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Pathways To Power: The Role Of Political Parties In Women’S National Political Representation, Sheri L. Kunovich, Pamela Paxton

Sociology Research

The authors extend previous research on women’s participation in politics by examining the role of female elites in political parties in selecting and supporting women as political candidates. They hypothesize that political parties, in their role as gatekeepers, mediate the relationship between country-level factors, such as women’s participation in the labor force, and political outcomes for women. The article focuses on three outcomes for women: the percentage of female political party leaders, the percentage of female candidates in a country, and the percentage of women elected. New cross-national measures of women’s inclusion in political parties are developed and analyzed in …