Wednesday, July 8, 2015
S08 (13 rue de l'Université)
In 2006, the term « Radical Right Gender Gap » was coined to capture the greater reluctance of women to vote
for these parties in Europe (Given, 2006). Several lines of explanation were put forward (women were more
educated, less exposed by the types of jobs they held to competition with immigrants, less supportive of political
violence and extremism, more religious, etc.). But systematic analysis of survey data shows that there are large
variations in the gap from one country to another (Immerzeel, Coffé and van der Lippe, 2013; Mayer, 2012). In
addition, even where this gap existed, things might be changing (Barisione and Mayer, 2013), Radical Right
Parties presenting themselves as women friendly and targeting Islam and Muslims in the name of democratic
values and women’s rights (Tjitske and Haggelund, 2007). Using the 2014 European Election Studies dataset, this
paper intends to revisit the RRGG in a comparative perspective. Drawing from the 2014 European Parliament
elections, we analyze gender as a predictor of vote choice for Radical Right Parties. While the main effect of
gender should generally be very weak or null, once controlled for education, age, religion, occupation, we expect
interactions of gender and left-right ideology to significantly affect electoral support for RR parties across Europe.
for these parties in Europe (Given, 2006). Several lines of explanation were put forward (women were more
educated, less exposed by the types of jobs they held to competition with immigrants, less supportive of political
violence and extremism, more religious, etc.). But systematic analysis of survey data shows that there are large
variations in the gap from one country to another (Immerzeel, Coffé and van der Lippe, 2013; Mayer, 2012). In
addition, even where this gap existed, things might be changing (Barisione and Mayer, 2013), Radical Right
Parties presenting themselves as women friendly and targeting Islam and Muslims in the name of democratic
values and women’s rights (Tjitske and Haggelund, 2007). Using the 2014 European Election Studies dataset, this
paper intends to revisit the RRGG in a comparative perspective. Drawing from the 2014 European Parliament
elections, we analyze gender as a predictor of vote choice for Radical Right Parties. While the main effect of
gender should generally be very weak or null, once controlled for education, age, religion, occupation, we expect
interactions of gender and left-right ideology to significantly affect electoral support for RR parties across Europe.
