“Why Does the Political Inequality of Women Endure? Institutional Constraints and the Ideological Fragmentation of Women’s Organizations in Cross-National Perspective, 1981-2020”
Abstract:
The international women’s movement transmits the “global culture” scripts at the national level, improving, among other things, the political equality of women. Yet, the aims of women’s organizations vary; i.e., there are ideological divisions within the movement.
The literature presents conflicting perspectives on how the ideological fragmentation of international women’s organizations affects women's political equality at the national level. The first perspective contends that minimal organizational fragmentation improves women's political empowerment, whereas the second contends the contrary. Additionally, the third approach holds that fragmentation effects are time-dependent, beneficial at first but unfavorable in the long run.
There is a knowledge gap since these perspectives were often explored independently and their results were not synthesized. I combine work on women’s movements, women's political equality, and organizational fragmentation to address this gap.
I create a new dataset of women's international organizations ideological fragmentation utilizing data from the Union of International Associations database. From 1980 to 2020, the dataset covers 64 countries in Europe, South America, and North America. Then, I combine the newly created dataset with V-Dem and other administrative data. Using mixed-effects linear regression models, I test the conflicting perspectives relating to organizational ideological fragmentation and its influence on women’s political equality.