Party-Centered Politics and Women’s Access to Committee Appointments

• In Event: Class, Gender and Legislative Behavior in Comparative Environments

Abstract

Party leaders act as the main gatekeepers that determine legislators’ access to key legislative resources such as leadership posts and committee assignments. Previous research shows that women tend to be disadvantaged when it comes to these key political appointments. Yet, scholarship has rarely considered the ways that institutions and individual characteristics condition women’s access to key committees. We ask: when are party-centered political systems good for women? While parties often impede women’s ability to access power in political institutions, party power can also serve to advantage women. We argue that electoral systems that foster strong party-centered incentives may level the playing field for women’s access to powerful committees. Absent strong party-centered incentives, individuals’ personal political power, connections, and committee preferences are more likely to influence access to powerful committees. As a result, men in legislative bodies will be more likely to serve on powerful committees. In the context of strong party-centered incentives, by contrast, parties have more control over legislators' political careers. Instead, committee membership will be more evenly distributed across the party members as the party controls all committees and outcomes. Thus, we argue that strong party-centered political systems have an unintended positive consequence for women’s committee assignments in legislatures. We examine our expectations using novel data from 32 Argentine subnational chamber-years wherein we trace 1700+ legislators' previous political careers, legislative tenure, professional background, and formal party commitments. Argentina provides a hard test of our expectations as the chambers are typically filled with non-professional legislators who do not specialize in a policy area; the presence of gender quotas and high rates of turnover combine with these features to produce an environment where we would expect very low levels of committee specialization.

Authors

• Tiffany D. Barnes, University of Kentucky

• Mirya R. Holman, Tulane University