Under the Microscope: Gender and Accountability in the US Congress

We study how officeholder gender affects issue accountability and examine whether constituents evaluate women and men legislators differently on the basis of their policy records. Data from 2008 through 2018 show that constituents’ approval ratings and vote choices in US House elections are more res...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:The American political science review 2022-05, Vol.116 (2), p.516-532
Main Authors: KASLOVSKY, JACLYN, ROGOWSKI, JON C.
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Accountability
Archives & records
Candidates
Congressional elections
Constituents
Election results
Elections
Evidence
Females
Gender
Gender stereotypes
Legislators
Legislatures
Males
Men
Political representation
Political science
Politicians
Politics
Preferences
Public officials
Sanctions
Stereotypes
Voters
Voting
Women
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Summary:We study how officeholder gender affects issue accountability and examine whether constituents evaluate women and men legislators differently on the basis of their policy records. Data from 2008 through 2018 show that constituents’ approval ratings and vote choices in US House elections are more responsive to the policy records of women legislators than of men legislators. These patterns are concentrated among politically aware constituents, but we find no evidence that the results are driven disproportionately by either women or men constituents or by issues that are gendered in stereotypical ways. Additional analyses suggest that while constituents penalize women and men legislators at similar rates for policy incongruence, women legislators are rewarded more than men as they are increasingly aligned with their constituents. Our results show that accountability standards are applied differently across legislator gender and suggest a link between the quality of policy representation and the gender composition of American legislatures.
ISSN:0003-0554
1537-5943
DOI:10.1017/S0003055421001118