidates, as well as a black and female vice president. The increasing diversity of the U.S. political elite heightens the importance of understanding the psychological factors influencing voter support for, or opposition to, candidates of different races and genders. In this study, we investigated the relative strength of the implicit biases for and against hypothetical presidential candidates that varied by gender and race, using an evaluative priming paradigm on a broadly representative sample of U.S. citizens (n = 1076). Our main research question is: Do measures of implicit racial and gender biases predict political attitudes and voting better than measures of explicit prejudice? We find that measures of implicit bias are less strongly associated with political attitudes and voting than are explicit measures of sexist attitudes and modern racism. Moreover, once demographic characteristics and explicit prejudice are controlled statistically, measures of implicit bias provide little incremental predictive validity. Overall, explicit prejudice has a far stronger association with political preferences than does implicit bias.

It’s not me, it’s you: perceptions of others and attitudes toward a female nominee in the 2020 New Hampshire democratic primary

ABSTRACT While the 2020 Democratic field was touted as one of the most diverse in presidential nomination history, a white, male, heterosexual candidate ultimately won the nomination. This is, on its face, surprising, as we might expect less sexism and more enthusiasm for diverse candidates among Democratic voters. To help explain this outcome, we refocus attention on the “third-person effect” and the anticipated reactions of others to a female candidate, rather than voters own individual beliefs in two ways. First, we demonstrate that attitudes about female presidential candidates still follow third-person effect predictions; individuals attribute socially desirable attitudes to themselves and less so more distant others (i.e. “Americans”). Second, we analyze how voters take into account perceived potential gender bias by others, which in turn influences female candidates’ perceived electability (likely support from other voters). Gendered electability then has measurable impacts on preference for female candidates, as they strategically choose the more electable candidate. Overall, these results demonstrate looking at the anticipated gender bias of others, rather than just an individual’s attitudes, can be helpful in explaining the continued perception of female presidential candidates as less electable and, ultimately, why women have not yet broken the highest glass ceiling.

“Deal me in”: Hillary Clinton and gender in the 2016 US presidential election

Hillary Clinton’s nomination as the first female presidential candidate to represent a major party in the 2016 US presidential election represented a key moment in US history. The focus on her gender during the campaign was intensified following the accusation by Republican Party nominee, Donald Trump, that Clinton was “playing the woman card”. The present article explores US media constructions of Clinton’s orientation to the topic of gender during the presidential campaign. Data were identified by searching the Lexis Advance® database between 4 February 2016 and 8 November 2016. Using a qualitative methodology guided by a Critical Discursive Psychology approach, we identify two discursive repertoires that were repeatedly mobilised in these media accounts: 1) a repertoire in which the principle of merit was used to undermine arguments for gender equality, and 2) a repertoire in which Clinton’s espoused version of feminism was undermined as ‘old-fashioned’. These repertoires functioned to de-legitimise Clinton as a political candidate by positioning her as seeking special treatment as a woman, who played the victim of sexism and was out of touch with the interests and concerns of female voters. We demonstrate how attempts to counter such characterisations can be problematic for female leaders.

“The stiletto in Putin’s side”: Analyzing Russian media coverage of the only female presidential candidate in 2018

ABSTRACT Ksenia Sobchak, the only female candidate to make it to Election Day in the 2018 Russian presidential elections, faced many gender and political hurdles. We conducted quantitative content-analysis of Russian media coverage to see whether coverage added to these challenges. Using social role theory, we discussed how the five most popular Russian online news outlets labeled Sobchak, covered political issues and character traits. The results showed that news outlets used more legitimizing than delegitimizing labels, emphasized masculine issues and feminine traits. Comparing “credible” and tabloid press revealed mixed findings and highlights how outlets within these categories can differ in Russia.

Social Media, Gender and Politics: Public Perception of Female Politicians through the Facebook

Social Media is a dynamic form of communication platform that gives rapid feedback to messages posted/sent to targeted receivers. However, as much as there seems to be a fairly remarkable acceptance of females in politics, there is still an assumption that responses gotten on their social media platforms particularly are biased and unbalanced compared with that of their male counterpart. This work (a short field communication) evaluates the perception of messages received by or posted on the social media platforms of female politicians by the Nigerian citizens, based on responses and reactions to the social media updates and posts of these female politicians, using Facebook, as a case study. With the use of content analysis, the accounts of four selected female presidential candidates were purposively selected and analysed using Pew Institute data). The results revealed the suspected imbalance but noted an increase the citizens’ awareness of the effects of gender prejudice. It however avers that this could change with time because of the noticeable people’s sensitivity to effects of the imbalance. The study concludes that the dynamic nature of the social media goes a long way in influencing the sensitivity to the female gender.

The Comparison of Commisive Speech Acts by Trump and Warren Presidential Candidate Viewed from Gender Differences

Politics is not only controlled by male but also female. Commissive speech acts often happen in presidential campaign speeches. This research aims to analyze the comparison of commissive speech acts in English speeches by Trump and Warren presidential candidate viewed from gender differences. Qualitative method is applied in this research. The data are analyzed by using commissive speech acts from Searle (2005), Cutting (2002) and talk theory from Tannen (1991). The findings show that Trump used seven types of commissive: promise, guarantee, pledge, contract, offering, threaten, and refusal. The functions are giving solution, convincing, insulting, threatening, showing care, and encouraging. Warren used three types of commissive: promise, guarantee, and threaten. The functions are giving solution, convincing, threatening, and showing care. There are three similarities of commissive between them: promise, guarantee, and threaten. Promise is the most frequent type used by them. Viewed from gender differences, female and male presidential candidates applied report and raport talks. They tended to use report talks.The differences are that Trump employed more types of commissive than Warren did. Trump used seven types while Warren used three. Viewed from gender differences, Trump’s report talk is more varied than Warren’s. Meanwhile, Warren’s rapport talk is more varied than Trump. This research gives the example to students of English language on how to convince hearers or audience by utilizing commissive speech acts.

Gendered Incentives, Party Support, and Viable Female Presidential Candidates in Latin America

Women hold less than 10 percent of chief executive positions worldwide. Understanding how women democratically access these posts requires theorizing how they gain resources from established parties to mount viable electoral campaigns. We argue that in stable regimes marked by representational malaise parties respond to gendered incentives and nominate female candidates. Drawing on Latin American cases, we show how diverse parties nominated women in order to signal change or novelty, to credibly commit to "feminine" leadership and issues, and to mobilize female voters. A negative case depicts how a lack of representational critiques can fail to incentivize parties to back women instead of men. Our focus on gendered incentives provides a new framework that places political parties at the center of questions about women's electoral opportunities.

Social Gender Construction in Political Context: A Corpus-Based Study of Lexical Differences across Genders

Anchored on the public stereotype towards the dichotomization of gender and the social gender construct theory, the study examines the gender differences in terms of lexical choice manifested by the selected 20 U.S. presidential candidates from the year 2012 to 2020 and presents the changes of each gender group in a male-dominated political context. The corpus of this study consists of 60257 lexis of 10 male politicians and 63095 words of 10 female politicians which are extracted from their announcement and campaign speeches. Findings obtained from the results based on the quantitative research design and the application of CLAWS, AntConc and chi-square test reveal statistically significant gender-based differences. The findings support that even though male and female presidential candidates have almost the same priorities of usage in general lexical categories, the lexical choice of male candidates was relatively close to feminization while women tended to be neutral. Finally, it further speculates that the candidates of differing gender enjoy a distinctive consciousness on the social gender construction in public discourse to challenge or neutralize public stereotypes of gender identity. In view of the findings, the study recommends a questionnaire survey to verify the inference on gender color displayed by different language variables and an extensive database to enable a greater validity of the results in the future.

We would rather be leaders than parliamentarians: women and political office in Ghana

Ghana, an emerging democracy, lags far behind in women’s representation in Parliament. This article, based on interviews with delegates, aspirants, candidates, Members of Parliament and potential female presidential candidates, suggests that women are dissuaded from standing for Parliament by the exorbitant ‘cost of politics’, humiliating ‘politics of insult’ and keen appreciation of Parliament’s limitations. Still, women may be eager to hold appointive office. Until new democracies are established with electoral systems devoid of costly and insulting electoral politics, and with elected offices in which women may accomplish important goals, women will not exhibit the political ambition to participate in those spaces.

(De)Stigmatization of Political Leadership: The Case of a Right-Wing Populist Presidential Candidate in the Finnish Media

In this article, we examine the discursive practices of (de)stigmatizing right-wing populist party leaders. We draw on a recent example from Finland by examining how the female presidential candidate of a right-wing populist party was portrayed in the Finnish media during the 2018 presidential campaign season. We examine the stigmatization by the press media and the stigma-management tactics used by the presidential candidate to resist stigmatization. The media representation of the right-wing party leader is highly tensioned, and the media positions her political leadership within the duality of charisma and stigma. In our analysis, we extend earlier literature by unveiling the emotional tensions inherent in portraying and (de)stigmatizing populist political leadership. The results highlight how religion, radical nationalism, and inappropriate expression of emotions are intertwined as the main sources for attributing stigma. In this case, the stigmatization of the leader occurs via threatening and ridiculing imagery and erosion of the leader’s authority. Resistance to stigma occurs through distancing, emotional and moral argumentation, and attribution of strong leadership.

Steeled for the challenges: a critical discourse analysis of gendered news frames of Hillary Clinton in battleground coverage of the 2016 Democratic National Convention

ABSTRACTThis project employs framing theory to analyze the gender ideologies present in local coverage of the Democratic Party’s official nomination of Hillary Clinton in battleground counties. By applying framing theory, this study aims to uncover how journalists covered her bid to “win the day” over her male opponents, Democratic challenger Bernie Sanders and Republican nominee (and now president) Donald Trump. The study revealed that the ideological residue related to her “deviant” gender identity shaped journalistic reactions to her nomination as the first female major-party presidential candidate. It argues that it was not Clinton’s identity as the “feminist presidential candidate” but rather her expertise in gender code-switching that encouraged journalists to write flatteringly about her.

Informative treatment of presidential candidates: a proposal from the elaboration

The paper presents a review of the literature of news coverage on female presidential candidates. For this purpose, seven coverage frames are included: a) visibility, b) gender reiteration, c) mediation of the intimate sphere, personality, d) thematic agenda, e) tonality and f) particularities of the media. Finally, an operationalization proposal is formulated for each of the frames that could be used in future research that addresses these political figures. It is concluded that women are represented from their intimate sphere and femininity, characteristics that are far from being culturally appropriate for debate in the public and political arena.

Race, Gender, and the 2016 Presidential Election

ABSTRACTWith the first female presidential candidate at the top of the Democratic ticket, the gender gap in 2016 was predicted to be the largest ever. Although the gender gap proved to be bigger than any other in recent history, with a majority of women voting for Hillary Clinton, a disaggregation of the vote by race indicated that not all women equally supported the female presidential candidate. This suggests the existence of a racialized gender gap not previously explored by extant research. Thus, this article explores the nature of this interracial gender gap by examining the political evaluations of men and women, by race, in the 2016 presidential election. Using data from the 2016 American National Election Study (ANES) Time Series Study merged with the ANES Cumulative Data File (1948–2012), predictors of the gender gap were explored and the circumstances under which an interracial gender gap can be narrowed were examined.

Sylvanas Windrunner of the World of Warcraft, Hillary Clinton, and the Rhetoric of Female Leadership

Abstract:In 2016, Hillary Clinton was nominated as the first female presidential candidate of a major party in a United States election and Sylvanas Windrunner was appointed as the first female Warchief of the Horde in the fictional land of Azeroth in which the popular MMORPG World of Warcraft is set. This article is a rhetorical analysis of how authority and ethos were constructed by, respectively, Lady Sylvanas and Garrosh Hellscream in the World of Warcraft and Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump in the 2016 United States election. As well as investigating issues of race and gender, it explores how these four figures deploy what Richard Weaver has termed “charismatic” and “ultimate” terms to establish the legitimacy of their actions and positions.

Media and Gender Inequality in Nigerian Politics

Media and Gender Inequality in Nigerian Politics Desmond Ekeh Abstract This paper investigates the role of the media in promoting gender discrimination and inequality in Nigerian politics. It argues that the male domination of Nigerian politics, which reproduces gender inequality, is anchored on societal patriarchy as a cultural logic, but, orchestrated and reinforced by media stereotypical portrayal of female politicians as unequal with their male counterparts in the Nigerian political sphere. The study uses a corpus of sociological and media communication theories to advance the argument that the media reinforce the cultural-patriarchal social structure which „narratives‟ women as subordinates, weak, inferior and subservient to their male counterparts; and this engenders gender inequality and affects how the society perceives women and their participation in politics. It examines media coverage of the 2015 presidential election in Nigeria; with the aim to compare the level of coverage given to the female presidential candidate in contradistinction to the male candidates. It content analyzed two purposively selected national news papers in Nigeria – THISDAY and The Guardian. The study examined data generated from news mentions in these two newspapers for a specific period of 28 days in proximity to the election. It concludes that media role affected how the electorate perceives the female candidate in the election. Full Text: PDF DOI: 10.15640/ijgws.v6n2a6

Feminist Education in Indonesian Novels Under the Domination of Patriarchy

Media and Gender Inequality in Nigerian Politics Desmond Ekeh Abstract This paper investigates the role of the media in promoting gender discrimination and inequality in Nigerian politics. It argues that the male domination of Nigerian politics, which reproduces gender inequality, is anchored on societal patriarchy as a cultural logic, but, orchestrated and reinforced by media stereotypical portrayal of female politicians as unequal with their male counterparts in the Nigerian political sphere. The study uses a corpus of sociological and media communication theories to advance the argument that the media reinforce the cultural-patriarchal social structure which „narratives‟ women as subordinates, weak, inferior and subservient to their male counterparts; and this engenders gender inequality and affects how the society perceives women and their participation in politics. It examines media coverage of the 2015 presidential election in Nigeria; with the aim to compare the level of coverage given to the female presidential candidate in contradistinction to the male candidates. It content analyzed two purposively selected national news papers in Nigeria – THISDAY and The Guardian. The study examined data generated from news mentions in these two newspapers for a specific period of 28 days in proximity to the election. It concludes that media role affected how the electorate perceives the female candidate in the election. Full Text: PDF DOI: 10.15640/ijgws.v6n2a6