Beyond Meating Climate Goals: Gender and Climate Policy

• In Event: Gender and Climate

Abstract

Adopting climate mitigation policies is highly politicized in the US context. Do women policymakers face an even greater challenge in advancing such initiatives? We theorize that women face a higher penalty for pursuing climate mitigation when they advocate for climate policies that threaten masculine-coded norms and behaviors. For example, if a woman leader proposes climate mitigation measures that disincentivize eating meat or driving larger, ``manly'' vehicles, then we expect public approval will be lower than if a man proposed an identical policy. To test our theoretical expectations, we will deploy a pre-registered survey experiment on a representative sample of the US public. Our project has substantial implications for academic theories about gender and climate policymaking. The results will also inform real-world climate advocates about how to most effectively compose coalitions for mitigation action.

Authors

• Sabrina Beth Arias, Lehigh University

• Christopher William Blair, Princeton University

• Joshua Schwartz, Carnegie Mellon University