Race and Gender in the 2024 Presidential Election

The influence race and gender have on how leaders are judged was glaringly on display during the 2024 Presidential election process. Yes, there are multiple reasons people vote for a particular candidate and why some candidates win, and some lose, but for the first time at the Presidential level, both race and gender were on full display. The mental models we all subconsciously hold of who a leader is and who a leader is not provide an interesting and critical lens to analyze the 2024 Presidential election. Ultimately, this analysis highlights the costs associated with leadership for women and Black and Brown people.

Implicit prototypes are mental models that allow our brains to efficiently process incoming visual cues. For example, if I say the word “snake,” most likely a mental image of some form of a snake pops up in your head. Implicit prototypes help us to make quick decisions that in some cases could be life or death. With the snake example, if you see a snake, being able to quickly recognize it as a snake and deciding to run is much more beneficial than your brain running through the 3,400-plus species of snakes that exist and then determining if you should run. These prototypes are referred to as “implicit” because we are not consciously aware that we have them or use them.

All of us have implicit prototypes of leaders just as we have them of snakes, bears, immigrants, rich people, etc. My dissertation looked at the impact of race and gender on implicit prototypes in the relationship between leaders and their followers. I conducted a systematic review, meaning that I took the most recent peer-reviewed journal articles on prototypes and did a qualitative analysis to synthesize the major themes present across all of the findings. Here are the key themes that I found:

·      For implicit prototypes based on race and gender, perceived leader performance is strongly influenced by whether the follower’s implicit prototype is a match or mismatch with that leader.

·      The non-prototypicality of Black leaders combined with poor organizational performance led to lower patronage in ways that high-performing organizations did not experience.

·      Black leaders in poor-performing organizations were rated as lower than White leaders in poor-performing organizations, showing the impact of the mismatch between how a leader was perceived and the follower’s implicit prototype based on race.

·      Non-White racial identities and female identities are associated with more communal leader traits (empathetic, collaborative, transparent, relationship-oriented) while White race identity and male identity are associated with agentic leader traits (assertive, independent, competitive, and courageous). Leaders are viewed as less capable by followers when the expected leadership traits the follower has for someone does not match the actual traits the leader displays.

·      Belief systems have an influence on implicit prototypes for gender and race. The level of “patriotism” (the extent to which people see themselves or describe themselves as American) a person has influenced implicit prototypes. In addition, the level of social dominance (endorsing ideologies, policies, and practices that maintain group dominance rather than those that ease inequality) a person has influences implicit prototypes. White racial identity and male gender identity were found to be the standard for the leadership prototype for people with high levels of patriotism and high levels of social dominance.

·      For African Americans specifically, the impact of having a White racial identity prototype of a leader can lead to lower levels of behaviors that are associated with leadership aspiration.

How might we analyze the 2024 Presidential election in light of the themes from the literature on race, gender, and their influence on leader prototypes?  The outcomes of the vote are consistent with what we may expect based on implicit prototypes and role congruity.

·      Harris had a +56 margin for Black men compared to Clinton at +69 and Biden at +60, consistent with the impact that the combination of Black race and female gender identity can have on leadership perception.

·      Harris had a -12-point margin for Latino men compared to Clinton having a +31-point margin and Biden having a +23-point margin, again consistent with the race and gender combination impact.

·      Men voted in favor of Trump overall and women voted in favor of Harris overall, consistent with the notion that the majority of women see female leadership as congruent with their prototype of leadership. It is, however, interesting that Harris had a +8-point margin for women, lower than Clinton at +13 and Biden at +15, consistent with the impact of race.

·      Trump had a +23-point margin for White men, same as 2020 but less than the +31-point margin against Clinton. Trump also had a +8-point margin for White women, less than he had against Clinton at +9 and Biden at +11, all consistent with gender and race impacting leadership perception.    

 Given that research supports White race identity and male gender identity as prototypical of leadership, it is not a far leap to conclude that there was a mismatch in leadership prototype for VP Harris and a match for President Trump. For VP Harris, the mismatch of leadership prototype along both racial and gender lines was likely augmented by the perceived poor performance of the Biden administration and VP Harris by association.  Understanding that these influences exist can serve as a valuable tool for Black leaders who are tied to perceived poor-performing organizations.

The majority of White voters who voted for President Trump likely have White males as their implicit prototype for a leader. It is not a far leap to conclude that the White majority views President Trump with his brazen and aggressive words and behaviors as more congruent with what they view as a leader. Additionally, the White majority likely views VP Harris as a Black woman, with her bold and confident rhetoric and messaging, to be incongruent with what they expect from a Black woman.

The history of excluding minorities and women from the armed services is a staunch reminder that the argument over who is a patriot and who is not includes who has the privilege to serve and die in our military forces. Voters who see themselves as a prototype of an American patriot likely see Trump as closer to the prototype than Harris along racial and gender lines. In addition, voters who endorse policies that maintain group dominance over equality (Social Dominance) likely hold belief systems that align with endorsing Donald Trump for President and seeing Kamala Harris as unqualified to be President of the United States.

To be clear, there is no way to directly tie the implicit prototypes American voters have around leadership to who they voted for, but we can’t ignore the consistencies between the outcomes of the election and implicit prototype theories. We also can’t ignore the very real impact race and gender have on how leaders are perceived, meaning these consistencies provide a unique opportunity for analysis and reflection. Anyone who pursues a leadership role must understand there can be a cost associated with those responsibilities based on race and gender. While each voter is free to choose who they vote for regardless of the reason, VP Harris has helped to bring back the reality that Black female leadership is an equally valuable prototype for leadership for anyone, to include young Black men and women across the planet.

Reference for voting margin data

Anatomy of three Trump elections: How Americans shifted in 2024 vs. 2020 and 2016. Wolf, Z., Merrill, C., and Mullery, A. (2024). Available at https://www.cnn.com/interactive/2024/politics/2020-2016-exit-polls-2024-dg/