The gender gap in political ambition is an important explanation for the absence of women in legislative assemblies. However, previous research on this matter is limited by two facts: it is conducted mostly in the United States and does not pay much attention to cultural and institutional factors. In this article, we test the extent to which established mechanisms behind female politicians' career ambitions—such as differentiated political socialization and family support for men and women—are related to gender inequality among parliamentarians. We also draw attention to other lesser-known aspects, such as political culture and gender policies. To do so, we compare Spain and Sweden, two countries with a relatively high number of female members of parliament (MPs) but different cultures and gender policies. We make use of two representative surveys on Swedish and Spanish MPs. The results show that female MPs in Spain have to sacrifice their family life more than Spanish males and Swedish MPs regardless of sex. In addition, Spanish female MPs' long-term political ambitions are more dependent on family support. Female MPs' ambition in Sweden, in turn, is highly influenced by a politicized upbringing.

Unlike earlier attempts to theorize Israeli women's peace activism in civil society, this article examines the involvement of women in backstage roles of formal negotiations during the Oslo Process. On the basis of a qualitative analysis of the organizational structure and gender division of labor in Israeli negotiating bodies, I find that women were placed as midlevel negotiators and professional and legal advisors, and also served as spokeswomen and secretaries. This pattern of participation reveals 1) that the “security logic,” developed by Israeli negotiators led to, and reinforced, a structured gendered division of labor, providing a rational justification for gender inequality; 2) that the ability to control administrative capacities and women workers generated symbolic masculine power and assisted in maintaining asymmetries between Israeli and Palestinian delegations; 3) and that midlevel Israeli negotiators' narratives reveal the extent to which conceptual confusion and self-contradictory approaches toward the Oslo Accords reinforced women's overall invisibility. I conclude that patterns of rigid gender roles in official negotiating structures not only minimize women's meaningful inclusion in peace negotiations but also affect the production of public historical narratives about gender, peace, and war.

Considerations to integrate feminist security studies (FSS) and global political economy (GPE) were first systematically reflected in the Critical Perspectives section of the June 2015 issue of this journal. That collection presented engaging essays on how the divide between the two fields has evolved and ways we can seek to overcome it—or, indeed, whether we should attempt to bridge the divide. This debate has gained momentum in workshops and conference panels attempting to build bridges between the two feminist subfields. Given the richness of scholarship associated with the two fields, we aim to continue this productive conversation by bringing new voices and ideas into the debate and by engaging in further possibilities for theoretical, methodological, and empirical advancement that allow for a more comprehensive approach to global gendered inequalities and hierarchies—one that is not disciplined by academic boundaries. With this, we hope to challenge the constructed and sometimes violently sustained borders between public and private, domestic and international, political and economic, Global North and Global South, as well as disciplinary “camp structures” (Parashar 2013) that too often shape academic, and also feminist, knowledge production.

The spread of women's quotas in legislative bodies across the world since the mid-1990s has become one of the most significant factors impacting levels of women's political representation (Dahlerup 2013; Krook 2009; Tripp and Kang 2008). In the Middle East, a region that has long held a place at the very bottom of global rankings of women's representation, the adoption of such quotas is transforming levels of representation (Kang 2009). But there is still much debate over the utility of quotas for women's meaningful participation in political life. There is now a well-established literature that examines the effects of quotas on women's descriptive or numerical representation. We have a fairly robust idea about the types of quotas that are appropriate for particular sets of electoral system contexts when the goal is to generate a target percentage of women elected to legislative bodies (Jones 2005; Larserud and Taphorn 2007). However, questions about whether and how quotas benefit women beyond the simple addition of several women parliamentarians to the political game remain contested. The various arguments for the utility of quotas rest mainly on two underlying propositions. The first is that quotas, by bringing more women to the political sphere, promote the substantive representation of women's interests. The second is that quotas have a symbolic effect. They help demonstrate that women are fit and able to govern and so contribute to countering women's historical exclusion from politics.

Extensive public opinion research on gender-related attitudes has focused on identifying and understanding the dynamics of individual gender role attitudes, as well as attitudes toward more explicitly policy-related and political issues broadly related to gender. One stream of research considers egalitarianism in a generic sense as in inquiries about whether men and women should have equal roles in public affairs (e.g., Jennings 2006; Sanbonmatsu 2002, chapter 3) and evaluations of the women's movement (e.g., Huddy, Neely, and Lafay 2000). Another line of research has solicited opinions about specific gender-related policies and issues, including support for the ERA (Mansbridge 1986; Plutzer 1991), abortion (e.g., Bolzendahl and Myers 2004; Wilcox and Carr 2010), gender-based affirmative action (Kane and Whipkey 2009), the suitability of women for political life (Sanbonmatsu 2002, chapter 3), and a variety of other issues and policies often noted as being especially relevant for women (Sapiro and Shames 2010).

Gender gaps in voter turnout and electoral representation have narrowed, but other forms of gender inequality remain. We examine gendered differences in donations: who donates and to whom? Donations furnish campaigns with necessary resources, provide voters with cues about candidate viability, and influence which issues politicians prioritize. We exploit an administrative data set to analyze donations to Canadian parties and candidates over a 25-year period. We use an automated classifier to estimate donor gender and then link these data to candidate and party characteristics. Importantly, and in contrast to null effects from research on gender affinity voting, we find women are more likely to donate to women candidates, but women donate less often and in smaller amounts than men. The lack of formal gendered donor networks and the reliance on more informal, male-dominated local connections may influence women donors’ behavior. Change over a quarter century has been modest, and large gender gaps persist.

In Russia and Turkey, the pro-authoritarian regimes have largely relied on nationalistic narratives appealing to cultural authenticity, tradition, and religion for legitimacy and cultural resonance at the mass level. Within this narrative, as it is argued, traditional notions of family and femininity are endorsed so as to represent national power against the West and to invigorate social unity and morality in Russian and Turkish societies. The revival of traditional gender norms and patterns that characterize the prevailing gender climates in Russia and Turkey is visible in the restructuring of gender equality mechanisms, the organization of reproduction in accordance with pronatalist policies, women's employment patterns, and state policy on combating domestic violence. This analysis relies on empirical data obtained through in-depth interviews with academics, representatives of international organizations and nongovernmental organizations, feminist activists, experts from women's shelters, and public officials based in Russia and Turkey. It is supplemented with a review of relevant examples from political discourse employed by political leaders, legal regulations, and public policies on these four areas. The article concludes that the revival of traditional gender categories and stereotypes aggravates the inferior position of women and unleashes discriminatory attitudes toward them at home, in society, and in the labor market.

Do women share interests? Seeking interests that women share is theoretically problematic and politically undesirable for feminists. Efforts to redefine interests as subjective, contingent and/or context sensitive are unsatisfying for those who want to link women's representation to the fact of their oppression, exploitation, and discrimination. Fortunately, we need not posit shared interests to make strong claims about the importance of women's representation. Nor do we need such a concept to explain why women work together across significant institutional barriers and social differences. Overlapping, entwined sets of global and local social structures define “women” as a social collectivity. Women in diverse organizational, social, and national contexts organize to alter this complex configuration, forging relations of solidarity and shared identities in the process. But this is not reducible to shared interests. Moreover, focusing on things that women have in common de-emphasizes issues that mainly confront marginalized groups of women and/or that are group or context specific but critical to achieving gender justice. Fortunately, feminist theorists have identified bases for political representation and mobilization that offer more useful accounts of social group politics (e.g., Mansbridge 1995; Mohanty 2003; Young 1997, 2000;). The idea of social perspective is one such concept.

The question of conservative feminism in the United States did not really arise before the 2008 elections; most politically active conservative women leaders did not refer to themselves as feminists. Sarah Palin's vice presidential bid, however, prompted a shift. On a number of well-publicized occasions, Palin called herself a feminist, generating considerable discussion over whether conservative feminism is now a political movement. Using data from in-depth interviews with conservative women leaders, this article asks whether conservative women in the United States identify as feminists. Findings indicate that on the whole they do not, but conservative women are important gender-conscious political actors whose efforts compel questions about ideology and women's activism. Implications for understanding feminist and conservative movement politics more broadly are also explored.

As numerous conflicts have come to an end in Africa over the past two decades, women's movements have sought to advance a women's rights agenda through peace accords; through constitutional, legislative, and electoral reforms; as well as through the introduction of gender quotas. This article focuses the impact women's movements have had in shaping constitutions after periods of turmoil, particularly in areas of equality, customary law, antidiscrimination, violence against women, quotas, and citizenship rights. It demonstrates how countries that have come out of major civil conflict and violent upheaval in Africa after the mid-1990s—but especially after 2000—have made more constitutional changes with respect to women's rights than other African countries. The second part of the article provides two examples of how women's movements influenced constitutional changes pertaining to gender equality as well as the difficulties they encountered, particularly with respect to the international community.

Motherhood as a political identity grants women political legitimacy, enabling them to make rights-based claims. However, the efficacy and possibility of motherhood as a political identity is entangled in the sexist and racist narratives that are inextricable from white supremacy. In this article, I analyze the language used by the Mothers of the Movement (MothM) at the 2016 Democratic National Convention to demonstrate how the identities and experiences of Black women, specifically Black mothers, are co-opted and reproduced as deficient, criminal, and irrelevant, thereby limiting their ability to make claims as mothers and citizens. How, then, can marginalized mothers confront the tools of white supremacy, which portray them as “bad” mothers and “bad” citizens, to be heard within the dominant order without conforming to it? I contend that in appropriating the very discourses and spaces that seek to exclude and subjugate them, the MothM demonstrate the hypocrisy of the system of “good motherhood”—all the while reaffirming their status as equal citizens deserving of political recognition. Drawing from Black feminist thinkers, I demonstrate how motherhood and the rights that the MothM claim as mothers can be conceptualized as assertions of freedom and equal citizenship.

When Iran's new president, Hassan Rouhani, presented his proposed Cabinet to the Majles (parliament) in August 2013, one issue brought up in social media was the strange silence of the women members throughout the intensive four-day sessions to assess the ministerial nominees' programs before the vote of confidence. None of the nine women parliamentary members (MPs) used the podium to object that the president had not nominated any woman as minister. Only on social media and Persian language television was there criticism for the absence of women ministers. Eventually, Rouhani promised to include a woman in his Cabinet and to promote women in middle managerial positions. Not only was this tokenism evidence of gender-blindness, but it also evinced historical amnesia, as it overlooked the intense campaigning for women's greater participation and rights on the part of the 13 women members of Iran's Sixth Majles during the reform era coinciding with President Mohammad Khatami's two terms (1997–2005). That parliament is notable for its commitment to political and cultural reform and for the caucus that agitated for women's greater presence. Among its accomplishments were passage of the UN's Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW); raising the minimum age of marriage for girls from puberty to 13; and removing the ban on single young women traveling abroad on state scholarships.

Electoral quotas are a key factor in increasing women's political representation in parliaments globally. Despite the strong effects of quotas, less attention has been paid to the factors that prompt countries to adopt electoral quotas across developing countries. This article employs event history modeling to analyze quota adoption in 134 developing countries from 1987 to 2012, focusing on quota type, transnational activism, and norm cascades. The article asks the following questions: (1) How might quota adoption differ according to quota type—nonparty versus party quotas? (2) How has the 1995 Fourth World Conference on Women in Beijing, China (Beijing 95), contributed to quota diffusion? (3) Do global, regional, or neighboring country effects contribute more to quota adoption? Results provide new evidence of how quota adoption processes differ according to quota type, the central role played by participation in Beijing 95, and how increased global counts contribute to faster nonparty quota adoption while increased neighboring country counts lead to faster to party quota adoption.

This article develops an analytical framework to study the power struggles between status quo and gender equality actors underpinning the implementation of gender equality policies. While resistance to gender equality policies in different institutions has received considerable scholarly attention, examining this struggle in light of a multifaceted concept of power that encompasses both domination and individual and collective empowerment, we argue, offers a more accurate account of the possibilities of a feminist politics of implementation. Our analytical framework also accounts for the factors that enable resistance by dominant actors and counter-resistance by gender equality actors and the informal rules that are being upheld or challenged, respectively. Applying our framework to the study of Spanish universities, we identify both the forms and types of resistance that hinder gender reform efforts in higher education institutions and the counter-action strategies that seek to drive implementation forward and achieve institutional change.

Analyzing unique, nationally representative data, I show that two faces of sexism—hostile and benevolent—operate in systematically different ways to shape Americans’ electoral decisions and evaluations of their leaders. In the 2016 presidential election, both fostered support for Donald Trump and opposition to Hillary Clinton. They operated differently at the congressional level, however. In analyses of actual congressional candidates and in a conjoint experiment, the impact of hostile sexism is moderated by candidate sex: those high in hostile sexism oppose (and those low in hostile sexism favor) female candidates. Benevolent sexism is moderated by candidates’ symbolically gendered leadership styles: those high in benevolent sexism oppose candidates with feminine styles and favor candidates with masculine styles, regardless of whether the candidate is male or female. I conclude with discussion of the implications of the two faces of sexism for the role of gender and power in American elections.

In this article, I examine how conflicts over transgender bathroom rights have ignited debates concerning the fundamental nature of transgender identity. Through an institutional and discursive analysis of North Carolina's House Bill 2 or “bathroom bill,” the Title IX case in Gloucester County School Board v. G. G., and similar federal court cases, I explore how and why forces both on the right and in the LGBTQ movement have come to rely on scientific expertise to legitimate their conceptions. As conservatives have marshaled evidence to challenge notions that transgender identity is innate, LGBTQ and transgender organizations as well as the American Civil Liberties Union have crafted a “born this way” biopolitical construction of transgender identity. I find that at their core, these conflicts are over the meanings of gender and sex in relation to transgender identity. Conservatives posit sex as biologically rooted and gender as a psychological phenomenon, whereas transgender advocates subsume gender identity into the definition of sex in arguing that constitutional and federal civil rights law must recognize gender identity as a biologically constitutive element of sex. I conclude by noting the limits of a liberal assimilationist and litigation-centric transgender politics and by exploring alternatives to this biopolitical form of transgender political identity.

“Here Come the (Stylish) Grooms,” declared the headline, which was accompanied by a 9 1/2-inch-high photograph of two smiling, dancing, and, yes, stylish grooms. The article appeared on the front page of the Thursday Styles section of the October 20, 2011 edition of the New York Times. Alluding to the New York State law passed in June of that year that gave legal recognition to same-sex marriage, it began, “As they walk down the aisle, gay couples are making new rules while keeping some old ones.”

It is well established that women and men differ in their psychological orientation to politics (Burns, Schlozman, and Verba 2001; Dolan 2011; Fox and Lawless 2004; Thomas 2012). In addition to willingness to run for office, expressing interest in politics, and political efficacy, men and women tend to differ in reporting their factual knowledge of politics, but how do we explain the gap? This question is not merely important from a measurement standpoint (e.g., Mondak and Anderson 2004) but also has implications for our understanding of gendered political attitudes and behaviors. The gap can be reduced when controlling for a number of factors, but there remains a residual when measuring knowledge with the scale most widely used. This paper aims at providing insight on how we think not only about measuring something like “political knowledge” but also how we theorize gendered political behavior. We present a behavioral genetic analysis of sex differences in political knowledge using a genetically informative twin design to parse out the source of variation in knowledge. We do so predicated on a framework for thinking about gendered patterns in political behavior as well as findings from the existing literature on gender differences in the psychological orientation to politics. We believe our findings give us insight on what is wrong with current and seemingly gender-neutral measures of political knowledge.

The most important feature of a quota system is that it ensures representation of the target group in a much more definitive manner than does any other method. Quotas are a form of compensation for historical injustice suffered by identifiable groups and represent evidence of society's commitment to redress that injustice. Quotas offer greater legitimacy to a political system by ensuring greater representation and by integrating marginalized groups into the mainstream. Utilitarian justifications of quotas focus on the advantages of greater representation of all sections of society as a means of facilitating their contribution to the society. Quotas indicate that underrepresentation of marginal groups is not a statement of the groups' poor performance but of the system's poor performance at creating a level playing field.

Are gender quotas a good idea? Yes, for two reasons: Quotas are an effective mechanism for improving women's numerical representation, and they encourage new attitudes towards women in politics. I argue that the numerical and ideational gains brought by gender quotas outweigh the potential pitfalls they might introduce. From a pragmatic standpoint, quotas constitute an imperfect means to a positive end: women's political empowerment. What is more, formal rules may become norms, reinforcing changing attitudes.I would like to thank Marilyn Dantico, Kim Fridkin, Adrian Pantoja, Becki Scola, and the editors of Politics & Gender for their constructive comments on this essay.