Women and Politics

…what would be different? Probably a lot.

Just some food for thought—if women had an equal voice in our country’s leadership, would we:

• Be in our current financial crisis?
• Have started all these wars?
• Still be fighting about health care reform?
• See all the backlash against women’s reproductive health choices?
• Continue to ignore the impending ramifications of our environmental impact?

Last night, my karate sensei said some of these very words to me. That’s right—my male karate instructor who is a human lethal weapon and spends 90 minutes yelling at us to be stronger and faster—pointed out that we might not be in all the trouble we’re in if women had an equal leadership role in this country.

If he and my 93 year-old grandfather can see the clear, common-sense, and urgent need for more women in public office, why can’t the rest of the country?

Why has our progress of electing more women stagnated in the past few years? Why don’t more women support women candidates? These are questions we all must answer and work to fix if we truly want to see our country choose a path of strength and prosperity for our future.

The confirmation of Sonia Sotomayor raises questions not just about the composition of the Supreme Court, but the balance of power in our entire country. The fact is, we need women to have an equal voice in our nation’s leadership. This is a very simple, yet somehow deeply complex idea.

Simple, because if you think about the range of diversity in our country, common sense would tell us that our public leadership should reflect the makeup of society. Otherwise, the needs of certain groups can easily be overlooked, and their unique experiences aren’t brought to the table.

Complex, because this is a new concept. Despite America’s goal to bring equality and justice to all, our history is riddled with different groups struggling to be heard and treated fairly. Certainly, never before have we been dedicated to ensuring that the governing power be divided based on the composition of our population. And don’t get me wrong—we aren’t now.

But there is, luckily, a growing sentiment that we should be thinking about the disparity between our government leadership and our society. And it seems that this idea is beginning with the need for women’s voices in our country’s leadership.

Many are conducting and reporting on research which shows that women having an equal seat at the table equals greater success. As Dee Dee Myers pointed out yesterday on MSNBC:

“Increasingly, there’s a body of research which says that when you have a diverse group of decision-makers, they actually reach better decisions. [...] Businesses with more women on their boards and in senior management positions are more profitable.”

Many articles have been written about the financial crisis, asking, if more women had been involved, would we be in such an economic disaster? Debora Spar, former Harvard Business School professor, says that women may “perceive and act on risk” in different ways - possibly leading them to avoid the “massively aggressive behavior that seemingly overnight brought us a crash of epic proportions.” She goes on to say,

“We desperately need to bring more women into leadership positions on Wall Street, in politics, in regulatory bodies and in American life generally. We need women in leadership positions not only because they can manage as well as men but because they manage differently than men [they tend] to make different kinds of decisions and to accept and avoid different kinds of risk.”

Now, before we go into any “wise Latina-she thinks women make better decisions” type territory, let me stop you there. That’s not the argument. The argument is that if women were equally represented on these bodies of power, the decisions made could have a different outcome. With a more diverse set of people working together, you increase the chance that a more balanced and well-thought-out conclusion might be made.

What Sonia Sotomayor has said, repeatedly, during her confirmation hearings is true: “Our system is enriched by a variety of experiences.” Simple idea in theory—endlessly complex in execution. But we have to start somewhere, and having Sonia Sotomayor on our Supreme Court is a heck of a start.

Twitter has been going wild all day. The tweets?

I signed petition to support legislation for presidential commission on women. Have you? http://twurl.nl/ezeuxi #womencount

photo: AP

Rep. Jackie Speier (D-Calif.) has launched an initiative to set up a permanent federal commission on women. Some are questioning the necessity for this commission since Obama started the White House Council on Women and Girls weeks ago. But Speier says they would work to complement each other and work together. WomenCount says:

“We need to bring together the efforts of the many organizations devoted to women’s issues and causes, and create a common movement to benefit the future of all women.”

Pointing out the great gains made in recent years, WomenCount also points out what we learned in 2008:

The election exposed extreme gender bias in the media, in politics, and throughout our culture.  This demonstrated that although women in the United States have come a long way since the last Presidential Commission on the Status of Women in 1961, we still have far to go.

Rep. Speier agrees, saying, ““I would say, ‘We’ve come a long way, baby’ … not.” True true. It seems that despite our gains, whenever women initiate concrete steps to change women’s leadership in society, we inevitably encounter opposition. (What, you can vote - aren’t you happy yet? You’re serving in Congress, what more do you want?)

But thanks to leaders like Hillary Clinton, President Obama, and Jackie Speier, the fight for women’s equality will not fade into the background. If you see any coverage (good or bad) about the women’s commission, post a comment!

picture by: Frank Hurley

Iconic feminist leader Gloria Steinem turns 75 today. As Gina Salamone in NYDailyNews writes, Her words continue to be motivating and inspirational:

“Women and girls no longer feel crazy, alone or flying in the face of nature if they have the outrageous idea that they should be treated as full human beings,” the feminist leader and social activist told The News Tuesday. “Knowing that the system is crazy, not you, is a huge leap forward.”

While we celebrate everything she’s done to advance women’s equality, she reminds us that the fight ain’t over yet.

“We’ve demonstrated that women can do what men do, but not yet that men can do what women do. That’s why most women have two jobs — one inside the home and one outside it — which is impossible. The truth is that women can’t be equal outside the home until men are equal in it.”

Steinem hopes we can keep making progress on issues such as reproductive rights, women in politics, and domestic violence.