Subtle but Tough: Gender Differences in Political Interests

To date, research on gender and political representation has predominantly centered on women. The assumption that men as a privileged group automatically gain representation is nevertheless problematic. Not only are some (dominant) groups of men better represented than others, we simply do not know what men’s interests are. Up until today, however, no study has actually explored the nature of men’s interests in an empirical way. This paper offers a first attempt to conceptualize and operationalize the notion of men’s interests in empirical research. Based on new and original data from the 2014 PARTIREP voter survey organized in Belgium on the occasion of the 2014 federal and regional elections, we study men and women along political themes, their political visions and their voting behavior. The main question that guides our research is the following: What do gender differences in political themes and visions tell us about male (and female) interests in politics? Next to offering empirical insights into women and men’s political interests, this paper also provides a theoretical contribution to broader debates on group interests. We reflect on our observation that men and women attach importance to the same political themes but have different visions about them, and what this teaches us about “male interests” and “female interests”. We also launch a call for new empirical and theoretical research into men and their interests in politics.