Sex, Resources, and Political Participation: Direct and Indirect Effects*

This article discusses the impact of sex and resources on political participation. The independent variables in the causal model are sex, education, organizational membership, and political involvement. Two measures of participation are used: frequency of voting and campaign participation. The results show that organization membership is the most important resource of participation. Organization is the only resource to have both indirect and direct effects. For sex and education, the effects are mediated through political involvement. The model is very weak in explaining variation in voting, but is clearly stronger in explaining variation in campaign participation.