Gender equality and policy congruence

Does public policy in Europe reflect women’s preferences equally well as men’s? In this new study in the European Political Science Review, Stefanie Reher compares the opinions of women and men on 20 policy issues in over 30 European countries. She finds that in most cases, majorities of men and women want the same policy outcomes. However, when women and men do prefer different policies, men are more likely to get the policies they want. In the paper, Stefanie Reher also looks at differences across countries. She finds that the percentage of women in parliament is not related to the extent to which women get the policies they prefer. However, she does show that the higher the number of parties in parliament, the more likely that women’s preferences are reflected in policy (see figure below).