In recent years, new tensions have flared up regarding the demand for gender equality policies for women. In this context, it is mainly right-wing populist and far-right parties that fuel the debate by positioning themselves against women's and reproductive rights and in doing so, collide with egalitarian positions of left-wing parties. These opposing attitudes generate different demands regarding welfare state policies and simultaneously have a divisive effect on social cohesion. Nevertheless, gender-related issues remain fairly neglected in research on electoral behaviour. This is even more surprising as studies continually find that voting behaviour remains gendered, with women tending to vote more often for left-wing parties and men for right-wing parties. Against the background of a renewed politicisation of gender-related issues, the paper explores the influence of attitudes towards gender equality on voting behaviour. We ask, who supports or opposes demands for more equal rights measures for women? Moreover, do attitudes towards gender equality influence voting behaviour?
To empirically address these questions, we rely on a newly surveyed gender equality item from a quota based online survey of the German Longitudinal Election Study (GLES) conducted in September 2021. The analysis proceeds in three steps: First, we look at how voters are distributed along the question of whether state equality measures for women still don’t go far enough or already go too far. Second, we identify socio-structural determinants of attitudes towards gender equality and the influence of gender attitudes. Third, we assess the impact of attitudes towards gender equality on vote choice.