Why Does Alejandro Know More about Politics than Catalina? Explaining the Latin American Gender Gap in Political Knowledge

Fraile, Marta and Gomez Martinez, Raul (2017) Why Does Alejandro Know More about Politics than Catalina? Explaining the Latin American Gender Gap in Political Knowledge. British Journal of Political Science, 47 (1). pp. 91-112.

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Abstract

This article tests contextual and individual-level explanations of the gender gap in political knowledge in Latin American countries. It suggests that this gap is impacted by political and economic settings through two interrelated mechanisms: gender accessibility (that is, the extent of available opportunities for women to influence the political agenda) and gender-bias signaling (that is, the extent to which women play important roles in the public sphere). Analyzing data from the 2008 Americas Barometer survey, this study shows that the gender gap in political knowledge is smaller among highly educated citizens, in rural areas (where both men and women know little about politics) and in bigger cities (where women’s levels of political knowledge are higher). More importantly, the magnitude of the gap varies greatly across countries. Gender differences in income, party system institutionalization and the representation of women in national parliaments are all found to play a particularly important role in explaining the magnitude of the gender gap in political knowledge across Latin America.

Item Type:	Article
Uncontrolled Keywords:	4405 Gender Studies, 4407 Policy and Administration, 4408 Political Science, 44 Human Society, 5 Gender Equality
Depositing User:	Symplectic Admin
Date Deposited:	13 Jun 2017 09:51
Last Modified:	22 Jun 2024 00:59
DOI:	10.1017/S0007123414000532
Related URLs:	Author Publisher
URI:	https://livrepository.liverpool.ac.uk/id/eprint/3007962