Mother of the Nation: Negotiating Women Leaders’ Credibility in a Health Crisis

Abstract Women political leaders, research shows, have been able to use stereotypically feminine traits to their advantage in their response to the pandemic, thus overcoming usual double binds of performing femininity and political leadership. But what, more precisely, accounts for women politicians’ successful performance of pandemic leadership? In this paper, we argue that public perceptions of women leaders’ credibility are negotiated through news media and further mediated by specific events and broader cultural contexts. Using a mixed methodology of media readings and focus group interviews, we show how prime ministers Erna Solberg of Norway and Mette Frederiksen of Denmark both performed a persona of the “mother of the nation,” but only Solberg succeeded in doing so authentically, leading to the public’s celebration of her credibility while Frederiksen was chided for being inauthentic and strategic.