The Glass Ceiling in Politics: Formalization and Empirical Tests

Olle Folke and Johanna Rickne

No 1034, Working Paper Series from Research Institute of Industrial Economics

Abstract: There is a scarcity of women and minorities at the apex of political power. This paper formalizes the concept of the glass ceiling for political organizations and builds on previous research to suggest four testable criteria. A glass ceiling exists if women and/or racial minorities (1) are discriminated against in the organization’s promotion process and (2) the discrimination increases in severity for the top levels of power and over an individual’s career trajectory. We suggest a series of empirical tests for this phenomenon and apply them to longitudinal data on Swedish politicians. Results show that women face a glass ceiling, while minorities’ career disadvantages are more severe at the earlier career steps (a "sticky floor").

Keywords: Glass ceiling; Political careers; Subnational politics; Women and politics; Supply of politicians; Gender inequality; Racial inequality (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: H10 J16 J21 J45 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 66 pages
Date: 2014-08-12
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-hme, nep-lma and nep-pol
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (6)

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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:hhs:iuiwop:1034

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