Hostname: page-component-6bf8c574d5-7jkgd Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2025-02-18T01:39:14.088Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Why Theorizing and Measuring Shared Experience in Descriptive Representation Is “A Mess Worth Making”

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  15 March 2023

Christina Xydias Open the ORCID record for Christina Xydias [Opens in a new window]
Christina Xydias*
Affiliation:
Bucknell University, USA
*
Email: [email protected]
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Extract

Jane Mansbridge’s (1999) “contingent ‘yes’” amplified a chorus of voices discussing the substantive and symbolic functions of historically marginalized groups’ presence in political office. In her essay, Mansbridge points to contexts of mistrust and uncrystallized interests as domains where presence enhances “adequate communication” and “innovative thinking” for these social groups (628). In this and many other accounts, the linchpin between descriptive and substantive representation for these functions is group members’ shared experiences, alternatively framed as the perspectives informed by those experiences. Shared experiences cannot and do not produce identical effects (they are filtered through many lenses), but they are widely understood to inform and indeed often to authenticate political representation.

Type
Critical Perspectives Article
Information
Politics & Gender , Volume 19 , Issue 4 , December 2023 , pp. 1239 - 1244
Copyright
© The Author(s), 2023. Published by Cambridge University Press on behalf of the Women, Gender, and Politics Research Section of the American Political Science Association

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Allen, Peter. 2021. “Experience, Knowledge, and Political Representation.” Politics & Gender. Published online December 2. https://doi.org/10.1017/S1743923X21000362.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Barnes, Tiffany, Beall, Victoria, and Holman, Mirya. 2021. “Pink-Collar Representation and Budgetary Outcomes in US States.” Legislative Studies Quarterly 46 (1): 119–54.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bittner, Amanda, and Goodyear-Grant, Elizabeth. 2017. “Sex Isn’t Gender: Reforming Concepts and Measurements in the Study of Public Opinion.” Political Behavior 39 (4): 1019–41.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Burden, Barry. 2007. Personal Roots of Representation. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Butler, Judith. 1988. “Performative Acts and Gender Constitution: An Essay in Phenomenology and Feminist Theory.” Theatre Journal 40 (4): 519–31.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Chattopaddhay, Raghabendra, and Duflo, Esther. 2003. “Women as Policy Makers: Evidence from a Randomized Policy Experiment in India.” Econometrica 72 (5): 1409–43.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Crenshaw, Kimberlé. 1989. “Demarginalizing the Intersection of Race and Sex.” University of Chicago Legal Forum 1: 139–67.Google Scholar
Diamond, Irene, and Hartsock, Nancy. 1981. “Beyond Interests in Politics.” American Political Science Review 75 (3): 717–21.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Dovi, Suzanne. 2002. “Preferable Descriptive Representatives: Will Just Any Woman, Black, or Latino Do?” American Political Science Review 96 (4): 729–43.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hochschild, Jennifer, and Weaver, Vesla Mae. 2010. “‘There’s No One as Irish as Barack O’Bama’: The Policy and Politics of American Multiracialism.” Perspectives on Politics 8 (3): 737–59.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lemi, Danielle. 2020. “Do Voters Prefer Just Any Descriptive Representative? The Case of Multiracial Candidates.” Perspectives on Politics 19 (1): 1061–81.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Leung, Vivien. 2021. “Asian American Candidate Preferences: Evidence from California.” Political Behavior. Published online February 8. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11109-020-09673-8.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Mansbridge, Jane. 1999. “Should Blacks Represent Blacks and Women Represent Women? A Contingent ‘Yes.’” Journal of Politics 61 (3): 628–57.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Medeiros, Mike, Forest, Benjamin, and Öhberg, Patrik. 2020. “The Case for Non-binary Gender Questions in Surveys.” PS: Political Science & Politics 53 (1): 128–35.Google Scholar
Montoya, Celeste, Bejarano, Christina, Brown, Nadia, and Gershon, Sarah Allen. 2022. “The Intersectional Dynamics of Descriptive Representation.” Politics & Gender 18 (2): 483–512.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Phillips, Anne. 1998. The Politics of Presence. Oxford: Oxford University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Piscopo, Jennifer M. 2011. “Rethinking Descriptive Representation: Rendering Women in Legislative Debates.” Parliamentary Affairs 64 (3): 448–72.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Schilt, Kristen. 2006. “Just One of the Guys? How Transmen Make Gender Visible at Work.” Gender & Society 20 (4): 465–90.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sherer, Ilana, and Hanks, Madeleine. 2021. “Affirming Pediatric Care for Transgender and Gender Expansive Youth.” Pediatric Annals 50 (2): 65–71.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Smooth, Wendy. 2006. “Intersectionality in Electoral Politics: A Mess Worth Making.” Politics & Gender 2 (3): 400–414.Google Scholar
Stensöta, Helena Olofsdotter. 2020. “Does Care Experience Affect Policy Interests? Male Legislators, Parental Leave, and Political Priorities in Sweden.” Politics & Gender 16 (1): 123–44.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Stroumsa, Daphna. 2014. “The State of Transgender Health Care: Policy, Law, and Medical Frameworks.” American Journal of Public Health 104 (3): 31–42.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Swers, Michele. 2002. The Difference Women Make: The Policy Impact of Women in Congress. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Tate, Katherine. 2001. “The Political Representation of Blacks in Congress: Does Race Matter?” Legislative Studies Quarterly 26 (4): 623–38.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Van der Haar, Marleen, and Verloo, Mieke. 2013. “Unpacking the Russian Doll: Gendered and Intersectionalized Categories in European Gender Equality Policies.” Politics, Groups, and Identities 1 (3): 417–32.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Washington, Ebonya. 2008. “Female Socialization: How Daughters Affect Their Legislator Fathers.” American Economic Review 98 (1): 311–32.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Weldon, Laurel. 2008. “Intersectionality.” In Politics, Gender and Concepts: Theory and Methodology, eds. Goertz, Gary and Mazur, Amy G.. New York: Cambridge University Press, 193–218.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Wylie, Alison. 2003. “Why Standpoint Matters.” In Science and Other Cultures: Issues in Philosophies of Science and Technology, eds. Figueroa, Robert and Harding, Sandra. New York: Routledge, 26–48.Google Scholar
Xydias, Christina. 2014. “Women’s Rights in Germany: Generations and Gender Quotas.” Politics & Gender 10 (1): 4–32.CrossRefGoogle Scholar