Leader gender, country culture, and the management of COVID-19.

Abstract

As early as two months into the COVID-19 pandemic, popular media started reporting that women leaders, compared to men leaders, were managing COVID-19 better. This paper empirically examines the impact of women leaders in managing pandemic health outcomes one year after the onset of the pandemic. Further, we consider leader effectiveness within the context of country culture. We find that women's leadership is indeed associated with better containment of the pandemic. We also find that certain country-level cultural traits play a significant role in pandemic outcomes. More hierarchical societies experience higher COVID-19 cases and death. Individualistic cultures and masculine cultures are associated with more deaths from the pandemic. Some cultural traits modulate women's ability to manage COVID-19. Our findings have implications for health policy and provide rationale for promoting gender equity in political leadership.