Conflict and Cooperation: Legislative Strategies and Concepts of Power among Female and Male State Legislators

This study of the behavior of women and men in public office focuses on the more procedural aspects of legislative life, on the policy process rather than policy inputs and outputs. At issue is whether female officeholders are changing the legislative process by employing alternative methods for obtaining their policy goals. Using data collected in 1990 from in-depth interviews with Arizona and California state legislators, I compare female and male legislators' self-reported strategies for getting bills passed, their descriptions of the bases of their own power and influence, and their orientations toward "hard-ball" politics. I find that these men and women were equally likely to endorse feminine or feminist leadership styles and concepts of power that stress the value of compromise, consensus-building, equality, and honesty. In addition, they were equally critical of and reluctant to participate in stereotypically masculine behavior involving hierarchically based manipulation and coercion of others. The power of institutional norms, as opposed to gender norms, of behavior is offered as the primary explanation for the lack of sex differences among the legislators.