In comparative perspective, the United States ranks fifty-seventh among the world's nations in terms of female legislative representation. Even elections to state positions, where women have gained over 20% of seats, have lagged in recent years, reflecting a kind of stagnation in the opportunity structure for women at all levels of the political system. However, when women run for office, they win in the same proportions as their male counterparts.

What, then, explains the poor showing of American women in elective office? These two volumes seek to explain the underrepresentation of women in American politics, but from different perspectives. While to all outward appearances the present-day electoral process is “gender neutral,” a pervasive, subtle form of discrimination continues to exist in the electoral arena.

In It Takes A Candidate, Jennifer Lawless (herself a former congressional candidate) and Richard L. Fox premise their analysis on the hypothesis that men and women are not equally interested in running for office. Why does female electoral representation lag so far behind comparable professional attainment, say, in the field of law and higher education? On the basis of the Citizen Political Ambition Survey of 3,800 eligible male and female candidates in professions most suited to political office, the authors identify a gender gap in political ambition between men and women. In doing so, they discount other, conventional explanations for women's low representation, such as discrimination and incumbency. They suggest that discrimination against women in political office has become less obvious, with majorities of men and women supporting female candidacies. However, the war on terror after 9/11 may have weakened their appeal, at least for higher executive-level positions. (In contrast, Jean Roth Schroedel and Marcia Goodwin in Sue Thomas and Clyde Wilcox emphasize continued voter hostility, gatekeeper resistance, and electoral arrangements as obstacles for women who seek elective office.) Nonetheless, despite the apparent decline in the overt discrimination of the past, subtler and still pervasive obstacles to women's electoral attainments persist.

Lawless and Fox's approach emphasizes the gap in political ambition that affects women's reluctance both to run for electoral office and to seek higher-level political positions. They point to a two-stage process, in which potential candidates decide first to consider and run for political office and then to seek higher-level positions. In general, as other studies have also shown, women are less likely to be politically involved than men, when their meeting attendance and contributions to campaigns are assessed. They appear reluctant to be involved in a government structure designed and dominated by men. Lawless and Fox stress the extent to which traditional family socialization and roles reflect the gendered private and public spheres that still pervade the political process.

What is the explanation for the lag in women's political ambition? For Lawless and Fox, women are less encouraged by political “gatekeepers,” including party leaders, and more self-doubting in terms of political efficacy. It is the latter that comprises the crux of their argument. Women undervalue their skills and experiences, perceive major obstacles to political participation, and feel that they are judged more harshly than men by the public and media. Socialization emerges as a major factor in explaining low numbers, with family, school, and local political arrangements contributing to the marginalization of women as candidates. It would be helpful to learn more about the role of mentors and role models in recruiting female candidates, referred to only briefly in the narratives of both books.

Factors cited that do positively affect women's willingness to run include prior political experience in school and college, as well as endorsement of issues such as gay rights, abortion, and environmental policies. Perhaps surprisingly, although far more women who do participate find a home in the Democratic Party, they are no more likely than Republican women to seek political office—suggesting that the gender gap in perceived political opportunity has a nonpartisan cast. Articles in both volumes point to the greater ambition of black women seeking political office, apparently comprising an exception to the patterns of reluctant office seeking that is characteristic of other female candidates. According to these studies, black women are more likely to run for political office—perhaps because they are more ambitious and can count on support from black voter coalitions. Is this always the case? What would happen if a black man ran against a black woman?

The authors' research suggests, alarmingly, that the female antipathy to political office is still evident today among undergraduates and young women. The barriers erected by a candidate-centered system of electoral recruitment remain formidable, particularly in the absence of quotas and/or positive discrimination that have increased women's representation in other nations. It would be useful to gauge the effectiveness of groups that seek to encourage the recruitment and financial support of women candidates—EMILY's List, the White House Project, and the Women's Campaign Fund—in altering these patterns.

In Women and Elective Office, edited by Sue Thomas and Clyde Wilcox, the authors similarly address barriers to political office for women, as well as assess their effectiveness once they are in office. At least one article in this anthology, by Heather L. Ondercin and Susan Welsh, broadens the framework for analysis of the barriers, both institutional and psychic, that affect women's candidacies. This volume also addresses institutional and other obstacles that continue to subtly discriminate against women. These include funding, support from party and other elites, media treatment, and mode of entry into politics. Among the disparate factors addressed by the contributors to the volume is inequitable fund-raising for men and women, which includes differential sources of support. For women, these are more likely to be women's and community-based groups, rather than the professional and business groups that support men. Women who choose to enter political life do so in a gendered manner, usually when they are older and have raised their families. A disproportionate number are unmarried, are childless, or have fewer children than their male counterparts. Still Michael J. Epstein, Richard Niemi and Lynda Powell emphasize the similarities between male and female candidates related to office seeking and the likelihood of reelection. How can these disparate findings related to women's candidacies be explained? Perhaps they relate to the level of office seeking: local, state, or federal.

There is considerable controversy remaining about two factors related to political success for women. One relates to media coverage: Is it more negative for women or do women benefit from being political novelties and potential innovators? Another deals with women as fund-raisers. Are there more barriers for women seeking campaign finance? In their chapter on paths to Congress, Ondercin and Welch emphasize women candidates as political innovations whose success rates may be improved if there are open seats, if they are running outside of the South, and if they are following in political cultures that have been hospitable to female candidates in the past. The latter point begs the question of how female candidates in such areas were initially able to successfully gain political office.

The significance of term limits as a factor constraining women's opportunities is dismissed relatively quickly in both volumes under review. Here, further analysis would be helpful, since the authors assert that the number of incumbent women forced to vacate seats has exceeded the number newly elected.

As noted, several articles in the Thomas and Wilcox collection deal with the role of women once elected to office. Since women elected are a heterogeneous group, does their presence in office bring a gendered agenda? Michelle Swers and Carin Larson emphasize the importance of women in leadership positions on the Hill; even female Republicans are more likely to support some women's issues than are men, although their issue positions are mediated by their party status and committee position.

One issue that might be explored further is the extent to which women voters support women candidates; the data in both books are inconclusive. The Thomas and Wilcox book would benefit from section headings; the present arrangement lumps all aspects of women in the political process together, which is difficult for the reader to follow.

What is the future of elected women in American politics? The prospects seem far from sanguine. Given the present ascendancy of Republican politics, the outlook for more women candidates and victors, who are primarily nominated and elected through the Democratic Party, seems to call for pessimism. With the leveling off and/or decline of women in elective office, will women be able to achieve any kind of critical mass through which to influence policy? Electoral factors unique to the United States, including single-member districts and the power of incumbency, as well as the surprising persistence of gender roles, continue to limit women's parity with men in elective officeholding. In the absence of political reforms that help to end the “political glass ceiling” for women, the prospects for more than slow and incremental change in political representation appear limited, at best.