What Happens When Women Win Elections? The Electoral Returns to Increased Representation of Women

Frederik K. Kjøller, Benjamin Egerod, Lene Holm Pedersen, Jens Olav Dahlgaard

Research output: Contribution to journalJournal articleResearchpeer-review

Abstract

How does the election of a woman shape the electoral performance of their party? Research suggests that electing women to political office shapes party behavior and improves voters’ perception of the party. However, the downstream electoral consequences of electing women to office remain understudied. Draw- ing on administrative data and closely contested municipal elections in Denmark from 1997 to 2017, we find that marginally electing a woman over a man improves the electoral performance of the entire party in the succeeding election. We propose three mechanism that can produce these findings: the competence, legitimacy, and party coherence mechanisms. We find evidence partly consistent with the latter two mech- anisms, but little to support the first one. This suggests that electing women changes the functioning of the party’s elected delegation. These findings offer insights into the role of women in politics and prompt further inquiry into gender representation in elected offices.
Original languageEnglish
JournalJournal of Politics
Number of pages57
ISSN0022-3816
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 27 Nov 2024

Bibliographical note

Epub ahead of print. Published online: 27 November 2024.

Keywords

  • Women in politics
  • Local politics
  • Descriptive representation
  • Close-elections design

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