Does she lift as she climbs? Female mayors and women’s representation in district legislatures in Indonesia

Women remain underrepresented in elected office worldwide, and whether female leadership generates spillovers to broader women’s political representation remains an open question. Using close mixed-gender mayoral elections between 2005 and 2018 in a regression discontinuity design, we estimate the causal effect of female mayoral victories on female political outcomes in the 2019 district legislative elections in Indonesia. We find that female mayors do not increase the share of women elected to district legislatures. Examining mechanisms, we find no effects on party behaviour, either in the share of female candidates or their placement on ballots. On the voter side, the share of female candidates experiencing positive list improvement—where voter preferences elevate candidates beyond their initial party-assigned positions—is 3.7–4.4 percentage points lower in districts with female mayors. Restricting the sample to mayors elected in 2015–2018—who remain in office at the time of candidate registration for the 2019 legislative election—the estimate increases to 10.5 percentage points. While some estimates are imprecise due to limited statistical power, the results allow us to rule out large effects. Overall, our findings suggest that exposure to female executive leadership alone is insufficient to expand women’s political representation, highlighting the importance of more targeted interventions.

This seminar is co-badged with the Indonesia Study Group.