Eileen McDonagh is an American political scientist. She is a professor of political science at Northeastern University. She has published works on topics like women's participation in politics, gender imbalances in sport, and abortion law.
Eileen McDonagh | |
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Nationality | American |
Alma mater | |
Awards | J. David Greenstone Book Prize, APSA |
Scientific career | |
Fields | |
Institutions |
McDonagh graduated from Harvard University with a PhD in government in 1972.[1] In addition to being a member of the political science faculty at Northeastern University,[2] she has been a visiting scholar in the Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences at Stanford University,[3] at the Institute for Quantitative Social Science at Harvard University,[4] and at Radcliffe College's Murray Research Center.[5]
In addition to journal articles and book chapters, McDonagh has written several books. McDonagh wrote the 1996 book Breaking the Abortion Deadlock: From Choice to Consent. McDonagh builds on arguments by thinkers like Judith Jarvis Thomson and Laurence Tribe, contending that pregnancy constitutes a relationship between a woman and a fetus which relies on the fetus's use of the woman's body, and that consequently the woman's consent should be required for the relationship to be legitimate.[6] From this, McDonagh reasons that abortion is therefore a form of state protection for a woman's right to defend her bodily autonomy.[7] Charlotte Ellertson called Breaking the Abortion Deadlock "the most thought-provoking addition to a stale abortion debate to emerge in 25 years", including "one of the most logical and consistent pro-choice arguments articulated to date".[6]
With Laura Pappano, McDonagh published Playing with the Boys: Why Separate Is Not Equal in Sports in 2008. The authors examine the history of legal and social policies that have caused gender imbalances in both competitive and recreational sports.[8]
In 2009, McDonagh published the book The Motherless State: Women's Political Leadership and American Democracy, in which she proposes that the low proportion of women elected to political office in the United States is partly a function of the overlap between the types of policies that the United States government has traditionally pursued and stereotypes about what tasks are best administered by men and women.[9] The book won the 2010 J. David Greenstone Book Prize for "the best book in history and politics in the past two calendar years" from the American Political Science Association.[10] McDonagh has also studied and spoken about women's participation in the politics of Massachusetts specifically.[11]
McDonagh's work has been cited or she has published in Fast Company,[12] The Christian Science Monitor,[13] and HuffPost.[14][15]