Corruption, Sex Scandal, and Female Underrepresentation in China

• In Event: Conceptualizing Sexual Corruption and Sextortion

Abstract

This study investigates the effects of sex scandals revealed during China's anticorruption campaign on women's willingness to work for the government. As the majority of victims of sexual misconduct are female, women are expected to be more sensitive to their working environment and the risk of sexual misconduct. Exposure to sex scandals potentially discourages women from seeking employment with the government. Men, meanwhile, should be less likely to factor potential sexual misconduct into their career decisions as they are less likely to be the victim of sexual misconduct. Men may even be incentivized by exposure to sex scandals since holding political power can be a bargaining chip in the marriage market. I conduct a survey experiment to examine the effect of sex scandals on the willingness to work for the government. The findings show that exposure to sex scandals enlarges the gender gap in willingness to work for the government, indicating that sex scandals in politics could impede female representation from the supply side.

Author

• Yuyang Pu, University of Pittsburgh