Revisiting Forms of Representation by Critically Examining Men

Abstract

Research on gender and politics has made use of Pitkin's (1967) distinction between descriptive, substantive, and symbolic representation to conceptualize and understand the different facets of women's underrepresentation and misrepresentation. The corresponding overrepresentation of men has seldom been explicitly recognized in this literature. We explore what the critical study of men and masculinities could contribute to the study of different forms of representation. Researching the descriptive overrepresentation of men implies recognizing male dominance and turning our attention from the factors that constrain women from entering politics to the factors that enable and reproduce men's presence. Researching the substantive representation of men also implies investigating how men represent men and identifying whether hegemonic masculinities privilege the representation of some men while neglecting others. Finally, a study of the symbolic representation of men implies identifying and describing the masculine signals and symbols that permeate political life but remain largely invisible because they constitute the political norm. Naming them as “masculine” will facilitate a gendered analysis of political institutions, practices, and discourses that are seldom questioned. We also consider the symbolic representation of men who do not conform to hegemonic masculine ideals and are not represented descriptively.

Male MPs, electoral vulnerability and the substantive representation of women's interests

“…Relying on Pitkins' (1967) taxonomy of representation and Phillips' (1995) politics of presence, earlier studies were mainly interested in the link between the descriptive and substantive representation of women and whether and under which conditions, female MPs represent women's concerns in parliament due to them sharing gender-specific experiences with women in the population (Wängnerud 2009). Nevertheless, there are some pioneering studies concerning the descriptive representation of men and women in parliament, which explicitly focus on men's overrepresentation in parliament (Bjarnegård & Murray 2018;Murray 2014). In the same vein, several scholars have called for a reframing of women's substantive representation and argued for a broader understanding of the potential actors that might act as representatives for women's interests.…”

Ethnicity, gender, and intersectionality: How context factors shape the intersectional (dis)advantage under proportional representation rules

“…Despite women constituting more than half of the world population, parties continue to (re)produce male dominance in politics (Bjarnegård and Murray, 2018). Research notably highlights the existence of a party bias that reflects in female candidates’ lower list positions (Allik, 2015; Kunovich, 2012).…”

Interpreting toxic masculinity in political parties: A framework for analysis

“…The toxic masculinist cleaves to a narrow ‘standard upon which the “real man” is defined’ (Kupers, 2005: 716; see also Grey and Shepherd, 2012: 122; Stępień, 2017), upon which he or she confers a ‘position of centrality in a structure of gender relations’ (Connell, 2014: 8). Significantly for the cases explored below, the toxic masculinist endorses ‘misogynistic and homophobic views’ along with ‘sexism, heterosexism and [extreme] competitiveness’ (Parent et al, 2019: 4; see also the list in Kupers, 2005: 717), conferring on ‘wealthy, able-bodied, heterosexual, ethnic-majority men’ advantages over these other groups (Bjarnegård and Murray, 2018b: 268). The next section explains how these insights were used to develop framework for analysing the operation and effects of TM inside political parties.…”

“…Complicating things is that even far-right parties represent and empower women in diverse ways, including through making them party leaders and developing myriad policies for and about ‘women’ (Dietze, 2018; Mudde, 2007: 93–95). However, as gender experts have pointed out, ‘not all women representatives are feminists’ (Childs and Webb, 2015: 25) and descriptive representation does not necessarily lead to substantive representation (Bjarnegård and Murray, 2018b: 267). This makes it important to tune in to a party’s everyday practices as well as its ‘manifesto’ stance on female representation and legitimating discourses on women and gender issues (see below plus Akkerman, 2015; de Lange and Mu¨gge, 2015), both of which can be used as what the sociologists would call ‘front stage’ smokescreens for what is going on ‘back stage’.…”