Political Gender Gap Research Articles

Rethinking Compassion: Toward a Political Account of the Partisan Gender Gap in the United States

Scholarship on the political gender gap in the United States has attributed women's political views to their greater compassion, yet individual‐level measures of compassion have almost never been used to directly examine such claims. We address this issue using the only nationally representative survey to include psychometrically validated measures of compassion alongside appropriate political variables. We show that even though women are more compassionate in the aggregate than men in some respects, this added compassion does not explain the gender gap in partisanship. Female respondents report having more tender feelings towards the less fortunate, but these empathetic feelings are not associated with partisan identity. Women also show a slightly greater commitment to a principle of care, but this principle accounts for little of the partisan gap between men and women and has no significant relationship with partisanship after accounting for gender differences in egalitarian political values.

Bargaining within the family can generate a political gender gap

Consider spouses who engage in Nash bargaining to allocate resources between them. The person with a higher income when unmarried enjoys a larger share of the joint income, and benefits less from an increase in joint income. This difference can cause spouses who have the same utility functions and the same family incomes to differ in their benefits from governmental tax and spending policies, and to cast opposing votes. In particular, these incentives can generate a gender gap, with women more supportive than men of governmental taxes and spending.

The Political Gender Gap in Afghanistan

Women’s empowerment has become a salient issue in nation building in recent times. The need to secure basic human rights may well be at the core of the attention, but development experts appear to have recognized the core role of women in family and community well-being in developing countries and are beginning to tout the importance of women’s empowerment in all the aspects of development policies as reflected in the European Union’s Millennium Development Goals. This study explores political gender differences in Afghanistan, a Muslim country of extensive gender differentiation. The gender disparities we observe are not what one might have expected. Men outperform women only in those specific areas where the prohibitive structural and social limitations placed on women by the larger Afghan society would predict. We contend that these gaps would attenuate as Afghanistan’s nascent democracy deepens and extends more freedoms to Afghan women.

Adolescent moral motivations for civic engagement: Clues to the political gender gap?

This study explored gender differences in moral motivations and civic engagement among adolescents to add to existing explanations for the gender gap in political engagement in the US. We examined moral motivations for civic engagement in a sample of 1578 high school seniors, using a mixed-methods analysis of survey and interview data. Multiple regression confirmed that girls were more civically involved and expressed greater future civic intention. However, analysis of motivations suggested that differences in moral motivations might impact ongoing political development, as girls were more likely to take political action out of desire to help, while boys were more often motivated to act on values. Case studies of two interviewees—one male and one female—were analyzed to examine how civic commitment emerges in the interaction of desire to help, to act on civic values and another moral motivation that emerged in the qualitative analysis—to empower others.

Gender Tendency of Russian Political Activity from the Perspective of Jurisprudence

The article Russian women is considered as a subjects of constitutional and administrative law and studies different characteristics of their political activity: Conservation of patriarchal tendency as precondition of actual inequality of men and women in the political sphere; formal indices of women's political activity in the Soviet times, their quantitative and qualitative reduction during perestroika and in contemporary times; disregard of different recommendations given by international organizations on the issue of gender parity and overcoming evident gender gap in politics and power-holding structures; retardation of legislative decisions on gender quotas and contradiction between the real practice and the principle of gender equality stated in the legislation on political parties. The article examines the contradictory phenomenon of civic engagement of Russian men and women: The average quantity of women in the Public Chambers of the Russian Federation reaches the level of one-third; the quantity of men in the grass-roots opposition movement prevails; women vote generally for the governing party showing conservatism rather than a thoroughly taken decision. The article claims that unsteady gender situation in the given sphere is the result of a certain impact of the following factors: Marginal condition of gendered discourse, the authority's interest in conservation of the traditional gender roles, the same influence of the major religious denominations on public opinion and indirectly on policy decisions.

Gender Trends in Tourism Destination

Abstract The tourism experience was perceived traditionally in terms of products, destinations and consumption patterns. The “new mobility turn” sees the holiday experience as “performance”, “surveillance”, “play”, relationships “at-a-distance”, the impermanence of “sandcastles”, place making, etc. Gale (2007) stated five principles of this turn in tourism: it studies the mobility of individuals; it acknowledges material and immaterial structures; it deals with immobility and power relations; it recognizes virtual and imaginative forms of mobility; and it is concerned with environmental and global consequences. Destinations are not perceived now as fixed unities but as“sandcastles” made of objects, mobility and proximities (Baerenholdt et al., 2004). In the context mentioned above the holiday experience can be evaluated as a process, wherein gender relations are constructed, legitimated, reproduced and reworked” (Aitchison, 2003). These experiences can affect the identities of tourists, locals and employers positively and negatively (Crouch, 2002) and also affect gender identities slightly differently. The Global Gender Gap Report for 2010 found that while 93% of the global education gap and 96% of the global health gap has been closed, only 60% of the economic participation and 16% of the political gender gap has been closed and this gender differences in social and economic roles and responsibilities exacerbate vulnerability. Through this paper we intend to investigate the most important gender trends affecting tourist destination and tourism in general, based on the premise that destination is actually a perceptual concept, interpreted subjectively by consumers and also a result of the moment, the people and artifacts present. The aim of the paper is to get an assessment of future destination in terms of the influence of gender and offer solutions to adapt to trends investigated and to shape a tourism industry more welcoming for women.

Reconsidering Migration, Globalization and Social Conditions in the World System

The present article is based on a 175-nation, 26 standard predictor variables study on the determinants of seven important indicators of social conditions on a global scale. The standard predictors cover all major development accounting theories today, including a) Demographic factors, b) Dependency and world systems approaches, c) Feminist paradigms, d) Geographic factors, e) Human capital formation, f) Integration into the European Union and the European Monetary Union, g) Migration, h) Military expenditures and military personnel rates, i) Neo-liberal approaches, and j) World religious factors. Our indicators of the social conditions relating to our globe include data about 1. Basic human needs satisfaction, 2. Gender inequality, 3. Inequality, 4. Life satisfaction, and 5. Unemployment. Our seven multiple OLS regressions, based on the SPSS statistical program and international comparative country-level data for the world in 2000 and after, take into account the non-linear trade-offs between development level and subsequent development performance, first associated with the name of the economist Simon Kuznets. They show the importance of migration in comparison to other, widely debated “drivers” and “bottlenecks” of social development. Received worker remittances per GDP have positive effects on life quality (life expectancy, life satisfaction, Happy Life Years), and gender relations (closing the political gender gap; closing the overall gender gap) in the labor exporting economies. There is no significant effect of any migration variable on the unemployment rate. Elements of other, more established approaches also receive qualified support.

Successful Female Politician in Russia 2011-2020: Prospects and Approaches to Image Making Technology

Objective of this report is the current situation with gender gap in Russian politics and government deсision making institutions. First part of the report presents snap-shot of all forms of female participation in Russian politics. To give comprehensive picture of political gender gap we’ve analyzed political and sociological gender studies of 1999-2010 and updated the data to verify proposed tendencies. The report specifically highlights topics related to gender discrimination in the aspect of public opinion and cultural attitudes. Second part of the report presents ad hoc research of female leadership in the eyes of Russian voters. Results of the analysis propose several approaches to creation of a successful female political leader.

What drives the political gender gap?: The role of gender on facial judgments of politicians

In U.S. electoral politics, men are more likely to run and be elected to political office (Fox and Lawless, 2004). Moreover, previous research demonstrates that perceived competence from facial appearance alone can predict the outcome and margin of victory in political races, such as the U.S. Senate and U.S. House of Representative elections (Todorov et al., 2005). However, little is known about the role of gender on facial judgments of elected political officials. Here we examine the role of gender on facial judgments of male and female winners of recent U.S. House of Representative races. Twenty-three college-aged participants judged how competent, dominant, warm and approachable the faces of elected U.S. Representative leaders seemed on a Likert scale from 1 (not at all) to 7 (very much). All participants judged faces of male politicians as significantly more competent relative to female politicians. Moreover, participants judged the faces of female politicians as significantly more dominant and more approachable relative to faces of male politicians. There was no difference in perceived warmth of male and female elected officials' faces. These results suggest that the political gender gap may be driven by differences in perceived competence of male and female political leaders from the face and that female politicians who are elected, succeed potentially due to a highly dominant and approachable facial appearance.

Explaining the Persistence and Eventual Decline of the Gender Gap in Voter Registration and Turnout in the American South, 1956–1980

Recent studies of the gender gap in politics tend to focus on candidate choice rather than registration and turnout. This shift in focus away from gender inequality in political participation may be due to the finding in several studies of U.S. voting behavior since 1980 that differences in rates of registration and voting between men and women are modest and not statistically significant after controlling for traditional predictors of participation. However, we argue that researchers have overlooked the substantial gender gap in registration and voting in the South. While the gender gap in participation virtually disappeared outside the South by the 1950s, substantial gender differences in rates of voter registration and turnout remained in the South throughout the 1950s and 1960s. We test several explanations for the persistence of the gender gap in registration and voting in the South in the 1950s and 1960s and why it began to decline in the 1970s. These explanations include female labor force participation, resources, mobilization, and political engagement. Using American National Election Studies data for every presidential election year from 1956 to 1980, we employ heteroscedastic probit models within a cross-classified multilevel age-period-cohort framework to examine the declining gender gap in voter registration and turnout in the South. The results indicate that the decline of the gender gap is due to converging rates of political engagement and employment for women and men in the South during this time period. We conclude with a discussion of the theoretical implications.

The Political Gender Gap: Gender Bias in Facial Inferences that Predict Voting Behavior

BackgroundThroughout human history, a disproportionate degree of political power around the world has been held by men. Even in democracies where the opportunity to serve in top political positions is available to any individual elected by the majority of their constituents, most of the highest political offices are occupied by male leaders. What psychological factors underlie this political gender gap? Contrary to the notion that people use deliberate, rational strategies when deciding whom to vote for in major political elections, research indicates that people use shallow decision heuristics, such as impressions of competence solely from a candidate's facial appearance, when deciding whom to vote for. Because gender has previously been shown to affect a number of inferences made from the face, here we investigated the hypothesis that gender of both voter and candidate affects the kinds of facial impressions that predict voting behavior.Methodology/Principal FindingMale and female voters judged a series of male and female political candidates on how competent, dominant, attractive and approachable they seemed based on their facial appearance. Then they saw a series of pairs of political candidates and decided which politician they would vote for in a hypothetical election for President of the United States. Results indicate that both gender of voter and candidate affect the kinds of facial impressions that predict voting behavior. All voters are likely to vote for candidates who appear more competent. However, male candidates that appear more approachable and female candidates who appear more attractive are more likely to win votes. In particular, men are more likely to vote for attractive female candidates whereas women are more likely to vote for approachable male candidates.Conclusions/SignificanceHere we reveal gender biases in the intuitive heuristics that voters use when deciding whom to vote for in major political elections. Our findings underscore the impact of gender and physical appearance on shaping voter decision-making and provide novel insight into the psychological foundations underlying the political gender gap.

From the parish to the polling booth: Evolution and interpretation of the political gender gap in Italy, 1968–2006

Traditionally, in Western democracies women tended to be more conservative than men. More recently, this difference has significantly weakened, and in some countries men actually appear to be more conservative than women. We analyse the evolution of the political gender gap in Italy between 1968 and 2006, showing that it has disappeared over the course of the 2000s. We interpret this trend in the context of social role theory: the political gender gap is explained by different structural characteristics such as occupational status, education, and religiousness. The latter, in particular, plays a particularly significant role and affects the gender gap through individuals' social networks rather than through the pressure to conform to specific values.

Political Participation and the Gender Gap in European Union Member States

The European Union (EU) has repeatedly tried to answer complaints about a possible democratic deficit. With the empowerment of the European Parliament scholars have assumed that European citizens were participating more in political matters. This research focuses on the levels and styles of political participation in general in the EU, testing whether EU member states have reached similar levels of political participation, conventional and non-conventional, and whether there might be a possible base for a political gender gap assessment. Datasets from the World Values Surveys for European countries in 1990 are used to compare three dimensions of political involvement: conventional, protest-oriented and the intensity of political integration. The results highlight the presence not only of a group of countries whose citizens are strong political participants across the participation dimensions used, but also of a serious, constant presence of gender differences in the levels of political participation declared.

What Women Want: Suffrage, Gender Gaps in Voter Preferences and Government Expenditures

This paper combines unique individual-level information on ballot votes with state-level data on expenditures to provide new evidence on how women suffrage has affected government spending. Using data from the last country in Europe to adopt suffrage, Switzerland, we demonstrate two main results. First, women suffrage has changed the scope of government much more than its size. Women are more likely to support expenditures for public goods like environment and public transport, but oppose defense spending and subsidies for agriculture. Second, the political gender gap has shifted over time. While women were equally likely than men to support publicly provided health and welfare services shortly after suffrage adoption, their demand for these services has increased over the past two decades. We calculate that ten years after women suffrage, total expenditures are around 7 percent lower than prior to adoption, while welfare expenditures are 10 percent higher.

Clergy and the Politics of Gender

Using data from a new survey of mainline Protestant clergy, we explore the extent to which a political gender gap exists between male and female mainline Protestant ministers. Analysis reveals major partisan, ideological, attitudinal, and participatory disparities among clergymen and clergywomen. Women are far more liberal than their male counterparts, and even though they face the constraint of being a professional minority, clergywomen tend to participate in politics at higher rates than clergymen.

The Political Gender Gap: Australia, Britain and the United States

This article explores gender differences in voting habits and explores the question of whether it is possible to speak of a distinctive women's perspective when it comes to elections. Drawing on a wide body of existing data, the discussion focuses on the “gender gap” in three settings: Britain, Australia and the United States. It canvasses competing explanations of political gender differences and seeks to account for the similarities between the British and Australian cases and their differences with the American. A key puzzle is this: Why was America's “traditional” (that is, conservative) gender gap superseded so readily by a “modern” (that is, liberal) gender gap while Australia and Britain's traditional gender gap retained its resilience? Future prospects for the gender gap in each case are also considered.

Why Have Women Become Left-Wing? The Political Gender Gap and the Decline in Marriage

The last three decades have witnessed the rise of a pohtical gender gap in the United States wherein more women than men favor the Democratic party. We trace this development to the decline in marriage, which we posit has made men richer and women poorer. Data for the United States support this argument. First, there is a strong positive correlation between state divorce prevalence and the political gender gap—higher divorce prevalence reduces support for the Democrats among men but not women. Second, longitudinal data show that following marriage (divorce), women are less (more) likely to support the Democratic party.

Dispositional Empathy and the Political Gender Gap

Abstract The gender gap in contemporary American politics refers to differences in politicalattitudes and behavior between men and women that may be traced back to the 1980 presidential election and the Reagan presidency. For nearly two decades, men have displayed consistently more conservative and pro-Republican preferences than women. Although the gender gap has been well-documented and recognized by practitioners and scholars alike, explanations of why women have been less supportive of the conservative agenda in the Reagan and post-Reagan years have not been explained satisfactorily. In this exploratory study, we suggest that the gender-based political divisions observed in American politics have their origins in exogenous dispositions that men and women bring with them to the political environment. Specifically, women are more predisposed than men to display empathy toward distressed others in society. Differences in dispositions toward empathy are stimulated in the political arena when the agendas o...

Dispositional empathy and the political gender gap

Dispositional empathy and the political gender gap

The Gender Gap and Attitudes Towards Economic Development Strategies Among Midwestern Adults

Data and analysis are presented testing the argument that poverty and social position account for an important difference between men and women in political attitudes. The opening of the gender gap in politics coincided with the opening of the poverty gap. Gender politics are as much class as gender. Hypotheses are tested using 4-way ANOVA. One hypothesis is that income, gender, and age combine to explain voting in the 1988 presidential election where age is used in combination with income and gender to reflect social position. A second hypothesis tests attitudes on issues not apparently reflecting gender association to see whether gender divisions exist. Attitudes toward government subsidized economic development strategies are used as the issue area not obviously gender related.