Competitive Loss, Gendered Backlash and Sexism in Politics

Mansell, Jordan; Harell, Allison; Thomas, Melanee; Gosselin, Tania

doi:10.1007/s11109-021-09724-8

Cited by 6 publications

(7 citation statements)

References 65 publications

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“…Similarly, Willer et al (2013) find that threats to masculinity prompt higher support for President George W. Bush and the Iraq War. Meanwhile, Mansell et al (2021) find that during a nonpolitical real-effort task giving men negative feedback about their gender group's poor task performance results in greater preferences for men in political leadership. Despite their focus on different dynamics and populations, these studies concur that aggression toward out-groups is often a product of insecure or negative feelings toward oneself.…”

Section: Identity Self-esteem and Attitudes Toward Womenmentioning

confidence: 95%

“…and men candidates (Carian and Sobotka 2018;Mansell et al 2021); reactions to political scandal (Barnes, Beaulieu, and Saxton 2020); and preferences toward public policies such as gender quotas (Batista Pereira and Porto 2020), public breastfeeding (Huang, Sibley, and Osborne 2020), the gender pay gap (Connor and Fiske 2019), and women's reproductive rights (Jelen 2015;Strickler and Danigelis 2002).…”

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confidence: 99%

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Insecurity and Self-Esteem: Elucidating the Psychological Foundations of Negative Attitudes toward Women

Mansell¹,

Gatto

2022

Pol & Gen

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Political scientists recognize discriminatory attitudes as key to understanding a range of political preferences. Sexism is associated with both explicitly and non-explicitly gendered attitudes. But why do certain individuals display discriminatory attitudes, while others do not? Drawing from psychology, we examine the potential power of an underexplored set of personality traits—secure versus fragile self-esteem—in explaining gendered attitudes and preferences. With an online sample of (N = 487) U.S.-based participants, we find that fragile self-esteem is an important trait underlying individuals’ attitudes: individuals who display a discordant view of self—explicitly positive but implicitly negative—are more likely to hold hostile sexist attitudes and prefer men in leadership; these individuals are also more likely to support the Republican Party and former U.S. president Donald Trump. While present in only a fraction of the population, our results suggest that this trait may be important for understanding the development of discriminatory attitudes toward out-groups.

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Section: Identity Self-esteem and Attitudes Toward Womenmentioning

confidence: 95%

mentioning

confidence: 99%

Insecurity and Self-Esteem: Elucidating the Psychological Foundations of Negative Attitudes toward Women

Mansell¹,

Gatto

2022

Pol & Gen

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“…This suggests that many in Alberta may expect that their elected representatives will also be masculinized conservatives. Second, the competitive and zero-sum nature of politics means that for some men, losing to women in a neutral, non-political context makes them more likely to subscribe to sexist views and to prefer men's leadership in politics (Mansell et al 2021). For Albertans in the lead up to the 2019 election, this sense of loss was driven, in part, by two things: a left-leaning party in government and the ongoing bust in the oil and gas industry.…”

Section: Stereotypes and Status Threatmentioning

confidence: 99%

Blue Storm: The Rise and Fall of Jason Kenney

2023

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In 2019, the United Conservative Party, under the leadership of Jason Kenney, unseated the New Democratic Party to form the provincial government of Alberta. A restoration of conservative power in a province that had seen the Progressive Conservatives win every election from 1971-2015, UCP quickly began to make political waves. This is the first scholarly analysis of the 2019 election and the first years of the UCP government, with special focus on the path of Jason Kenney’s rise to, and fall from, provincial political power. It opens with an examination of the election from a number of vantage points, including the campaign, polling, and online politics. It provides fascinating insight into internal UCP politics with chapters on the divisions within the party, gender and the UCP, and the symbolism of Kenney’s famous blue pickup truck. Explorations of oil and gas policy, the Energy War Room, Alberta’s budgets, health care, education, the public sector, Alberta’s cultural industries, and more provide unprecedented insight into the actions, motivations, and impacts of Kenney’s UCP Government in power. Contributions from top political watchers, journalists, and academics provide a wide range of methods and perspectives. Concluding with a survey of the impacts of COVID-19 in Alberta and a comparison between Jason Kenney and Doug Ford, Blue Storm is essential reading for everyone interested in Alberta politics and the tumultuous first years of the UCP government. Providing key insights from perspectives across the political spectrum, this book is a captivating deep-dive into an unprecedented party, its often controversial politics, and its unforgettable leader.

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“…We hypothesize that this is the case, particularly among young men who (a) perceive public institutions in their region to be unfair, and (b) reside in regions that register recent increases in unemployment. This theorization is based on group and status threat theory, as well as the concepts of hostile sexism (Glick and Fiske, 1996), envious prejudice (Fiske et al, 1999), and modern sexism (Swim et al, 1995), as well as more recent studies focussing on the notion of competition between men and women (Kasumovic and Kuznekoff, 2015;Mansell et al, 2021). These concepts were developed to assess subtle sexism as societies become increasingly gender equal.…”

Section: Theorizing Perceived Competition As a Driver Of Sexismmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The theory that sexism is driven by perceived competition between the genders is supported by research showing that low-status men are more likely than high-status men to show hostility toward women who enter a previously men-dominated arena because low-status men will more likely lose from the hierarchy disruption caused by these women (Kasumovic and Kuznekoff, 2015). Similarly, Mansell et al (2021) show that men become more sexist after receiving negative feedback about their performance if their performance is assessed relative to women's performance. Our study adds to the hitherto scarce research on the role of perceived competition between men and women in sexism, which Kasumovic and Kuznekoff (2015, p. 2) consider an "evolutionary" perspective on sexism.…”

Section: Theorizing Perceived Competition As a Driver Of Sexismmentioning

confidence: 99%

Who perceives women's rights as threatening to men and boys? Explaining modern sexism among young men in Europe

2022

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While Western democracies have become increasingly gender-equal over the past decades, recent research documents a backlash against gender equality in the form of rising modern sexism. Previous research shows that modern sexism predicts political attitudes and voting behavior that are detrimental to women's empowerment and liberalism. Yet, we know little about which factors explain modern sexist attitudes and how they operate across multiple country contexts. Building on modern conceptualizations of sexism, we theorize that (perceived) increases in competition between men and women provoke modern sexism among young men in particular. Using an original measure that approximates dimensions of modern sexism embedded in the 2021 EQI survey, capturing 32,469 individuals nested in 208 NUTS 2 regions in 27 European Union countries, we demonstrate that young men are most likely to perceive advances in women's rights as a threat to men's opportunities. This is particularly true for young men who (a) consider public institutions in their region as unfair, and (b) reside in regions with recent increases in unemployment resulting in increased competition for jobs. Our findings highlight the role of perceived competition between men and women in modern sexism and contradict the argument that older generations are most likely to backlash against progressive values, potentially adding to research explaining the recent backlash against gender equality.

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Competitive Loss, Gendered Backlash and Sexism in Politics

Cited by 6 publications

References 65 publications

Insecurity and Self-Esteem: Elucidating the Psychological Foundations of Negative Attitudes toward Women

Insecurity and Self-Esteem: Elucidating the Psychological Foundations of Negative Attitudes toward Women

Blue Storm: The Rise and Fall of Jason Kenney

Who perceives women's rights as threatening to men and boys? Explaining modern sexism among young men in Europe

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