Women representatives, left-right ideology and gendered pathways to parliament in Asia and Europe

• Main Authors: OCH, Malliga, JOSHI, Devin K.
• Format: text
• Language: English
• Published: Institutional Knowledge at Singapore Management University 2021
• Subjects: Asia; Europe; left; right; parliaments; representation; women; Asian Studies; Political Science
• Online Access: https://ink.library.smu.edu.sg/soss_research/3509
• Institution: Singapore Management University

This article explores whether women political representatives from right-leaning and left-leaning parties differ significantly in their professional backgrounds. Using data collected from parliamentary websites on the demographics of individual members of parliament (MPs) in Germany, Austria, South Korea, and Japan, we compare partisan differences in background characteristics (education, occupation, ages, and legislative committee appointments) of recently elected women MPs. We find that compared to parties on the left, (1) right-leaning parties have fewer women MPs as consistent with previous findings in the literature, (2) women MPs from certain right-wing parties (especially populist parties) entered parliament at an older age than women MPs from their left-wing competitors, (3) rightist women did not have more feminized educational and occupational backgrounds than women on the left and (4) rightist women were more likely to sit on social affairs committees in parliament but not by a statistically significant margin.