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Masculinity and femininity in media representations of party leadership candidates: men ‘play the gender card’ too

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British Politics Aims and scope

Abstract

As men continue to dominate in executive office, male leadership remains the norm and has structured how we see leadership. Yet, current understandings of gender bias in political leadership too often refer to bias against women. To fully understand gender’s role in political leadership, it is vital to remember that ‘men have a gender too’. Accordingly, this article provides an inter- and intra-sex comparison of the media coverage both male and female leadership candidates running for party leadership in the UK. The results show how the leadership environment was gendered for both men and women. Gendering is found in nuanced gendered framings which worked for and against both men and women running for party leadership in the UK. Furthermore, both male and female candidates ‘played the gender card’ when negotiating the gendered norms of leadership, using their gender in their campaign imagery. The results beg key questions on the conscious use of gender in candidate strategy and the possible effect on voters.

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Notes

  1. Analysis is limited to the candidates who contested the whole election.

  2. Given news outlets Twitter feeds are mainly factual with links to articles, personal twitter accounts of relevant politicos were examined. Originally, it was planned to use political editors’ tweets; however, an investigation of broadcast and newspaper political editors’ feeds found that they were infrequent tweeters. Therefore, tweets from the broadcast or newspapers’ chief political correspondents or deputy editors were collected dependent on the correspondent covering the election. These are senior journalists who were ‘on the ground’, providing more data for analysis as they were more frequent tweeters. Given blogs’ smaller teams political editors’ Twitter feeds were analysed, except for Guido Fawkes which uses its main Twitter handle for opinionated, journalistic-style tweets and whose editor only tweets in a personal capacity. Appendix 1 lists Twitter accounts analysed.

  3. Alternative methods rely on the Twitter API and therefore would recover only a selection of tweets.

  4. Based on Trimble (2007).

  5. Average visibility score of broadcast, newspaper and blogs (excludes social media)

  6. Average tweets per day used instead of total tweets each month to account for May and September having a smaller sample of days as the campaign began mid-May and ended in Mid-September.

  7. In proceeding sections analysis was undertaken on all media forms.

  8. 'Parties civil war over spending record', Daily Mail, 15/05/2015.

  9. 'The longer Brown spoke the punier the candidates looked', The Daily Telegraph, 17/08/2015.

  10. 'Elfin Yvette has given her flat vowels a dab of polish', Daily Mail, 29/05/2015.

  11. 'Smash our glass ceiling, says Cooper', The Daily Telegraph, 14/08/2015.

  12. Channel 4 News at 7 pm. 13/05/2015.

  13. ‘Corbyn madness has got to stop, Alan Johnson tells Labour', Daily Mail, 05/08/2015.

  14. ‘Experience, passion and principle: PM in waiting..', Daily Mirror, 14/08/2015.

  15. ‘Community union backs Yvette Cooper and Caroline Flint in leadership races', LabourList.

  16. ‘Labour in turmoil as it tries to prophesy its future from its past', The Guardian, 19/05/2015.

  17. ‘Harriet's the best man for Labour', Daily Mail, 15/06/2015.

  18. ‘Winning the women: Yvette Cooper has spotted where Labour's hope lies', The Independent, 26/05/2015.

  19. ‘Labour Liz has style and substance… and not a hope in hell of becoming leader', The Daily Telegraph, 19/08/2015.

  20. Channel 4 News at 7 pm. 10/09/2015.

  21. BBC Six O'Clock News. 26/08/2015.

  22. Channel 4 News at 7 pm. 09/09/2015.

  23. 'So, Sir Kevin, who watches the watchers?', Daily Mail, 22/06/2015.

  24. ‘Lovable man of principle? No, Corbyn's spent 30 years embracing the world's most repellant monsters', Daily Mail, 20/08/2015.

  25. ‘You decide who takes on Tories', Daily Mirror, 12/08/2015.

  26. ‘My fictional PM was destabilised by MI5. Corbyn's enemies would be in his own ranks.', The Guardian, 11/08/2015.

  27. ‘Blair: Corbyn would put Labour in the wilderness', Daily Mail, 23/07/2015.

  28. ‘Why are women hot for sex pot trot?', Daily Mail, 11/08/2015.

  29. ‘Tony Blair versus Corbyn: What the newspapers say', The Guardian, 23/07/2015.

  30. Channel 4 News at 7 pm. 09/09/2015.

  31. BBC Six O'Click News. 15/06/2015.

  32. ‘Hague gets a dressing down', The Times, 05/08/2015.

  33. ‘Burnham Parents: Why Andy's right for Labour', Daily Mirror, 03/08/2015.

  34. ‘Experience, passion and principle: PM in waiting..', Daily Mirror, 14/08/2015.

  35. ‘Andy Burnham: 'I've never been part of the Westminster in-crowd'', The Guardian, 11/08/2015, ‘Top blue’ refers to loyal and longstanding supporters of Burnham’s local football team, Everton FC.

  36. ‘Yvette Cooper profile', The Guardian, 13/08/2015.

  37. ‘Yvette Cooper profile'', The Guardian, 13/08/2015.

  38. For further analysis see Smith (2018).

  39. 'Liz Kendall Interview: 'We have got to face up to the catastrophe'', The Guardian, 18/05/2015.

  40. 'Liz Kendall profile'', The Guardian, 13/08/2015.

  41. 'Labour Liz has style and substance… and not a hope in hell of becoming leader', The Daily Telegraph, 19/08/2015.

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Funding

This work was supported by the Economic and Social Research Council, grant number ES/J500021/1.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Politics and IR, University of Southampton, Highfield Campus, Southampton, SO17 1BJ, UK

    Jessica C. Smith

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  1. Jessica C. Smith
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Correspondence to Jessica C. Smith.

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Appendix 1 Twitter accounts analysed

Appendix 1 Twitter accounts analysed

Journalist

Position

Publication

Patrick Wintour

Political Editor

The Guardian

Christopher Hope

Chief Political Correspondent

The Daily Telegraph

Michael Savage

Chief Political Correspondent

The Times

John Rentoul

Chief Political Commentator

The Independent

Jason Groves

Deputy Political Editor

The Daily Mail

N/A

N/A

Daily Express

Craig Woodhouse

Chief Political Correspondent

The Sun

Ben Glaze

Chief Political Correspondent

Daily Mirror

Norman Smith

Assistant Political Editor

BBC News

Chris Ship

Deputy Political Editor

ITV

Michael Crick

Political Correspondent

Channel 4

Mark Wallace

Editor

ConservativeHome

Conor Pope

Acting Editor

Labour List

Guido Fawkes

Main Twitter Account

Guido Fawkes

Atul Hatwel

Editor

Labour Uncut

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Smith, J.C. Masculinity and femininity in media representations of party leadership candidates: men ‘play the gender card’ too. Br Polit 17, 408–429 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1057/s41293-021-00172-w

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