Are men and women contacted differently by electoral campaigns? A cross-national examination of gender gaps
| Published date | 01 March 2025 |
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1177/01925121241248450 |
| Author | Katrine Beauregard |
| Date | 01 March 2025 |
| Subject Matter | Original Research Articles |
https://doi.org/10.1177/01925121241248450
International Political Science Review
2025, Vol. 46(2) 219 –234
© The Author(s) 2024
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DOI: 10.1177/01925121241248450
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Are men and women contacted
differently by electoral campaigns?
A cross-national examination of
gender gaps
Katrine Beauregard
School of Politics and International Relations, College of Arts and Social Sciences,
Australian National University, Australia
Abstract
Although a large literature investigates cross-national differences in party mobilization, little is known about
cross-national gender differences in electoral campaign contacts. Using the Comparative Study of Electoral
System Module 4, which includes data from 2011 to 2016 and 32 countries, I find gendered patterns in
reported contacts across different activities performed by campaigns. I test two potential explanation for
these variations: electoral systems and women’s political participation. First, I find that women’s likelihood
of reported contacts increases to a greater extent than men’s when electoral systems provide incentives for
campaigns to increase their contact rates, decreasing and even reversing gender gaps. Second, I find limited
support regarding the impact of the percentage of women in legislatures on gender differences in reported
electoral campaign contacts.
Keywords
Electoral campaign contacts, party mobilization, electoral systems, gender gaps, women’s representation
Introduction
The importance of electoral campaign contacts for voter turnout is consistently emphasized in the
political science literature. To put it simply, citizens are more likely to turn out to vote if political
parties and candidates encourage them to do so (Garcia-Bedolla and Michelson, 2012; Gerber and
Green, 2000; Green and Gerber, 2008; Rosenstone and Hansen, 1993; Verba et al., 1995).
Comparative studies highlight the role of electoral systems in fostering cross-national variations in
contact rates (Karp, 2012; Karp et al., 2008; Rainey, 2015). Yet this literature rarely discusses
cross-national differences in contact rates between women and men. This is puzzling in light of the
recent findings on gender, political parties and electoral systems.1 On the one hand, in many
Corresponding author:
Katrine Beauregard, School of Politics and International Relations, College of Arts and Social Sciences, The Australian
National University, RSSS Building, Canberra, ACT 2601, Australia.
Email: katrine.beauregard@anu.edu.au
1248450IPS0010.1177/01925121241248450International Political Science ReviewBeauregard
research-article2024
Original Research Article
220 International Political Science Review 46(2)
democracies, women are more likely to turn out than men, which might indicate that political par-
ties and candidates are more likely to mobilize the former than the latter (Kittilson and Schwindt-
Bayer, 2012). On the other hand, studies show that political parties are more responsive to men’s
policy preferences than women’s (Homola, 2019), signalling that parties and candidates view men
as their likely supporters. Consequently, cross-national differences should occur; yet there is little
investigation into these and their explanations.
This paper proposes to fill this gap. I define electoral campaign contacts as activities engaged in
that although for some countries men report greater contact rates than women, the gap is reversed
for other countries. I argue that two explanations may account for these cross-national gender dif-
ferences in reported campaign contacts. First, electoral systems that provide incentives for cam-
paigns to engage in higher levels of contacts should be associated with more equal contact rates for
women and men. When campaigns need to engage in additional contacts to win seats, their efforts
might target large demographically identified groups such as women, closing the gap with men’s
likelihood of reporting contacts. Second, electoral campaigns might contact women and men more
equally in countries where women have achieved greater equality in political participation. When
women are more active in public life, they might challenge political actors’ traditional conceptions
of who voters might be, leading to more equal rates of contact.
Using the Comparative Study of Electoral Systems (CSES) Module 4, which includes data from
2011 to 2016 and 32 countries, I show that women’s likelihood of reporting contacts is higher when
electoral systems provide incentives for campaigns to increase their contact efforts, decreasing and
even reversing the gap with men’s reported contact rates. I find limited support for the women’s
political participation explanation; the presence of women in legislatures has little impact on gen-
der differences in reported contacts.
Alternatively, when electoral systems provide campaigns incentives to increase their contact
efforts, women could report greater contact rates not because campaigns actively pursue them, but
because women are more likely to spend time on housework then men. Despite progress in achiev-
ing gender equality, traditional gender roles dictate that women ought to organize their family’s
home life. Women might be more likely to answer phone calls, get the mail and be at home than
men. Consequently, when campaigns engage in strategies such as door-to-door canvassing, mail-
ing leaflets and calling voters, they might be more likely to reach women than men. I examine
gendered patterns of cross-national differences for different types of contact. I find that indeed,
when electoral systems provide greater incentives to mobilize voters, more women than men report
contacts that coincide with housework such as being at home, getting the mail and answering the
phone. There is no gendered impact for other contact types, including by text, email and social
media.
These results contribute, first, to the literature on party mobilization by adding that contact
incentives provided by electoral systems do not influence every group similarly. Although there is
an important literature on the role of electoral systems in shaping mobilization, little is known
about how these incentives influence political parties’ mobilization strategies of different groups. I
show that women’s and men’s probabilities of reporting campaign contacts are affected differently
by electoral systems. I extend the literature on the gendered effects of electoral systems by focusing
on campaign strategies, mainly whom they contact. Second, by focusing on types of contact, I
provide evidence that traditional gender roles might explain women’s greater likelihood of report-
ing contacts when campaigns have incentives to increase their efforts. Although campaigns might
not specifically decide to target women, their actions nevertheless have the consequence of bring-
ing women into the political process. This highlights an additional avenue through which electoral
systems and political actors can increase women’s electoral participation.
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