Electoral Competition, Voter Bias, and Women in Politics

• 成果类型: Article
• 署名作者: Le Barbanchon, Thomas; Sauvagnat, Julien
• 署名单位: Bocconi University
• 刊物名称: JOURNAL OF THE EUROPEAN ECONOMIC ASSOCIATION
• ISSN/ISSBN: 1542-4766
• DOI: 10.1093/jeea/jvab028
• 发表日期: 2022
• 页码: 352-394
• 关键词: gender quotas; POLICY; REPRESENTATION; stereotypes; suffrage; election; QUALITY; parity; roles; break

摘要

We quantify the implications of voter bias and electoral competition for politicians' gender composition. Unfavorable voters' attitudes toward women and local gender earnings gap correlate negatively with the share of female candidates in Parliamentary elections. Using within-candidate variation across the different polling stations of an electoral district in a given election year, we find that female candidates obtain fewer votes in municipalities with higher gender earnings gaps. We show theoretically that when voters are biased against women, parties facing gender quotas select male candidates in the most contestable districts. We find empirical support for such a strategic party response to voter gender bias. Simulating our calibrated model confirms that competition significantly hinders the effectiveness of gender quotas.