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A View of Their Own: Women's Committee Leadership Styles and State Legislatures
Author(s) -
Rosenthal Cindy Simon
Publication year - 1997
Publication title -
policy studies journal
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.773
H-Index - 69
eISSN - 1541-0072
pISSN - 0190-292X
DOI - 10.1111/j.1541-0072.1997.tb00043.x
Subject(s) - legislature , professionalization , state (computer science) , political science , public administration , independence (probability theory) , nature versus nurture , state legislature , leadership style , public relations , sociology , law , statistics , mathematics , algorithm , computer science , anthropology
Analysis of survey data from 291 state legislative committee chairs suggests that professionalization has important gender implications not previously explored. Legislatures are gendered in the sense that culturally masculine and feminine committee management styles are more at home in some legislatures than in others. “Citizen” legislatures seem to be more hospitable to “feminine” behaviors of inclusion and a motivation focused on people‐oriented concerns. Professionalized legislatures–promoted in large part on the basis of a masculine vocabulary of independence, rationality, expertise, and competition with the executive–discourage inclusive or collegial committee strategies and public‐minded motives. Professional legislatures may be positive environments in which to nurture policy leadership, but their committee leaders eschew public participation.