Membership in state legislatures: intersections of race, ethnicity, and gender

Abstract

Purpose and approach – This research explores gender and gender inequality in representation in state legislatures among African Americans, Hispanics, and white Americans. Using 10 states with the largest concentrations of African Americans in the population and 10 with the largest concentrations of Hispanics in 2003, a parity index was used to compare each race/sex group's share of each state's population with that group's share of seats in the state legislature. Parity ratios were also constructed for white women and white men in both sets of states.

Findings – White men dominate all the state legislatures surveyed here; white women are severely underrepresented as are Black women, Hispanic women, and Hispanic men. Black men are slightly but not greatly underrepresented in political office in these states. A consistent pattern is that the higher the representation of any group of males, the greater is the gap between women and men.

For Black and white women in both sets of states, having a high proportion of women who are college graduates, who are employed, and who work as managers or professionals and garner larger earnings increases their chances for election, but this pattern is not observed among Hispanic women.

Implications – These findings are significant because they bring together previously disparate insights from political science and sociology; highlight differences between women and men and among people from different ethnic groups; and reveal the importance of an intersectional approach for understanding the representation of diverse groups in political office.

Citation

Esterchild, E.M. (2010), "Membership in state legislatures: intersections of race, ethnicity, and gender", Texler Segal, M. (Ed.) Interactions and Intersections of Gendered Bodies at Work, at Home, and at Play (Advances in Gender Research, Vol. 14), Emerald Group Publishing Limited, Leeds, pp. 121-146. https://doi.org/10.1108/S1529-2126(2010)0000014009