Browsing by Author "O'Neill, Brenda"
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- ItemOpen AccessA comparison of social and economic political attitudes of Canadian and American Evangelical Protestants(2008) Munroe, Jason C.; O'Neill, Brenda
- ItemOpen Access“Be Professional, Private and Pleasant”: The Conscious and Unconscious Gendering of Campaign Messages in Canadian and Australian Local Elections(2020-12) Croskill, Julie Lynn; O'Neill, Brenda; Franceschet, Susan; Young, Lisa; Lucas, Jack; Janovicek, Nancy; Raney, TraceyThis dissertation examines Australian and Canadian local campaigns to investigate the extent to which gender and gendered stereotypes consciously affect candidates’ campaign messaging. The data for this study was gathered via in-depth interviews with 92 candidates who contested elections at the state/provincial level between 2010 and 2013. The data collected during the interviews included information on how candidates presented themselves in terms of their appearance, qualifications, character traits and family life; the issues that they highlighted in their local campaigns; the voters they targeted and strategies to connect with them; and information about their opponent relationships such as whether they formed civility pacts, employed negative attack messaging and how they responded if they were negatively campaigned against. The main conclusion is that gender affects political campaigns. Women’s campaign messaging looks different from men’s campaign messaging in several ways. For example, women are less likely to share personal information about themselves and their families and less likely to target an opponent with negative attack messages despite being more likely to be the target of such attacks. Among the most competitive women candidates, the differences found between their campaigns, and men’s campaigns, regardless of competitiveness, started to diminish. In terms of understanding why campaigns are gendered, there was minimal evidence detected that candidates consciously adjusted their messaging in response to what they perceived to be either voter-held or self-held beliefs about gendered stereotypes. Thus, gendered campaign messaging is the result of unconscious gender role stereotypes. By and large, women candidates did not cue gender in their local campaigns by highlighting women’s issues in their messaging, or by appealing to voters to support a woman candidate.
- ItemOpen AccessBurgeoning quandary: the urban/suburban/rural cleavage in Canada(2008) Wasko, Kevin; O'Neill, Brenda
- ItemOpen AccessElectoral reform and the correct vote: the case of New Zealand(2009) Wilson, Evan; O'Neill, Brenda
- ItemOpen AccessEmploying Broad Tactics: Social Change, Women, and Work in Alberta: 1970-1993(2020-01) Hrynuik, Erin; Janovicek, Nancy; O'Neill, Brenda; Timm, Annette F.This study analyses how working women in Alberta navigated themselves throughout the change in workforce demographic in the province in the late 1980s and early 1990s. I argue that by employing a variety of tactics in advocating for themselves as full participants in the province’s workforce, the groups studied were successful in bringing the voice of women into Alberta’s labour movement. I assessed the activities and initiatives of three feminist labour activist groups in the province and found that each group was unique in how members tried to implement positive change to create a better environment for working women in the province. Through an analysis of each group’s meeting minutes, correspondence, press releases, and media attention, as well as three oral interviews, I argue that each group advocated for the rights of working women in Alberta.
- ItemOpen AccessFreedom of religion, women’s agency and banning the face veil: the role of feminist beliefs in shaping women’s opinion(Taylor & Francis Open Select, 2014-03-06) O'Neill, Brenda; Gidengil, Elisabeth; Cote, Catherine; Young, Lisa
- ItemOpen AccessGender Gaps in Political Participation in a Cross-National Perspective: The Gendered Effects of Political Institutions(2014-04-25) Beauregard, Katrine; O'Neill, BrendaGender differences in political participation have been a persistent phenomenon in multiple countries. On a variety of political activities, women are less likely than men to be involved. Multiple scholarly works have investigated explanations for these persistent gender gaps. Scholars have found that gender differences in political resources and psychological engagement play an important role in understanding participation gaps. Yet, gender differences in political participation have little been investigated in a cross-national perspective. Indeed, there is evidence indicating that gaps are not constant across countries, suggesting that it is possible for country-level factors to contribute to gender differences in political participation in addition to individual-level factors. This investigation tests for the possibility that political institutions, which vary across countries, contribute to an additional level of explanation for gender differences in political participation. I identify three political institutions that may have a gendered effect: the electoral system, party ideology, and women's representation and gender quotas. Findings demonstrate that all three aspects of political institutions tested in this analysis are associated with varying size of gender gaps in political participation. More specifically, first, it is found that more proportional electoral systems are associated with larger gender differences in political participation. Second, the presence of left ideologies in the party system is not enough to increase women's levels of political participation. It is only when political parties address women's interests in their platforms that gender gaps decrease. Finally, women's representation and gender quotas are found to affect gender gaps, but not always in the expected ways. Results show that both women's representation and gender quotas can influence men's behaviour more so than women's, leading to larger gender gaps in political participation. It is hypothesized that the gendered effects of political institutions occur since these institutions have an influence on the types and levels of political resources and orientations toward the political system needed to be involved in politics. Political participation occurs in an environment shaped by political institutions. Since men and women differ in the types and levels of resources and orientations they possess, political institutions will influence differently their participation.
- ItemOpen AccessProrogation 2008: A Case Study in how Media Communicate Democracy(2012-11-16) McBrien, Alex; O'Neill, BrendaThis thesis concerns the topic of how media communicate democracy, and uses the prorogation of Parliament in 2008 as its case study. A content analysis of the Toronto Star, National Post, and Le Devoir was performed to answer the question of what agendas and frames were used by the media (i.e., newspapers) when covering the prorogation crisis in 2008. Analysis of the agendas and frames used by federal political parties was also done to understand the impact that frames and agendas had on newspaper coverage. This study utilized both frame and agenda setting theory to determine which agendas and frames were most salient during the prorogation crisis of 2008. The results suggest that newspapers placed more salience on frames and agendas concerning socialists, separatists, questions of political leadership, and regional divisions, rather than communicating the role of responsible government in a Westminster Parliamentary system.
- ItemOpen AccessThe Gender Gap in Political Knowledge in Canada(2016) Giles, Janine Lee; O'Neill, Brenda; Young, Lisa; Franceschet, Susan; Gibbs Van Brunschot, Erin; Stephenson, LauraSince the 1990s, Canadian federal election studies show that women and men do not hold equal amounts of campaign knowledge. The political science literature suggests that changed gender roles, increased feminist socialization, and improved socio-economic resources over time should have eliminated the gender differences over time. Acquiring and maintaining political knowledge, however, is a complex phenomenon. I argue that the gender gap can be explained by taking into account women and men’s individual and aggregate-level political resources, personal motivations, cognitive engagement in electoral campaigns, and their roles as mothers and fathers. First, I test the conventional explanations of the gender gap. Using the 1997 to 2008 Canadian Election Studies, I examine the impact of the individual-level socio-economic status, gender role change, and individual political motivation on women and men’s knowledge of campaign facts. Even with these factors included in the model, the gender gap in knowledge of party leaders remained ten points in favour of men and for party promises eight points in favour of men. Two alternative explanations of the gap are then tested. First, I examine the gender gap during the five-week Canadian federal election campaign. Flooded by political coverage in media, political advertising and political discussion, the impact of gender changes across the campaign. I find that the rate change in providing correct responses is different for women and men during federal elections campaigns, which suggests that women engage later in the campaign compared to men. The gendered rate change in providing correct responses does not change the overall gender gap, however. Second, I test the impact of political resources at the local level on the gender gap in campaign knowledge using the 2006 Canadian Census. The analysis shows that compared to men, women’s knowledge of the party leaders is positively affected by the employment rate at the constituency level. Local education rates, on the other hand, have an impact on neither women nor men’s knowledge of party leaders. Women living in areas with the highest employment rate provided correct responses five percentage points higher than women living in areas with the lowest rate of employment on average.