4
1999, Phillips 1995). Therefore we can hypothesize that female representatives will be
more inclined to bear the opportunity costs of becoming legislative entrepreneurs on
issues of special concern to women.
I also maintain that the impact of representative sex will be largest on legislative
activities that involve the greatest time and resource costs (Hypothesis 2). In his
examination of legislative participation in committees, Hall (1996) found that on any
given bill only a small subset of interested members within the committee or
subcommittee actively participated in the drafting and markup of legislation and the floor
deliberation. According to Hall, few members attended the markups on a bill and fewer
still offered amendments to the legislation or made a substantial contribution to the
development of the legislation. Therefore, sex differences in legislative behavior should
be larger in agenda-setting activities that require greater expenditures of time and staff
resources in comparison to the expected benefit return of achieving personal good public
policy goals and enhancement of the member’s reputation and record for re-election
purposes.
Additionally, I maintain that the relevance of descriptive representation as a
motivation for member involvement in legislation will be greatest on issues that are most
easily identified as those issues having specific consequences for women as a group
(Hypothesis 3). Thus, congresswomen should be disproportionately spurred to action on
feminist issues such as sexual harassment and reproductive rights that have clear and
direct implications for women, while sex differences in legislative entrepreneurship
should be of a lesser magnitude on issues that affect children and families such as
education and health care which are perceived as social welfare problems that
Convention