Gender and Legislative Preferences: Evidence from the Argentine Provinces

W omen are underrepresented in most of the world’s legislatures.While the scarcity of female representation is problematic for multiple reasons, one of the central concerns of advocates and scholars rests on the assumption that women have different legislative preferences than their male counterparts. If this is the case, then it implies that where women do not occupy an equitable proportion of the legislature, their interests are not well represented. On the other hand, there is reason to believe that the lack of female legislators may not be problematic for women’s representation. Many scholars assume that all legislators have an electoral incentive to represent constituents ’ interests. This implies that, even if female legislators have different preferences, they will not behave differently than their male collogues. Given the divergent expectations of these two assumptions, scholars have developed a keen interest in understanding whether gender shapes legislative preferences and the extent to which it can be observed through legislative behavior. I would like to acknowledge Mark P. Jones and Royce Carroll for their guidance and support on thi