Previous research has shown a prevailing 'modern gender gap' in socio-political attitudes in advanced capitalist economies. While numerous studies have confirmed gender differences in attitudes toward the welfare state in Europe, few have addressed the reason for this rift in men's and women's views about the role of government in ensuring the general welfare of citizens. In this paper, I examine the relationship between gender equality in unpaid labour, family policy and the gender gap in welfare state attitudes. Based on data from 21 countries participating in the European Social Survey (ESS) round 4, and using a mix of country- and individual-level regression models and multilevel models, I find that there is a clear relationship between country-level gender equality in unpaid labour and gender differences in support of an encompassing welfare state. A more equal distribution of unpaid care and domestic work correlates with women being increasingly supportive of a large and encompassing welfare state, in comparison with men. This pattern holds when controlling for individual-level economic risk and resources, cultural factors such as trust and social values traditionally related to support of an encompassing welfare state, and beliefs about welfare state efficiency and consequences for society in general. This pattern is evident for countries with a low level of familistic policies, while no distinguishable pattern is discernible for highly familistic countries. These findings have implications for the perception of gender as an emergent social cleavage with respect to welfare state attitudes. The results are discussed in the light of institutional theories on policy feedback, familism, social role theory and previous findings relating to modernization theory and 'gender realignment'.

The gender gap in welfare state attitudes is the tendency of men to be less positive toward an encompassing welfare state than women. To study attitudinal gender differences at the individual level, this paper synthesizes prior explanations, focused on self-interest and norms, with a social identity perspective, centered on the process of social identification with a gender group. With representative survey data (n = 1515), covering social spending preferences in Sweden, this study uses a psychometric instrument to gauge the emotional and psychological centrality of gender to individuals’ concept of self—thus distinguishing between men and women with different degrees of attachment to their gender group (strength of gender identification). The results show a strong gender identification is negatively related to social spending preferences for men, but not for women. The findings are discussed in the light the influence of gender norms and masculinity threat, highlighting the structuring and normative implications of social policy for gender differences in attitudes toward the Swedish welfare state.

In this study, we explore individual differences in suspicion of welfare overuse in Sweden. Focusing on previously underdeveloped areas, we find that the hitherto observed negative relationship between political interest and suspicion of welfare overuse is only valid for those who sympathize with political parties to the left (and to a lesser extent the Green Party). Conversely, individuals who sympathize with centre‐right parties or right‐wing populists differ little internally depending on their level of political interest. We also find a strong positive correlation between anti‐immigrant attitudes and suspicion about welfare overuse. Finally, we find that women are less suspicious of welfare overuse than men are, and that this cannot be attributed to gender differences in material risks or resources, education, experiences of welfare services, general trustfulness, anti‐immigrant sentiment or political orientation. Neither do gender differences vary according to strength of gender identification. Thus, being suspicious about welfare overuse is not likely to be perceived as a typically masculine or feminine posture. Based on our findings, we argue that future studies exploring partisan or ideological differences in perceptions of welfare overuse need to consider these in conjunction with political interest and political context; that rising anti‐immigrant sentiments pose a particularly serious threat to the legitimacy of welfare states, given their strong connectedness to suspicion of welfare overuse; and that gender differences in perceptions of welfare overuse are more fruitfully addressed through a lens of gender relations, rather than gender role stereotypes.