Gender and Political Participation in Australia

A sizeable gender gap in political participation, such that men are more likely to be active than women, is a well-established cross-national finding. But evidence for Australia is scarce, particularly in recent times, and so is international evidence since the mid-1970s. The 1984–85 Australian National Social Science Survey shows only a small gender gap to exist in a variety of political activities, in contrast to past findings. Furthermore, controlling for political interest largely explains the gap in rates of orthodox political participation. A significant gender gap remains in political protest activities, however, despite the introduction of a wide range of controls.     

英雄伦理与抗争行动的持续性——以鲁西农民抗争积极分子为例

在中国乡村抗争研究中,农民抗争的动机经常被理解为一种“受损逻辑”。虽然受损逻辑能够部分解释抗争行动的发起,但却不能解释在利益补偿、伦理关系修复的情况下,抗争为何会继续进行。本文在对鲁西农民抗争积极分子进行研究的基础上指出,推动抗争积极分子持续抗争的动机是一种由抗争行动本身带来的、突出的、不同于受损逻辑的“英雄伦理”。这种英雄伦理发展出了互助连带机制、等级区分机制和友情再造机制等三种机制,从而推动着抗争的持续进行。然而,这三种机制在推动抗争持续进行的同时,也存在着各自内在的限制。最后,笔者讨论了“英雄伦理”对于理解中国乡村抗争政治的贡献。     

中国网民的政治价值观与网络抗争行为的限度

中国的市场化转型带来了政治价值观的变化,进而重塑着个体的政治参与行为,其中包括网络抗争行为。由于种种限制,互联网并不必然带来网络抗争,个人的政治价值观是重要的影响因素。基于全国性的概率抽样调查数据,本文首先构造了个人的政治价值观倾向得分,然后用广义倾向值匹配估算了政治价值观对批评政府官员或政策和讨论集体行动这两种网络抗争行为的响应函数和干预效应。结果显示,越趋向自由民主价值观,个人拥有这两种网络抗争经历的概率越高,且呈现强化趋势。但是,这种作用具有阈值效应,即自由民主价值观达到较高水平后,更高的自由民主价值观带来的网络抗争行为的发生概率反而更低。因此,除了来自政府和体制的外在限制,网络抗争还存在着内生于行动者本身的限制。本文通过实证研究证实了政治价值观对网络抗争行为产生的内在限制。     

Media exposure and the engaged citizen: How the media shape political participation

Media exposure is widely known to increase institutional forms of political participation such as voting. Less well understood is whether media exposure also affects protest, a less institutional form of engagement. This paper examines the mechanics through which this relationship operates by considering the media's direct and indirect effect on voting and protesting, via political trust, efficacy, and knowledge. We make these comparisons by analyzing the unique Jennings panel dataset that collects information on respondents at three separate points. The results show that media exposure affects voting more than protesting and that these relationships operate through different mechanisms. While media exposure leads to voting because it increases political knowledge, it is associated with protest via external political efficacy. Furthermore, while this relationship is causal for voting it is only correlational for protest. The results illustrate the importance of disentangling forms of political engagement when considering media effects.     

政治信任、社会网络与抗争倾向:基于53个国家和地区的实证比较

本文基于世界价值观调查数据（2010～2014年）,构建了以抗争倾向为因变量的多层次混合效应逻辑斯蒂回归模型。对53个国家和地区的7万余份样本的分析表明,影响个体抗争倾向的因素同时存在于微观与宏观两个层次。在微观层次,相较于政治信任,个体的社会网络对抗争倾向的影响程度更高,说明相较于社会心理学视角下的集体行为理论,组织社会学视角下的资源动员理论具有更强的解释力。在宏观层次,相较于威权政体,民主政体下的个体更倾向于诉诸抗争行为。具体而言,威权政体下,强社会网络、低政治信任的个体抗争倾向最高;民主政体下,强社会网络、高政治信任的个体抗争倾向最高。这说明微观层次的因素对抗争倾向的影响受到政体类型的干预。     

Globalization and Political Change in the Women's Movement: The Politics of Scale and Political Empowerment in the World March of Women*

Objective. The objective of the article is to show that in order to understand the ongoing transnational mobilizations of the European wing of the World March of Women (WMW) between 2000 and 2006 we also need to consider the politics of scale of the transnational social movements' mobilizations. The WMW is a transnational collective action that integrates women from grassroots organizations, labor unions, and leftist political parties in over 150 countries (approximately 6,000 groups) into a process of transnationalization of solidarities. Method. The method is based on the analysis of internal documents of the international and European wings of the movement, interviews with key actors and militants, and direct observations over the years 1998–2005. Results. The results are twofold: we investigate the shift in the politics of scale of the movement, from using the same scale as the political authorities with which they interact to the creation of its own scales of action (first part); we focus on the articulation of different scales of protest, showing how, by constructing networks and coalitions, actions, and demands under the WMW umbrella, grassroots women's groups are becoming empowered and are regaining political power over the definition, dissemination, and resolution of gender issues (second part). Conclusion. The conclusion is that this specific process of empowerment helps to explain why feminist activists pursue transnationalization actions despite all the material, ideological, and relational difficulties that accompany such actions.     

Political information,gender and the vote: the differential impact of organizations,personal discussion,and the media on the electoral decisions of women and men

Although there are many demonstrated ways in which men and women approach politics differently, we know very little about how sources of political information, e.g., mass media, political organizations, differentially influence the vote choices of men and women. Using a rich, contextual dataset containing measures not only of respondent perceptions of political information, but actual content coding of those sources of political information, we estimate how television, newspapers, personal discussants, organizations, and political parties may have impacted the voting of men and women in the 1992 U.S. presidential election. We find that women’s vote choices are more likely than men’s to be influenced by the organizations to which they belong. Women are also more likely to respond to television news with a hostile media bias—they see television newscasts as definitively favoring the candidate that they oppose. We address possible explanations for these patterns of results and point towards directions for additional research.     

The Effectiveness of Assigned Goals in Complex Financial Decision Making and the Importance of Gender

Evidence suggests that men are more confident and less risk averse in financial decision making. Researchers did not address how men and women respond differently to goals in financial decision situations, however. In the present study, men set more challenging personal goals and risked more resources than women in a complex financial decision task. Men did not report higher self-efficacy versus women. As expected, gender interacted with assigned goals to predict self-efficacy, risk behavior, and personal goals. Results concur with recent financial decision research that suggests men and women differ in their use of externally-provided information such as assigned goals. Suggestions for future research are offered and limitations are discussed.     

Disobedience and support for democracy: Evidences from the World Values Survey

For some time, social movement research and political science have studied protests and activists. However, little empirical research attempts to relate movements to the type of social change they endeavour to achieve. In this paper, we suggest that different psychosocial processes may distinguish between different types of movement and protest. In particular, we cross lines between classical social psychology studies on the individual–authority relationship and studies on protest and social movements. We focus attention on the psychological processes triggered in obedience/disobedience. Our results show that when disobedience is associated with attitudes of inclusiveness, it is also positively linked to prodemocratic individual attitudes and to the enhancement of democracy at institutional levels.     

Protest militancy in the USSR: When does it work?

Recent studies of political protest suggest that militant tactics tend to produce greater concessions for aggrieved groups in hegemonies than in polyarchies. In hegemonic systems (such as the Soviet Union), political protest seems to be a two-player, regime-dissident power struggle in which the dissidents' best hope for success lies in overcoming regime force with their own force—disruption and damage. Protest militancy in hegemonies may work even better when militant tactics are combined with other protester power resources and when regime power resources are avoided. A study of 382 demonstrations in the Soviet Union confirms these propositions. Militancy does prove positively correlated with regime concessions under a wide variety of geographic, protest-group, and target characteristics. Yet protest militancy is even more effective under conditions of relative regime weakness and protester strength. The study concludes with some implications for the stability of hegemonic regimes.     

Latino and Asian American Mobilization in the 2006 Immigration Protests*

Objective. Through a comparative analysis of Latino and Asian American participation in the 2006 immigration rallies, this article presents a new framework for understanding differential protest outcomes. Methods. To understand the relative lack of Asian American participation in contrast to their Latino counterparts, I conducted in‐depth interviews with community organization leaders and assessed the text of HR 4437, U.S. ethnic media, and organizational resources. Results. I find that structural disadvantages diminished prospects for Asian American activists to effectively mobilize the Asian American community. Conclusion. By conducting a systematic and multidimensional approach to understanding differential protest participation, I conclude that structural conditions significantly advantage the mobilization of certain groups over others.     

Gender, Feminism, and Partisanship among Women's PAC Contributors

Objective . We examine the political attitudes and priorities of contributors to two prominent women's PACs for evidence of a gender gap. Methods . A survey of contributors to EMILY's List and to WISH List shows that contributors to both organizations are overwhelmingly women. However, because EMILY's List is so large, there is a sufficient number of men to compare to the two groups of women using percentages and difference-of-means tests. Results . Partisanship is the overriding influence on political priorities and attitudes toward economic and social welfare policy. However, partisanship and gender interact to influence political attitudes in at least two areas. First, EMILY's List men are more supportive of militarism and use of force than are EMILY's List women, but they are less supportive than WISH List women. Second, the women of EMILY's List are more staunchly feminist than either EMILY's List men or WISH List women. Conclusions . We conclude that the source of each group's financial commitment to women's political equality and reproductive rights is different: for EMILY's List women, it is liberal feminism; for WISH List women, it is libertarianism; and for EMILY's List men, it is general egalitarianism.     

Protest Suicide: A Systematic Model with Heuristic Archetypes

Suicide as a form of political protest is a little studied social phenomenon that cannot be dismissed simply as being irrational or patholognomic. We consider protest suicide to be a meaningful social action as purposive political act intended to change oppressive policies or practices. This paper synthesizes theoretical propositions associated with suicide in general, and protest suicide in particular, so as to construct a general explanatory model of protest suicide as a social phenomenon. Then, it analyzes protest suicide as a meaningful social action. People considering protest suicide have to discern the logic of the situation in which such action is to take place. This involves answering two fundamental questions: Is suicide an acceptable course of social action? Is the envisaged protest suicide likely to achieve their hopes, aspirations and goals? How these questions are answered gives rise to a set of protest suicide archetypes. Our analysis generates a more sophisticated understanding of the potential reasons for, and motivations behind, protest suicide as a social phenomenon.     

Down and Down We Go: Trust and Compliance in South Korea*

Objective Sociopolitical value orientations in South Korea have changed dramatically throughout the post‐World War II period, primarily as a function of intergenerational change and rising levels of education. This article investigates the impact of value change on political cynicism and noncompliance. Methods This research analyzes data from the three waves of the World Values Surveys from 1982 to 1995. Results The findings indicate that there had been a general pattern of spreading public distrust of both social and political institutions between Koreans and that more elite‐challenging forms of political participation showed the predicted increase as well. Also found are different predictors of our two dependent variables: for political cynicism, those with a higher education and/or more libertarian values were more cynical of political institutions; for protest potential, citizens who are better educated, young, more libertarian, and more active in the political process were more likely to exhibit a greater potential to involve themselves in protest activities. Conclusions The research findings conclude that value change has played a central role in interpreting the sociopolitical world, and thus in minimizing the public's faith in key political and private institutions in Korea.     

More of a Bridge than a Gap: Gender Differences in Arab‐American Political Engagement*

Objective. Research on immigrant women's economic and cultural adaptation has increasingly come to the fore of immigration research, yet relatively little remains known about their engagement in the political arena. This study examines this question among Arab Muslims, a group that has been at the center of much public debate but little scholarly discourse. Methods. Using nationally representative data on Arab Muslims, this study examines gender differences in political consciousness and activity and assesses the degree to which different dimensions of religious identity contribute to differences in men's and women's attitudes and behaviors. Results. Both women and men have high levels of political engagement, in part reflecting their relatively affluent socioeconomic positions. Men are slightly more involved than women, and this is explained by their greater participation in religious activities and higher levels of political religiosity. In contrast, subjective dimensions of religiosity—or being a devout Muslim—have no effect on political engagement. Conclusions. Overall, there are few gender differences in Arab Muslim political engagement, suggesting that collective identity based on ethnicity and religion is more salient for the political mobilization of this group. Further, religion is not uniformly associated with political activity, varying by gender and the dimension of religious identity in question, suggesting that future research needs to focus on how different facets of religion influence U.S. political involvement.     

Sex and the Statehouse: The Effects of Gender on Legislative Roll‐Call Voting*

Objective. This analysis examines whether differences exist between women and men state legislators in their roll‐call voting behavior involving matters of economic and regulatory policy. Methods. Using interest group rating scores, I examine the voting behavior of representatives in the lower houses of 28 states in legislative sessions from 1995 to 2000. By controlling for a host of variables related to legislators (political party, years of service, etc.) and their districts (average income, level of education, urbanization, etc.), I am able to isolate the independent effect of gender on roll‐call voting. Results. The findings demonstrate that among Democratic legislators women are less conservative than men, but among Republican lawmakers women are slightly more conservative than men. Additional analyses show that many factors that influence legislative voting by women and men are similar; however, political party has a more prominent effect among women. Conclusion. Although factors such as political party and some constituency characteristics exert a much stronger influence than gender, women and men legislators differ in their roll‐call voting even when controls for a wide assortment of individual‐ and district‐level conditions are taken into account.     

Occupational differences and the division of labor in political party activities

Robert Dahl (1961) clearly identifies a division of labor within political associations that allows the organization to perform its functions in a “reliable” and “skillful” manner. According to Dahl, the division of labor is facilitated by an occupational based recruitment of party “leaders” and “subleaders”. This article examines such a division of labor in political parties activities at both the grassroots and convention levels. We find strong evidence for a division of labor in party activities at both levels. However, our findings provide only tenuous evidence for occupation based differences among those participating in these two distinct types of party activities.     

歧路纷出，何处是归程？--民国时期知识女性在事业与家庭上的两难选择

近代以来随着男女平等思想的传播,受过新式教育的知识女性要求在婚后学以致用,服务社会。男性也希望自己未来的配偶具有独立谋生的能力,共同分担家庭的经济压力。但是,整个社会对女性相夫教子的传统要求并没有消失或减弱。因此,民国时期的已婚知识女性就承担起了事业与家庭的双重责任。在难以兼顾的重压之下,最终多数人选择了回归家庭。究其原因,虽然政府颁布了产假制度,育儿社会化思想在社会上也广为传播,但是在经济疲敝的社会背景下产假制度与育儿社会化都缺乏得以实施的现实土壤。     

Exploring the Gender Gap in Support for a Woman for President

The gender gap in support for a female presidential candidate gathered much media attention with Hillary Clinton as a frontrunner for the 2008 democratic presidential nomination. Two common explanations for this gap are that women have more liberal gender role and political attitudes. We contend that another important, and distinct, factor for heightened support among women is a shared social identity. We tested these three explanations across two studies. In Study 1, hierarchical regression analyses revealed that both attitudes toward women and sex independently predict a significant proportion of the variance in willingness to elect a woman for president. In Study 2, hierarchical regression analyses showed that when entered together, attitudes toward female authority and sex independently predict support, but when political attitudes was entered, only sex and political attitudes predicted support for Clinton. Finally, as expected, when primed with their gender identity, women increased their support for Clinton and men decreased their support, and women perceived her more favorably and men less so. In sum, these studies strongly support the arguments that the gender gap in support for female presidential candidates stems in part from women's more liberal gender role and political attitudes, and also from women sharing the same gender social identity as a female candidate for commander in chief .     

Gender, Financial Risk, and Probability Weights

Women are commonly stereotyped as more risk averse than men in financial decision making. In this paper we examine whether this stereotype reflects gender differences in actual risk-taking behavior by means of a laboratory experiment with monetary incentives. Gender differences in risk taking may be due to differences in valuations of outcomes or in probability weights. The results of our experiment indicate that value functions do not differ significantly between men and women. Men and women differ in their probability weighting schemes, however. In general, women tend to be less sensitive to probability changes. They also tend to underestimate large probabilities of gains more strongly than do men. This effect is particularly pronounced when the decisions are framed in investment terms. As a result, women appear to be more risk averse than men in specific circumstances.