Publication Date

1-31-2023

Description

Research on the political science profession has shown that homophilous research networks—that is, those organized along the lines of gender and race/ethnicity—reproduce hierarchies. Research networks composed of white men experience the most prestige and lead to the most opportunities. This study documents homophilous networks in a setting where they likely are nurtured: academic conferences. Drawing data from the 2019 Annual Meeting of the American Political Science Association, we examine the correspondence between the gender and the racial/ethnic composition of section members, panelists, and audience members for four research sections: Political Methodology; Political Psychology; Race, Ethnicity, and Politics; and Women and Politics. We find that attendees’ and panelists’ gender and racial/ethnic identity largely mirror the dominant gender and racial/ethnic group in their section. These findings indicate that homophily manifests at academic conferences and that efforts to diversify research networks should consider who listens to whom in these settings.

Journal

PS: Political Science & Politics

Volume

56

Issue

1

First Page

61

Last Page

68

Open Access

Link to OA full text

Publisher Statement

This is an Open Access article, distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution licence (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0), which permits unrestricted re-use, distribution and reproduction, provided the original article is properly cited. Copyright © The Author(s), 2022. Published by Cambridge University Press on behalf of the American Political Science Association

DOI

https://doi.org/10.1017/S1049096522001032

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