AI, Gender, and Politics

The study of gender and politics is about how the multi-level processes that shape institutions, social relations, and individual behavior impact access to rights, representation, and political and economic power. Artificial intelligence (AI) is rapidly changing the landscape of work, social life, and culture. Although in some domains it can level the playing field between men and women by reducing the biases baked into technical education, in others it can be wielded as a tool for sexual harassment and buoy male dominance. This chapter articulates three ways that AI interacts with gender and politics: (1) as a tool of data creation; (2) as a method of data analysis; (3) as a category of analysis, either as a dependent or independent variable. To guide future work, we theorize several arenas where AI will likely reinforce, and several where it will undermine, longstanding patterns of gender inequality.