Recent elections have seen women break records in terms of their representation in elective office. Yet, behind this story of progress is a tale of two parties. Democratic women are on a steady march toward equal representation in state legislatures and Congress. Democratic women in elective office are also becoming more reflective of the nation’s diversity in terms of their race and ethnicity. In contrast, gains for Republican women in elective office have stalled and in many cases reversed. Republicans in elective office today are even more male and more white than in the past. Why do patter ... More

Recent elections have seen women break records in terms of their representation in elective office. Yet, behind this story of progress is a tale of two parties. Democratic women are on a steady march toward equal representation in state legislatures and Congress. Democratic women in elective office are also becoming more reflective of the nation’s diversity in terms of their race and ethnicity. In contrast, gains for Republican women in elective office have stalled and in many cases reversed. Republicans in elective office today are even more male and more white than in the past. Why do patterns of legislative office holding among women vary so dramatically across the two parties? The central argument of this book is that several long-term, structural changes in American electoral politics—the ideological, regional, and racial realignment of the parties—have had a profound impact on the representation of women in elective office. These reinforcing trends have reshaped the electoral landscape and the parties’ respective cultures and in doing so have led to the emergence of a dramatic partisan gap among women in elective office, with Democratic women far outnumbering Republican women. The dramatic and growing partisan gap among women in elective office holds powerful implications for women’s representation, the nature and viability of the two parties, and policy debates and outcomes at the state and national level.