Comparative Politics
Political ScienceComparative Politics
RTG Research Seminar: Vera Troeger talks on Female Marginalization in German State Parliaments
19 November 2024
The University of Duisburg-Essen (UDE) is hosting the Research Seminar & RTG Day , focusing on “Regional Disparities and Economic Policy.”
On November 19, 2024, Vera Troeger will deliver her talk titled
"Better Representation, More Influence? Explaining Female Marginalization in German State Parliaments."
Abstract:
Women are still under-represented in positions of power and have limited access to the most prestigious policy areas. As a consequence, women do not have the same opportunities as men to influence policy-making. We have theoretical reasons to believe that the politics of committee assignments give room for female discrimination. We assess differences in committee membership using unique fine-grained data on members of German state parliaments from 1948 to 2016 and provide several measures of committee importance. With matching and decomposition methods we test whether observable qualifications and experience, electoral incentives and structural aspects help explain gendered committee assignments. If anything, we find that female marginalization strengthens with more women entering state parliaments. Observable characteristics and structural aspects explain these patterns only partially. We conclude that women remain systematically disadvantaged in the most relevant policy domains.
The Research Seminar, part of the doctoral research training group ( RTG) 2484 on "Regional Disparities and Economic Policy,"is organized by the University of Duisburg-Essen (UDE) in collaboration with TU Dortmund and Ruhr-Universität Bochum. Funded by the German Research Foundation (DFG), this seminar features external researchers presenting their work in the dynamic field of regional economics. Open to the public, the seminar takes place every Tuesday from 16:15 to 17:30 during the winter semester of 2024/25 in LF 224 on the Duisburg Campus, fostering academic discourse and collaboration among scholars and students alike.
