2024/03/19 by Tanushree Goyal · 1 voice
Social Sciences · #Gender Politics and Representation #Electoral Systems and Political Participation
paper · pdf · doi:10.1111/ajps.12840
openalex publication_date 2024/03/19 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/22
Abstract What drives the career advancement of female politicians in opaque selection environments where party activists hold sway? I argue that women's higher presence in local politics not only improves party elite responsiveness to greater talent supply (top‐down mechanism) but also expands women's capacity to organize grassroots activist networks to influence party‐nomination decisions (bottom‐up mechanism). Using the natural experiment of gender quotas in Delhi, which cause as‐if‐random variation in the number of local reserved seats within state constituencies, I estimate a novel effect of gender quotas. In state constituencies with women's higher presence in local politics, local female politicians are more likely to be promoted, and senior female politicians are more likely to get renominated. Qualitative evidence shows how women leverage grassroots networks and forge informal connections across party hierarchies. The findings emphasize the pivotal role of women's strategic political networks and grassroots organizing in shaping their political careers.