The Complexity Conundrum: Why Hasn't the Gender Gap in Subjective Political Competence Closed?

Thomas, Melanee

doi:10.1017/s0008423912000352

Cited by 30 publications

(21 citation statements)

References 21 publications

(27 reference statements)

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“…The study's findings suggest female clinical social workers' perspectives of political participation and their own potential for political involvement align with the extant literature on women's political participation (e.g., Barabas, Jerit, Pollock, & Rainey, 2014;Dolan, 2010;Fox, 2011;Hannagan, Littvay, & Popa 2014;Thomas, 2012). The participants described their own expectations and their families' expectations that they would focus on family caretaking to the exclusion of political involvement.…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 73%

Clinical Social Workers, Gender, and Perceptions of Political Participation

Ostrander

Bryan²,

Lane

2020

ASW

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Political participation to create social change is considered a professional and ethical imperative for social workers. Although researchers have examined overall political participation by social workers, little is known about how clinical social workers participate and the broader societal factors that influence their political participation. A critical phenomenological methodology was used with a sample of 23 clinical social workers from New England states to (1) identify how socio-political forces influenced their political activity; and, (2) understand how the concept of power affected individuals’ level of engagement or inclination toward the political process. This article describes one of the study’s major findings. Female participants described themselves as unqualified and/or unknowledgeable in the political sphere, with low levels of ambition and confidence to engage in political processes. Many female participants also described the challenges of achieving a work-life balance between their careers and traditional gender-based roles with little time left for political engagement. Social work education and policy advocacy can affect change that will increase the internal and external efficacy of social workers and create a policy environment that allows more options for all social workers in balancing the demands of professional and personal lives.

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Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 73%

Clinical Social Workers, Gender, and Perceptions of Political Participation

Ostrander

Bryan²,

Lane

2020

ASW

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“…With the exception of voting, men engage in these activities more than women (Burns, Schlozman, & Verba, ). Men also display greater political engagement in that they have comparatively greater political knowledge (Delli Carpini & Keeter, ; Mondak & Anderson, ), political interest, and confidence in their political competence (Burns et al, ; Thomas, ). These broad engagement factors strongly predict political participation, since not wanting to participate is one reason why many disengage from politics (Verba et al, ).…”

Section: Gender In the Citizenrymentioning

confidence: 99%

“…American National Election Studies (ANES) data collected since 1947 demonstrated a rather stable knowledge gap such that women’s accuracy on a five‐question political knowledge battery is 20–35% lower than that of male respondents (Delli Carpini & Keeter, ; McGlone, Aronson, & Kobrynowicz, ). Larger gaps—15 points and 12 points, respectively—separate men and women with regard to paying attention to national politics (Verba, Burns, & Scholzman, ) and subjective political competence (Thomas, ). Finally, modest gaps of about 4 points occur on voter turnout, the one area where women participate more than men.…”

Section: Gender In the Citizenrymentioning

confidence: 99%

The Application of Social Role Theory to the Study of Gender in Politics

Schneider

Bos

2019

Political Psychology

139

106

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Social role theory provides a framework to help understand the complexity of gender in the political sphere. We demonstrate how SRT both helps to explain extant research findings and to generate future research that will help explain the complicated ways in which gender shapes U.S. politics. This article considers two broad categories of behavior: the gendered opinions and engagement of the citizenry and the gendered evaluations of political actors by elites and voters. Within each category, we propose moving beyond the male-female binary and consider the effects of gender in conjunction with other key political identities, such as race, ethnicity, age, as well as examining the effects of (dis)ability, and class. As well, our work demonstrates how masculinity encompasses the U.S. political system and serves as a backdrop in front of which gender roles shape political behavior, and role incongruity can lead to prejudice. This project lays the groundwork for future work to apply theories from psychology to a gendered analysis of U.S. politics. Through a better understanding of sex, gender, and their combined effects with race and other intersectional identities, we contribute to a broader goal of creating a more inclusive U.S. politics. bs_bs_banner Gender in the CitizenryTo consider how gender affects the opinions and participation of the citizenry, we first introduce key concepts that lay the groundwork for social role theory. As a central organizing theory, social role theory provides an explanation for how the powerful, pervasive, segregated social roles of men and women produce gender stereotypes and gendered behavior. Then, we organize the article into sections that address the main outcomes of interest we introduced above: public opinion and political participation. We conclude each section with future research.

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“…A typical explanation for women's lower rates of participation in party and electoral politics is resource disparity. This includes both socioeconomic resources such as time and money (Norris and Lovenduski, 1995) and political resources such as knowledge (Pruysers and Blais, 2014), interest (Delli Carpini and Keeter, 1996) and efficacy (Burns et al, 2001; Thomas, 2012). Given that women tend to have fewer of these resources, it should not be surprising that party members are significantly more likely to be men or that women candidates tend to have a shorter history with their party and attract significantly fewer volunteers 3 .…”

Section: Theory and Hypothesesmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Local Determinants of Representation: Party Constituency Associations, Candidate Nomination and Gender

Cross

Pruysers

2019

Can J Pol Sci

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It is well established that political parties play a key role as gatekeepers to elected office. This article explores the local determinants of a diverse candidate pool. In particular, we seek to uncover the district- or riding-specific party factors that are related to women's participation in the parties’ candidate nomination stages. That is, why do some nomination races in a party have no women contestants, while others have many? Using data from an original survey of party constituency association presidents, as well as extensive nomination data from Elections Canada, we demonstrate that a number of local factors are related to the presence of women contesting a party's nomination. Local party associations with a woman serving as president, as well as associations that hold earlier and longer nominations, are significantly more likely to see a woman enter the contest. The results are important since they call attention to what parties do at the grassroots level, as well as highlight practical solutions for parties seeking to have more diversity in their candidate pool.

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The Complexity Conundrum: Why Hasn't the Gender Gap in Subjective Political Competence Closed?

Cited by 30 publications

References 21 publications

Clinical Social Workers, Gender, and Perceptions of Political Participation

Clinical Social Workers, Gender, and Perceptions of Political Participation

The Application of Social Role Theory to the Study of Gender in Politics

The Local Determinants of Representation: Party Constituency Associations, Candidate Nomination and Gender

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