Milan Van Steenvoort (APRW)
Date and Time
Location
Speaker & Title
Milan Van Steenvoort (University of Namur), "Media and Gender in U.S. Politics"
Abstract
Women remain substantially underrepresented in political office, a persistent gap shaping policy priorities and gender role norms. Because news markets play a key role in informing voters, we study whether female and male politicians are unequally represented in the news, and if so, why. We focus on the nearly entire universe of candidates in state legislative elections in the United States between 1973 and 2020. First, we document that upon entering state politics, female legislators receive fewer news mentions, less policy-related coverage, and more gender-, family-, and physical appearance-related content. Second, we use a triple-difference strategy that compares, for a given candidate, how coverage varies across news markets with differing gender norms, and whether this variation differs between male and female candidates. By holding candidate behavior constant, this approach allows us to isolate whether news coverage of identical political actors varies with local gender norms. Preliminary results suggest that a given female legislator experiences a larger increase in coverage in more gender-progressive areas when elected, disproportionately so relative to male legislators.
The American Politics Research Workshop (Gov 3004) meets all academic year, Tuesdays, 12:00–2:00 PM, in CGIS K354. This workshop presents an opportunity for graduate students and Harvard faculty to present and receive feedback on their current research. The workshop highlights key theoretical and empirical findings from Harvard affiliates on topics related to American politics.
All interested Harvard affiliates are invited to attend. Lunch will be provided.