Do Woman MPs Influence Parties’ Policy Images?

• In Event: Gendering Party Politics

Abstract

Do Woman MPs Influence Parties’ Policy Images? A Cross-national Analysis of 20 Western Party Systems

We analyze whether the gender balance of parties’ parliamentary delegations influences voters’ perceptions of parties’ Left-Right positions, independently of the parties’ objective positions as outlined in their election manifestos. We then move on to assess whether the perceptual effects of women MPs influence measured levels of cross-party hostility and distrust in the mass public, i.e., levels of affective polarization. Our analyses will be based on Comparative Study of Electoral Systems survey data from 20 western democracies across the period 1996-2019, merged with an original data set on the gender composition of parties’ parliamentary delegations in these democracies.

Authors

• James Adams, University of California, Davis

• David Bracken, UC Davis

• Noam Gidron, Hebrew University

• Will Horne, Georgia State University

• Diana Z. O'Brien, Rice University

• Kaitlin Senk, Rice University