Gender Norms and Women's Political Representation: A Global Analysis of Cabinets, 1979–2009

What role does the international diffusion of gender norms play in determining recent increases in women's political representation? We argue that norm diffusion has larger positive effects on women's cabinet representation than on women's legislative representation. We also show that within cabinets, norm diffusion affects low‐prestige appointments more than high‐prestige appointments. We test these arguments using an original database of ministers from 1979 to 2009 and find that the association of women's representation with three separate indicators of international diffusion—levels of women's representation among neighboring states, levels of women's representation among intergovernmental organization partners, and time since ratification of the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women—is consistent with our arguments.     

Authoritarianism,socioethnic diversity and political participation across countries

It is argued in this article that threatening stimuli affect political participation levels among non‐authoritarians more than among authoritarians. Focusing on socioethnic diversity, which is known to be particularly threatening to authoritarians and to relate negatively to political participation in the general public, analyses of individual‐ and macro‐level data from 53 countries is presented which supports this thesis. Participation levels among authoritarians are largely static, regardless of a country's level of socioethnic heterogeneity, while non‐authoritarians participate considerably less in countries with relatively high levels of socioethnic heterogeneity. This suggests that authoritarians participate to a proportionately greater degree in the most diverse countries.     

Substantive Symbols: The Attitudinal Dimension of Black Political Incorporation in Local Government

Traditional studies of minority incorporation focus on the redistribution of public resources that purportedly follows black gains in representation. The present study departs from this approach by focusing on the attitudinal effects of black leadership. Two research questions guide this study: To what extent do blacks' assessments of neighborhood services and conditions stem from black representation in local executive and legislative offices? Are these attitudinal effects rooted in policy and service delivery outcomes? Employing survey data from 3,000 blacks embedded in 52 cities and 53 school districts, this study reveals that blacks report higher levels of satisfaction with their neighborhood conditions, police services, and public schools when represented by blacks in city hall and on school boards and that these evaluations are most positive when improvements in local services are conspicuous. Overall, these findings extend conventional conceptualizations of substantive benefits and challenge more pessimistic accounts regarding the effects of black representation in local politics.     

All Male Panels? Representation and Democratic Legitimacy

What does women's presence in political decision‐making bodies signal to citizens? Do these signals differ based on the body's policy decisions? And do women and men respond to women's presence similarly? Though scholars have demonstrated the substantive and symbolic benefits of women's representation, little work has examined how women's presence affects citizens' perceptions of democratic legitimacy. We test the relationship between representation and legitimacy beliefs through survey experiments on a nationally representative sample of U.S. citizens. First, we find that women's equal presence legitimizes decisions that go against women's interests. We show suggestive evidence that this effect is particularly pronounced among men, who tend to hold less certain views on women's rights. Second, across decision outcomes and issue areas, women's equal presence legitimizes decision‐making processes and confers institutional trust and acquiescence. These findings add new theoretical insights into how, when, and for whom inclusive representation increases perceptions of democratic legitimacy.     

Political will and government anti‐corruption efforts: What does the evidence say?

“Political will” is oft‐cited as the major obstacle to government's anti‐corruption efforts. Notwithstanding, there is remarkably little systematic analysis of the concept, with some scholars describing it as the “slipperiest concept in the policy lexicon,” whereas others are calling for its empirical relevance. This paper tries to unpack the “black box” of political will by making it an empirically relevant concept drawing on evidence from two Asian countries; Singapore and Bangladesh. Four key indicators based on the works of earlier scholars are used including origin of the initiative; comprehension and extent of analysis; credible sanctions; and resource dedication and sustenance are used. The paper also uses Transparency International's Corruption Perception Index, World Bank's World Governance Indicators (Control of Corruption and Government Effectiveness), and Political, Economic and Risk Consultancy's annual survey in Asia, as outcome measures. Based on the empirical evidence from the two countries, the paper shows that political will indeed has a positive influence on government's anti‐corruption efforts. Although political will may not be sufficient, it is a necessary condition to fight corruption, and that the difference between the positions of Singapore and Bangladesh on various global corruption league tables may be attributed to political will.     

Out of the Hands of the Parties: Women's Legislative Recruitment at Westminster

At the next general election the percentage of women elected to the smaller House of Commons risks being lower than in the current parliament, where they constitute 22 percent of all MPs. The 2008–10 Speaker's Conference identified many of the barriers faced by women and other under‐represented groups and made a series of recommendations, only some of which have been introduced. The Government favours a voluntary approach to Recommendation 24, which calls for diversity data monitoring, whilst Recommendation 25 which calls for serious consideration of legislative quotas in the absence of a significant increase in the numbers of women in 2010, appears forgotten. A second Speaker's Conference should therefore be established; the issue of women's under‐representation should be taken up above the party level—with legislative quotas introduced to address the system level failure of democratic representation at Westminster.     

The Representative Roles of MPs: A Citizen Perspective

From the normative point of view, there is a general agreement that representatives should act in line with the interests of those being represented. The knowledge about citizens' preferences for representation is very limited, however. This study examines MP's representative roles from the perspective of the citizens. It utilises a task definition approach in the Finnish institutional setting, which substantially differs from the context of earlier investigations in terms of open‐list electoral systems with mandatory preferential voting. Based on the 2007 Finnish National Election Study (n = 1,422), voters' preferences concerning four different representational roles are analysed: as representatives pursuing the interests of their electoral district, party, individual voters or being independent actors. Next, voters' preferences are accounted for by the factors related to each type of representation: citizens' regional electoral context, party attachment and electoral supply, political engagement and political competence, respectively. The results show that citizens living in electoral districts located far away from the political centre or in constituencies where it is more difficult for small parties to win political representation are most prone to prefer regional representation. Similarly, voters who have closer ties with political parties prefer party‐centred representation while those who feel less politically efficient favour close ties with their MPs. Education in turn increases the support for a political representative to act independently from the electorate or the party.