publications

2026

1. Ana Catalano Weeks

   Gender quotas

   In Elgar Encyclopedia of Gender and Politics 2026

   DOI
2. Barnes, Tiffany , Giulia Venturini, and Ana Catalano Weeks

   Gender Quota Laws and Women in Cabinets

   The Journal of Politics Online first 2026

   DOI
3. Infanger, Camila and Ana Catalano Weeks

   Exporting Athena Swan? The Politics of Supporting Academic Mothers

   Politics & Gender 2026

   DOI
4. Fernandes, Jorge M. , Bonnie M. Meguid, and Ana Catalano Weeks

   Thinly Veiled: The Use of Femonationalist Speech in European Parliaments

   British Journal of Political Science 56: e40 2026

   DOI
5. Timlin, Louise , Ana Catalano Weeks, and Anna Helgøy

   How can we improve gender balance in local government? Family-friendly policies and static ambition in England

   Journal of European Public Policy 0(0): 1–27 2026

   Abs DOI

   Women’s representation in European local governments remains stagnant at around one-third of councillors. One explanation for this longstanding gender gap relates to structural barriers blocking the supply of women candidates, including working practices which are not compatible with caring responsibilities. Yet, so far we do not know whether measures governments can implement to remedy this, including reimbursing care expenses and remote working, increase women’s political ambition. To answer this question, the study uses a survey experiment fielded to local councillors in England (N = 534). The survey manipulates exposure to a bundled set of family-friendly policies in a hypothetical council to identify the causal effect of such policies on static political ambition (councillors’ willingness to run for their current level of office), and explores heterogeneous effects by gender. The introduction of family-friendly policies significantly increases women’s, but not men’s, willingness to run for office again. Analysis of open-ended survey responses further reveals that women councillors more frequently brought up the difficulty of balancing care and work with a political role, while men were less likely to mention this. Overall, the study contributes new evidence about the important role that family policies might play in closing gender gaps in political ambition.

2025

1. Helgøy, Anna and Ana Catalano Weeks

   Crowded Out: The Influence of Mental Load Priming on Intentions to Participate in Public Life

   British Journal of Political Science 55 2025

   DOI PDF
2. Ana Catalano Weeks

   The political consequences of the mental load

   European Sociological Review 2025

   DOI
3. Meguid, Bonnie M. , Hilde Coffé, Ana Catalano Weeks, and Miki Caul Kittilson

   Strategic Inclusion Without Transformation: How Populist Radical Right Parties Engage With Women’s Interests

   Comparative Political Studies 2025

   DOI PDF
4. Coffé, Hilde and Ana Catalano Weeks

   Representation

   In IPSA Companion to Political Science: A Practical Introduction to the 200 Most Important Concepts 2025
5. Ana Catalano Weeks, Helen Kowalewska, and Leah Ruppanner

   Take a Load Off? Not for Mothers: Gender, Cognitive Labor, and the Limits of Time and Money

   Socius 11(): 23780231251384527 2025

   Abs DOI

   Globally, women perform the lion’s share of domestic labor. Research indicates that gender disparities in cognitive labor—the “thinking work” required to anticipate and monitor household needs—are even more pronounced than in physical household labor. Although traditional theories explain the gender division of physical household labor in terms of time, money, or gender performance, the applicability of these frameworks to the mental load is unclear. The authors address that gap using survey data from 2,133 partnered, heterosexual U.S. parents. Exposing the limits of time-availability and resource-based models, the authors find that women’s employment and earnings reduce their physical household labor, but not their cognitive burden. To explain this persistence, the authors introduce the concept of gendered cognitive stickiness: once assigned on the basis of gendered expectations (often implicitly), cognitive tasks “stick” to women and resist negotiation, regardless of their employment or resources. This concept extends doing gender theory by showing how inequality is reproduced even without visible performance and identifying a dimension of domestic labor that is less situational and more internal. This hidden constraint on domestic gender equality represents an additional measure to explain the stalled gender revolution.

2024

1. Ana Catalano Weeks, Paloma Caravantes, Ana Espı́rito-Santo, Emanuela Lombardo, Maria Stratigaki, and Sami Gul

   When is gender on party agendas? Manifestos and (De-) democratisation in Greece, Portugal, and Spain

   South European Society and Politics 2024

   HTML PDF
2. Coffé, Hilde , Sparsha Saha, and Ana Catalano Weeks

   Quotas or parity? How the framing of positive action measures impacts public support and backlash

   Journal of European Public Policy 2024

   HTML PDF
3. Ana Catalano Weeks

   Women, Men, and Elections: Policy Supply and Gendered Voting Behaviour in Western Democracies. By Rosalind Shorrocks. New York: Routledge, 2022. 258 pp. 136.00 (hardcover). ISBN: 9780367353605.

   Politics & Gender 2024

   HTML
4. Ana Catalano Weeks and Leah Ruppanner

   A typology of US parents’ mental loads: Core and episodic cognitive labor

   Journal of Marriage and Family 2024

   HTML PDF

2023

1. Ana Catalano Weeks, Bonnie M Meguid, Miki Caul Kittilson, and Hilde Coffé

   When do Männerparteien elect women? Radical right populist parties and strategic descriptive representation

   American Political Science Review 117(2): 421–438 2023

   HTML PDF
2. Ana Catalano Weeks and Peter Allen

   Backlash against “identity politics”: far right success and mainstream party attention to identity groups

   Politics, Groups, and Identities 11(5): 935–953 2023

   HTML PDF
3. Ana Catalano Weeks and Francesco Masala

   Still “the Domain of Men?” Gender Quotas and Women’s Inclusion in Local Politics in Italy

   Legislative Studies Quarterly 48(3): 503–534 2023

   HTML PDF
4. Latura, Audrey and Ana Catalano Weeks

   Corporate board quotas and gender equality policies in the workplace

   American Journal of Political Science 67(3): 606–622 2023

   HTML PDF
5. Coffé, Hilde , Miki Caul Kittilson, Bonnie M Meguid, and Ana Catalano Weeks

   Parties, issues and gender

   2023

   PDF

2022

1. Ana Catalano Weeks

   Making gender salient: From gender quota laws to policy

   2022

   HTML
2. Saha, Sparsha and Ana Catalano Weeks

   Ambitious women: Gender and voter perceptions of candidate ambition

   Political Behavior 44(2): 779–805 2022

   HTML PDF
3. Espı́rito-Santo, Ana , Ana Catalano Weeks, and others

   Gender and politics in Portugal

   The Oxford Handbook of Portuguese Politics 2022

   HTML PDF

2019

1. Catalano Weeks, Ana

   Quotas and party priorities: direct and indirect effects of quota laws

   Political Research Quarterly 72(4): 849–862 2019

   HTML PDF

2018

1. Ana Catalano Weeks

   Why are gender quota laws adopted by men? The role of inter-and intraparty competition

   Comparative Political Studies 51(14): 1935–1973 2018

   HTML PDF

2015

1. Ana Catalano Weeks and Lisa Baldez

   Quotas and qualifications: the impact of gender quota laws on the qualifications of legislators in the Italian parliament

   European Political Science Review 7(1): 119–144 2015

   HTML PDF

2009

1. Catalano, Ana

   Women acting for women? An analysis of gender and debate participation in the British House of Commons 2005–2007

   Politics & Gender 5(1): 45–68 2009

   HTML PDF