About Us
South Asia has the largest gender gap in women’s political participation. In India, women have had legal suffrage since independence and for the past three decades have held at least 33 percent of locally elected seats in keeping with a quota enacted in the Constitution. However, women have low representation at higher levels of office -- only 12 percent of parliamentarians are female – and female citizens participate in politics in between elections at one fourth the rate of men. Regular protests continue to spotlight the issues of violence against women and persistent gender inequalities, as well as the limits of current political institutions and policies in representing women’s interests and generating truly equal representation. Ensuring the representation of women’s interests is important for a wide range of development issues, as women have been shown to be more likely to demand public goods and services that benefit their households and communities.
In this early-stage initiative, the Policy and Representation Lab will focus on improving women’s representation at all levels of the political process. In partnership with a political party in India and large central government Ministry, the initiative scholars will design and test interventions to make progress on improving female political participation through several avenues including turnout and helping women become party workers, local leaders, and political candidates and will examine the impact of representation on changes in policy outcomes like the provision of water, toilets, healthcare, and education and women’s participation in welfare schemes such as MGNREGS. Initiative scholars will also explore ways to ensure that women’s interests are elevated and heard broadly.
The lab will also train and mentor Stanford students working on questions of gender, representation, and development in South Asia, including providing training to graduate students conducting field research, particularly with policy collaborators. The lab aims to become a focal point for collaboration among Stanford scholars working on these critical topics.
Lab Directors
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Saad Gulzar
Saad Gulzar is an assistant professor of political science at Stanford University. His research asks under what conditions can representative government – one that provides equality of voice and influence – improve people’s lives? Focusing on South Asia, he poses two broad sets of questions:
In developing countries, does representative government improve redistribution at the cost of policy efficiency? His work shows that broadening political representation can improve policies both on the efficiency and redistribution margins. He argues that taking electoral incentives seriously holds the key to making politics work for development.
How can societies transition towards more representative government? He examines long-term historical processes of transitions and their policy consequences. He also studies how barriers that prevent broad political participation can be overcome both at the individual and organizational level. His work shows politics can be made more inclusive and that doing so can improve policy outcomes.
He received his PhD in political science at New York University in 2017.
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Soledad Artiz Prillaman
Soledad Artiz Prillaman is an asssistant professor of political science at Stanford University. Her research lies at the intersections of comparative political economy, development, and gender, with a focus in South Asia. She is motivated by questions such as:
What are the political consequences of development and development policies, particularly for women’s political behavior?
How are minorities, specifically women, democratically represented and where do inequalities in political engagement persist and how are voter demands translated into policy and governance?
In answering these questions, she utilizes mixed methods, including field experiments, primary surveys, and in-depth qualitative fieldwork to identify empirical relationships as well as the underlying causal mechanisms.
She received a PhD in government at Harvard University in 2017 and a BA in political science and economics from Texas A&M University in 2011.
We are funded by the Stanford King Center on Global Development!
Where to Find Us
Encina Hall West
417 Galvez Mall
Stanford, CA 94305
Email
id2lab@stanford.edu