It Takes a Candidate: Why Women Don't Run for Office

This important work constitutes a systematic, nationwide empirical account of the effects of gender on political ambition. Based on data from the Citizen Political Ambition Study, a national survey of 3,800 "potential candidates" conducted by the authors, it relates these findings: --Women, even at the highest levels of professional accomplishment, are significantly less likely than men to demonstrate ambition to run for elective office. --Women are less likely than men to be recruited to run for office. --Women are less likely than men to consider themselves "qualified" to run for office. --Women are less likely than men to express a willingness to run for a future office. According to the authors, this gender gap in political ambition persists across generations, despite contemporary society's changing attitudes towards female candidates. While other treatments of gender in the electoral process focus on candidates and office holders, It Takes a Candidate makes a unique contribution to political studies by focusing on the earlier stages of the candidate emergence process and on how gender affects the decision to seek elective office.

This book is easy to read and explains why we won't have equal representation by gender in politics until our culture and parties change. You also don't have to read the whole thing-- there are very nice chapter summaries with all the main points. It changed the way I look at myself- for instance, why do I think I would never be qualified for public office when I am a public policy major at an Ivy League university? It was very inspiring, especially coming from a professor who ran for office herself.

This is an excellent book for researching women and politics. It is easy to read and understand and provides insight that has never been covered. I highly recommend this book to anyone researching women in politics.