Unveiling the Gender-Age Nexus: An Intersectional Study of Political Ambition across Policy Levels in Finland

How do gender and age interact with regards to political ambition? This paper starts from two observations. First, women typically show lower levels of political ambition compared with men. Yet, the gender gap in political ambition has primarily been explored among young people. Hence, we have limited understanding of this gender disparity among older age groups. Second, we know that the magnitude of the gender gap varies depending on the level of policy making (Devroe et al. 2023). Reflecting on both observations, we investigate whether women and men from different age groups express different levels of ambition depending on the policy level. In addition, we investigate how various characteristics specific to the level of policy making may influence the attractiveness of specific policy levels for women and men across different age groups. The suggested explanations are variations in the policy issues dealt with, differences in perceptions about the work environment, the amount of media attention, and the impact on one’s personal life. To test the relevance of these possible explanations, we rely on original data on political ambition on the local, regional, national and European level collected among Finnish citizens older than 18 (N=1,300) in October 2023. Finland represents an interesting case to investigate the intersection between gender, age and political ambition across different policy levels as both women and young people are comparatively well represented in Finnish politics. Yet, differences in women’s and youth’s descriptive representation exist between different policy levels. Preliminary analyses reveal limited gender differences in political ambition in Finland across all levels of policy-making, and explanations related to the policy-level have surprisingly little impact on political ambition, both among women and men. We do, however, find significant interactions between age and gender. Overall, men’s political ambition is more negatively affected by age than women’s. While men exhibit higher levels of ambition at a younger age than women, these differences reverse as individuals age. Our findings highlight the dynamic nature of gender differences in political ambition across age groups and stress the need for comprehensive and intersectional approaches when studying gender and political ambition.