Women political leaders: Past and present

Jalalzai, Farida

doi:10.1080/1554477x.2004.9971045

Cited by 26 publications

(33 citation statements)

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“…As a result, works on top executive leaders have tended to focus on women, but the reason why the ways in which political careers may be gendered cannot be fully grasped. Most works are single-case studies (see Clemens 2006;King 2002;Wiliarty 2008), and the few studies using a comparative approach are mainly descriptive and have overlooked the selection stage of the vertical ladder of political recruitment (Jalalzai 2004(Jalalzai , 2008; but see Reyes-Housholder & Thomas 2018).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The gender politics of executive candidate selection and reselection

Verge

Astudillo

2018

European J Political Res

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This research provides new theoretical and empirical insights into the gender politics of the springboards to chief executive office. The extremely masculinised composition of the relatively few top national executive positions has posed a serious impediment to empirically assessing the conditions that may facilitate women's under‐representation and men's over‐representation. To overcome this constraint, this study looks at the top regional executive office across four West European countries that present a multilevel state structure – namely Austria, Germany, Spain and the United Kingdom. Using two original datasets, the article examines the ways in which the selection and reselection of regional prime ministerial candidates is shaped by individual, organisational and institutional factors that produce heterogeneous experiences and career opportunities across sex. The results show that women have not shattered the glass ceiling at the regional level and pinpoint the fact that they are held to higher standards, benefit less from the political resources they possess and are more dependent on the decision environment in which parties select executive candidates. The conclusion is that the rules of the game guiding selection and reselection processes are strongly biased towards men.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The gender politics of executive candidate selection and reselection

Verge

Astudillo

2018

European J Political Res

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“…First, unlike most of the women who have served as national leaders in developing countries (Jalalzai 2004a;2004b), neither Michelle Bachelet nor Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf is connected to a politically powerful man or an important political family. Indeed, they represent the only two woman elected to the presidency in developing countries without familial connections.…”

Section: The Article Extends the Limited Literature On Women Nationalmentioning

confidence: 98%

Breaking the Final Glass Ceiling: The Influence of Gender in the Elections of Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf and Michelle Bachelet

Thomas¹,

Adams²

2010

Journal of Women, Politics & Policy

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The article extends the limited literature on women national leaders by providing a comparative study of two popularly elected women presidents: Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf in Liberia and Michelle Bachelet in Chile. Both Bachelet and Johnson-Sirleaf rose to power in situations that lacked the circumstances identified by current literature as mitigating gendered barriers to national leadership: neither woman was connected to politically powerful families, they were elected in presidential systems, and they were elected in countries that lag behind regional leaders in terms of women's political inclusion. This comparison reveals important similarities in how both Bachelet and Johnson-Sirleaf incorporated gender into their campaign strategies. Both women pursued electoral strategies that combined attempts to confront gendered disadvantages and to take advantage of specific gendered opportunities present within their political contexts. Both women drew upon their personal biographies, highlighting their education and careers, and political experience to demonstrate that they had the traditionally masculine traits associated with political leadership. In addition, they also strategically appealed to gendered beliefs about women's unique capabilities and strengths and linked these perceived strengths to pressing political issues in both countries. Our study thus demonstrates the continuing salience of gender, even as its influence becomes more flexible and complex.

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“…While the literature focuses almost exclusively on legislators, executive scholarship indicates that women repeatedly come to power in countries where women's general status is very limited in terms of educational, economic, and professional achievement (Jalalzai 2004, Jalalzai 2008. In fact, the only quantitative study on this topic finds a correlation between the presence of a female head of state or government and women's general status but that lower levels of parity of women to men in life expectancy, education, and income are related to women executives (Jalalzai 2008).…”

Section: Review Of the Literaturementioning

confidence: 99%

Madam President: Gender, Power, and the Comparative Presidency

Jalalzai

2010

Journal of Women, Politics & Policy

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This article examines the paths and powers of women who have occupied presidential positions around the world from 1974 through 2008. While women have had less success in obtaining presidential posts compared to prime ministerial offices, there have been recent notable gains. Developing a typology of presidential positions, I find that presidential positions are still overwhelmingly dominated by men. Moreover, men tend to hold greater powers in their presidential posts than women. Strong women presidents are still exceedingly rare, particularly those elected by popular vote and absent familial ties to male leaders. Overall, the comparative presidency continues to be a male domain.

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Women political leaders: Past and present

Cited by 26 publications

References 0 publications

The gender politics of executive candidate selection and reselection

The gender politics of executive candidate selection and reselection

Breaking the Final Glass Ceiling: The Influence of Gender in the Elections of Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf and Michelle Bachelet

Madam President: Gender, Power, and the Comparative Presidency

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