What is the problem? Representations of gender and violence towards politicians in UK parliamentary debates

Abstract

Recent research demonstrates that there are important gendered dimensions in politicians’ experiences of violence. Less scholarship has examined the phenomenon’s political impacts, including how violence is represented as a policy problem by political actors themselves. This article applies feminist frame analysis to theories of gender and political violence to explore how UK members of Parliament frame their experiences of violence (including abuse, harassment and intimidation) in the eight House of Commons debates specifically on the topic between 2010 and 2021. Violence towards politicians, including an increasing focus on the experiences of women and social media abuse, has been politicised over time as a normative policy problem, being framed as an attack on the public good of democracy. This article develops theories of gender and political violence by demonstrating that the problem of gendered political violence can and should be conceptualised not only as a unique phenomenon but also as a policy problem.