ABSTRACT
This part of the book focuses on the gender revolution in electoral politics. The 2018 midterm elections were unprecedented in many ways and helped pave the way for future social change. As a result of the 2016 election and the 2017 Women’s March, more women ran for office and women (both candidates and voters) were responsible for the 2018 electoral “blue wave.” This chapter examines the gender self-presentations of key 2018 gubernatorial races. Based on a content analysis of candidates’ campaign advertisements and media coverage, this chapter analyzes the feminist and gender-nontraditional self-presentations that connected women’s movement frames to collective identity, as well as gender-neutral and traditional self-presentations. Considering local focus group data, interviewees supported transformations in women’s political power, yet they did so in gendered ways. Women participants embraced women’s movement collective identity in ways that suggest movement diffusion, while men viewed candidates in more individualized terms.
