TY - JOUR
T1 - Breaking the judicial glass ceiling
T2 - The appointment of women to high courts worldwide
AU - Escobar-Lemmon, Maria C.
AU - Hoekstra, Valerie J.
AU - Kang, Alice J.
AU - Kittilson, Miki Caul
N1 - Funding Information:
Maria C. Escobar-Lemmon (m_escobar@tamu.edu) is a professor of political science at Texas A&M University, College Station, TX 77843. Valerie J. Hoekstra (Valerie.Hoekstra@asu.edu) is an associate professor of politics and global studies at Arizona State University, Tempe, AZ 85287. Alice J. Kang (akang2@unl.edu) is an associate professor of political science and ethnic studies at University of Nebraska–Lincoln, Lincoln, NE 68588. Miki Caul Kittilson (Miki.Kittilson@asu.edu) is a professor of politics and global studies at Arizona State University, Tempe, AZ 85287. This material is based on work supported by the National Science Foundation under grants SES-1324181, 1323949, and 1323968 and a Research Council Faculty Seed Grant and Senning Summer Fellowship from the University of Nebraska–Lincoln. Data and supporting materials necessary to reproduce the numerical results in the article are available in the JOP Dataverse (https://dataverse.harvard.edu/dataverse/jop). An online appendix with supplementary material is available at https://doi.org/10.1086/710017. This article was accepted under the previous editorial team.
Funding Information:
This material is based on work supported by the National Science Foundation under grants SES-1324181, 1323949, and 1323968 and a Research Council Faculty Seed Grant and Senning Summer Fellowship from the University of Nebraska?Lincoln.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2021 by the Southern Political Science Association. All rights reserved.
PY - 2021/4
Y1 - 2021/4
N2 - The salience of judicial institutions in democratic and nondemocratic countries has increased, making it important to have women on these powerful and visible decision-making bodies. Yet, women have only recently gained entrance to peak judicial bodies including constitutional and supreme courts. The appointment of the first woman to a high court is a historic landmark, breaking traditional ideas of who can and should be on the court. Using a global, longitudinal data set we show that certain explanatory factors matter differently in wealthy, stable democracies and in developing countries. The method of selecting high court justices exerts influence in wealthy, stable democracies but not newer ones. Further, our findings suggest that in both sets of countries, appointments to high courts are not made in a domestic vacuum and are influenced by international norms of having women participate in governing institutions.
AB - The salience of judicial institutions in democratic and nondemocratic countries has increased, making it important to have women on these powerful and visible decision-making bodies. Yet, women have only recently gained entrance to peak judicial bodies including constitutional and supreme courts. The appointment of the first woman to a high court is a historic landmark, breaking traditional ideas of who can and should be on the court. Using a global, longitudinal data set we show that certain explanatory factors matter differently in wealthy, stable democracies and in developing countries. The method of selecting high court justices exerts influence in wealthy, stable democracies but not newer ones. Further, our findings suggest that in both sets of countries, appointments to high courts are not made in a domestic vacuum and are influenced by international norms of having women participate in governing institutions.
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U2 - 10.1086/710017
DO - 10.1086/710017
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85096881197
VL - 83
SP - 662
EP - 674
JO - Journal of Politics
JF - Journal of Politics
SN - 0022-3816
IS - 2
ER -