Exploring the intersections between gender and disability: participation, attitudes, and representation

Abstract

Gender and politics research has been transformed by the turn towards intersectionality, yet we know relatively little about the intersection between gender and disability nor about the perceptions or experiences of disabled women. This panel brings together a set of papers which examine this intersection from a variety of methodological approaches and with a focus on key questions that are of concern to gender and politics scholars. Starting with political participation in a historic context Heinrich’s paper explores the organising and activism of women with disabilities in the context of feminist and disability rights movements in Germany, Switzerland, and Austria. Turning to the views, perceptions, and political participation of disabled women across Europe, Evans and Reher’s paper uses ESS data to examine the extent to which the intersection between gender and disability produces significant differences on variables including political trust, participation, and attitudes, in ways that are more than just additive effects of gender and disability. Candlish then integrates political representation theory and disability research, to map how intersecting identities and motivations explain who speaks for disabled people, situating disability at the intersections of gender, minority, and ideological politics. It further explores how mechanisms such as group consciousness, intersectional linked fate, and intergroup solidarity influence claims-making. Atchison, then further develops the exploration of representation hypothesizing that women and members of Westminster’s Disability All-Party Parliamentary Group are more likely than their colleagues to be sources of substantive representation for disabled people, she tests these hypotheses using data on the submission of disability-focused Early Day Motions and Written Parliamentary Questions in the UK. This panel brings together scholars from a diverse range of locations and at different career stages to examine an under-represented research topic that concerns a politically marginalised group.

Title	Details
Activism and self-representation of women* with disabilities in German speaking Europe during the 1980/90s	View Paper Details
Gender, disability and public opinion	View Paper Details
Exploring motivations to (mis)represent: An intersectional analysis of the descriptive, constitutive, and substantive representation of disabled people in parliaments	View Paper Details
Who Speaks for Whom? An Exploration of the Substantive Representation of Disabled People at Westminster	View Paper Details
Affective representation in Europe: intersectional differences in emotions toward national and EU parliaments	View Paper Details