Political polarization is the divergence of political attitudes away from the center, towards ideological extremes. Scholars distinguish between ideological polarization and affective polarization.
Political representation is the activity of making citizens "present" in public policy-making processes when political actors act in the best interest of citizens according to Hanna Pitkin's Concept of Representation (1967).
The Wish List is a political action committee devoted to electing pro-abortion rights, also called pro-choice, Republican women to the House of Representatives and Senate. The Wish List was founded in 1992. The acronym "WISH" stands for Women In the Senate and House. The Wish List recruits candidates to run for federal office and state legislative offices.
Diversity within groups is a key concept in sociology and political science that refers to the degree of difference along socially significant identifying features among the members of a purposefully defined group, such as any group differences in racial or ethnic classifications, age, gender, religion, philosophy, politics, culture, language, physical abilities, socioeconomic background, sexual orientation, gender identity, intelligence, physical health, mental health, genetic attributes, personality, behavior, or attractiveness.
In many countries, women have been underrepresented in the government and different institutions. This historical tendency still persists, although women are increasingly being elected to be heads of state and government.
A gender gap in voting typically refers to the difference in the percentage of men and women who vote for a particular candidate. It is calculated by subtracting the percentage of women supporting a candidate from the percentage of men supporting a candidate.
Carol Christine Smart is a feminist sociologist and academic at the University of Manchester. She has also conducted research about divorce and children of divorced couples.
Voting behavior refers to how people decide how to vote. This decision is shaped by a complex interplay between an individual voter's attitudes as well as social factors. Voter attitudes include characteristics such as ideological predisposition, party identity, degree of satisfaction with the existing government, public policy leanings, and feelings about a candidate's personality traits. Social factors include race, religion and degree of religiosity, social and economic class, educational level, regional characteristics, and gender. The degree to which a person identifies with a political party influences voting behavior, as does social identity. Voter decision-making is not a purely rational endeavor but rather is profoundly influenced by personal and social biases and deeply held beliefs as well as characteristics such as personality, memory, emotions, and other psychological factors. Voting advice applications and avoidance of wasted votes through strategic voting can impact voting behavior.
Gender inequality in the United States has been diminishing throughout its history and significant advancements towards equality have been made beginning mostly in the early 1900s. However, despite this progress, gender inequality in the United States continues to persist in many forms, including the disparity in women's political representation and participation, occupational segregation, and the unequal distribution of household labor. The alleviation of gender inequality has been the goal of several major pieces of legislation since 1920 and continues to the present day. As of 2021, the World Economic Forum ranks the United States 30th in terms of gender equality out of 149 countries.
Jane Jebb Mansbridge is an American political scientist. She is the Charles F. Adams Professor of Political Leadership and Democratic Values in the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University.
The Jane Mansbridge bibliography includes books, book chapters and journal articles by Jane Mansbridge, the Charles F. Adams Professor of Political Leadership and Democratic Values, Kennedy School of Government, Harvard University.
Tali Mendelberg is the John Work Garrett Professor in Politics at Princeton University, co-director of the Center for the Study of Democratic Politics, and director of the Program on Inequality at the Mamdouha S. Bobst Center for Peace and Justice, and winner of the American Political Science Association (APSA), 2002 Woodrow Wilson Foundation Book Award for her book, The Race Card: Campaign Strategy, Implicit Messages, and the Norm of Equality.
Sexism in American political elections refers to how sexism impacts elections in the United States, ranging from influences on the supply, demand, and selection of candidates to electoral outcomes. Sexism is inherently a product of culture, as culture instills a certain set of beliefs or expectations for what constitutes appropriate behavior, appearance, or mannerisms based on a person's sex. Sexism in American political elections is generally cited as a socially-driven obstacle to female political candidates, especially for non-incumbents, raising concerns about the representation of women in the politics of the United States. Such prejudice can take varying forms, such as benevolent or hostile sexism—the latter stemming from fears of women threatening the power or leadership of men.
The Berkshire Conference of Women Historians Book Prizes are awarded each year by the Berkshire Conference of Women Historians. Nominees must be women normally resident in North America who have published a book in the previous year. One prize recognizes an author's first book that "deals substantially with the history of women, gender, and/or sexuality", and the other prize recognizes "a first book in any field of history that does not focus on the history of women, gender, and/or sexuality."
This is a select bibliography of Post World War II books and journal articles about Martin Van Buren, an American statesman who served as the eighth president of the United States from 1837 to 1841.
Barbara C. Burrell is an American political scientist. She is a professor emerita in the Department of Political Science at Northern Illinois University. Burrell specializes in women and politics, campaigns and elections, and public opinion. She was one of the first researchers to use public opinion data to systematically study why the number of women elected to the United States Congress remained small through the beginning of the 21st century, and to examine the experiences of women who ran for public office in the United States.
Native Americans in the United States have had a unique history in their ability to vote and participate in United States elections and politics. Native Americans have been allowed to vote in United States elections since the passage of the Indian Citizenship Act in 1924, but were historically barred in different states from doing so. After a long history of fighting against voting rights restrictions, Native Americans now play an increasingly integral part in United States elections. They have been included in more recent efforts by political campaigns to increase voter turnout. Such efforts have borne more notable fruit since the 2020 U.S. presidential election, when Native American turnout was attributed to the historic flipping of the state of Arizona, which had not voted for the Democratic Party since the 1996 U.S. presidential election.
A gender quota is a quota used by countries and parties to increase women's representation or substantive equality based on gender in legislatures. Women are largely underrepresented in parliaments and account for a 26.9% average in parliaments globally. As of November 2021, gender quotas have been adopted in 132 countries. Around the world, quotas vary greatly in their enforcement and the stage of electoral process targeted, creating three main types of quotas: legislated candidate quotas, voluntary party quotas, and reserved seats. Regardless of their prevalence, they are a controversial measure, creating debates concerning their impacts, both negative and positive.
Susan Kingsley Kent is a professor emerita in Arts & Sciences at the University of Colorado Boulder and the Chair of the Department of Religious Studies. Her specialty is British History, with a focus on gender, culture, imperialism, and politics. Kent has authored Making Peace: The Reconstruction of Gender in Interwar Britain, as well as Sex and Suffrage in Britain, 1860-1914 and Gender and Power in Britain, 1640-1990 in addition to other books. She has also co-authored books, including The Women's War of 1929: Gender and Violence in Colonial Nigeria with Misty Bastian and Marc Matera.
The political recruitment model is a framework, used by political scientists, to explain the stages a citizen goes through to become an elected official. The model has four stages: eligibles, aspirants, candidates, and legislators. There are barriers between each stage that has the potential to keep an eligible citizen from becoming a legislator. These barriers are individual resources and ambition, political party gatekeepers, and voters. The Political recruitment model is mainly utilized to study why women hold political office at lesser rates than men. Scholars use a supply vs demand model within the political recruitment framework to investigate where and why women "drop out" of the pipeline.
