women in politics
May 23, 2007 by thinking girl
A reader, Alec, sent me an email yesterday with a link to this article, about the level of representation in the current US Congress as it relates to the population at large. It’s pretty clear that the Congress is not really representative of the US population demographics. Check it out:
Males - As of the 2006 congress, 83.7% of the Congress is male, while the percentage of males of the voting age population (18 plus) is only 48.4. If this is further evaluated to include the over-representation of white males, the figure is even more staggering: 36.3% of the voting age population are white males, yet there are 79 White Male senators making up the Senate (79%).
[...]
The Wealthy/Educated - In the Senate, fifty-six senators hold degrees in the law, seven have MBA’s, and four have MD’s. The majority of COngress members come from upper-middle class to upper class income backgrounds, and the jobs themselves as Representatives and Senators pay $165,200 per year putting them in the top 5 percent of American household incomes, which does not reflect spouses income either (top 5% is deliniated by $157,000 per household).
On a similar note, the front-runner candidates for President in both parties (many of whom are currently serving in the Senate) had incomes that placed them in the top 1% of the population. Rudy Guiliani made 16.1 million dollars in 2006 with $45 million in assets, John Edwards $1.25 million in income and $29.5 million in assets, Barack Obama reported $938,000 in income and over 1 million dollars in assets, and possible third party candidate Michael Bloomberg has over 6.5 billion in his personal fortune.
Jews - While comprising 1.8% of the total United States population, Jews make up 7 percent of the Congress. This disproportional representation is extended higher in the Senate, where 13% of senators are Jewish.
Please take care to note the incomes and assets of the presidential candidates. Make extra-special attention to whose personal wealth is lowest. Yes, that’s right, it’s Barack Obama - the only black presidential contender. hmmm. interesting.
So that’s over-representation. The even sadder news is the flip-side of that coin, the under-representation, of women and people of colour. Check this out:
Women - Women of voting age represent 51.6 percent of the voting age population yet are 16.3% of the Congress, putting America below the global average of 17% female representation at parliamentary level. As of 2007, the US ranks 68th in terms of women holding office in the legislature — this puts the US just above Turkmenistan, and just below El Salvador and Panama. [emphasis mine - TG]
and women have all the rights we need? what do those rights actually mean when societal forces are in place to prevent them from being exercised and upheld? This is a clear-cut example of the very important difference between formal and substantive equality. Who will fight for these important differences to be eliminated than feminists? feminism is far from over.
Moving on:
Latinos - Hispanics represent over 14% of the U.S. population, while their Congress representation is 3% in the Senate and about 5% in the House.
African-Americans - The Senate is 1% African American and the House is roughly 9.2% African American compared to the 12.3 percent of American population that are of Black or African-American descent.
This is absolutely pathetic. And wholly related to the above point, about class. Note me, and note me well: class does not run deeper than race. Race and class are deeply interwoven, and that’s not because of class discrimination, it’s because of racism. People of colour are proportionately far far poorer than whites in these wealthiest of countries of ours, and it’s because they’re not white. Plain and simple. Get it through your heads, kids. Saying that blacks and hispanics are excluded from politics because they’re poor is a pretty pathetic excuse for an excuse. Stop and ask yourself : why are they poorer, statistically and significantly, than white folks? it doesn’t take a genius to put two and two together.
Thanks to Alec for providing me with some fodder for a post!
With regards to class issues, i would not see studies constructed by middle class academia as something that would really throw much light on the reality of the class system in society.
Thanks for the link! I’ve actually been a lurker on your site for a while so I’m happy to share. Also, being poor shouldn’t exclude people from politics, and I think it’s kind of sad that the ‘populist’ candidate, John Edwards, is a trial lawyer who is a multi-millionaire.
stixzz - you just spouted standpoint theory! yay for you!
alec - I’m glad you delurked, and shared your post.
politics is weird. everyone pretty much agrees that politicians are dishonest and untrustworthy, and yet parties look for people whom the public would find most trustworthy to be candidates. and somehow the elision is made that trustworthy=successful, and that successful=wealthy white male. meanwhile, the rest of us know fucking better!!!!
I think that the concentration of wealth in the U.S. is the “Big Issue”. Given 1983 statistics (and it worsening over time since then) figures like the top 1% - owning 33.4% of the wealth, the top 10% - 71% and bottom 40% - under 1% - shown inequality in the U.S.
While there are increasing numbers of women and People of Color earning high salaries, their wealth tends to be more concentrated in a Very Few. There aren’t very many Oprah’s - who have wealth.
The Super Wealthy can afford both to be politicians and to “hire” the politicians who will do their bidding.
(googling, I found sources such as below)
http://www.faculty.fairfield.edu/faculty/hodgson/Courses/so11/stratification/income&wealth.htm
http://concentrationofwealth.blogspot.com/2004/03/facts-about-wealth-in-united-states.html
Thanks!
I do think it would be nice if there were more women in Congress. What is interesting is that women are the majority of voters. If women really wanted to, they could decide the outcome of just about every single election in this nation and there’s really nothing men could do about it. So if women REALLY wanted to get together and vote in more women to office, they could. They have the power.
I also wanted to make one comment about minority representation. Before one sees racism in raw statistics, you need to keep something else in mind. Assuming people, for non-racist reasons, vote for someone who looks like themself - whatever that may be, the way things are subdivided for the senate, state by state, with a winner take all state-wide vote, you simply should never see any minorities in the senate if they are well below 50% of the voting population. If a minority is 12.5% of the population, and they all vote for a candidate in the same minority, in all 50 states (assuming uniform distribution) there would be zero members of that minority in the senate because 12.5% is not enough to win, particularly against another group that is over 50% of the population all by itself.
I also wonder, what will be the conclusion reached about racism in this country if Barrack Obama is elected President of the United States, making him the single most powerful individual in the United States (if not the world)? Particularly if you argue racism is only about power. If Obama picks African-Americans for his cabinet over a more qualified Caucasian american, can you finally label that racism since it is clear the person with the power there is an African-American?
And speaking of Obama, I hope he wins, though I would be almost as glad if Clinton wins.
DBB, it’s not just about who people vote for. Who do they have the choice to vote for? I mean consider the last presidential election, just cuz it’s simpler. The only real candidates were two white men that both supported the war in Iraq. What kind of choice is that? In the US, don’t the candidates with the most funding correlate with the candidates who win? And who funds the candidates? Not the working class black and latino women.
I think the funding model is shifting given the internet and the ability of much larger numbers of much smaller donations - which is what Obama has accomplished thus far.
But you are right, RJ, the choices usually suck rather badly. It isn’t just that it is primarily only white men on the ticket. It is a tiny tiny tiny subset of white men that actually ever get on the ballot. Almost a different species. One that I’m not a part of and I’m a white male. It is the power elite. Obama is a member of the power elite. I am not. But he is a candidate that represents change and I’d happily support him. Hopefully he’ll win.
Geo: I’m glad you mentioned Oprah to point out how she is the exception rather than the norm. I have heard people try to use her wealth and popularity as an example to claim that America is not racist. But it is important to think about numbers. As soon as you compare percentages of people who have that kind of wealth, the disproportionality (is that a word?) is apparent.
I think the same thing goes for Barack Obama and his success. DBB mentioned that we might have to re-evaluate our conclusions about racism if we have a Black president and Black cabinet members in government, but this victory at the executive level would by no means suddenly reverse the power structure of the country or overthrow institutionalized racism. I think having African Americans in power would definitely be a wonderful start toward boosting morale, and that those individuals in power would hopefully be proponents of legislation and programs that would make positive changes, but there’s no such thing as an overnight change when it comes to racism.
It may be bit off-topic, but I’d like to emphasise that the election system plays a crucial part in the distribution of political power. The First Past the Post (FPP) system, cherished by the Anglo-Saxon tradition, always systematically disadvantages and marginalises minorities. In the USA (except Vermont) practically no “third” party can win a seat in the Federal Congress, and seats gained by decent centre-left parties like the New Democratic Party and Lib Dems are about the half of what they would have got under the Proportional Representation (PR), Green Parties are successful in many countries (mainly in the European Continent) with PR system, but not in any FPP country.
None of the 17 countries with more than 30% female representation in Parliament has the FPP system. Some of these countries adopt a quota system, which technically can’t be done under the FPP. Giving all the power to a single winner in an electorate (who represents the majority) is a blatant disregard for minority’s viewpoints, so I don’t regard the FPP system as true democracy.
Yeah, it would be nice if instead of a winner take all, you could rank the candidates, and so if your first choice doesn’t fetch a majority, your second choice gets your vote, and so on down the line. It would give third-party candidates a chance.
I believe electoral reform is crucial to improving the representation of minority groups. Interestingly, this is something we are working on for our provincial government in Ontario. There was a citizens panel studying different systems, and they concluded that, for our particular situation, MMP was the best form. It will go to referendum so we’ll see, but it’s a very exciting possibility.
Thanks TG. I’m just a working class kid (well stretching the kid thing at 2
trying to make it in academia, so id say its more my “chip on the shoulder” standpoint rather than something more analytically substantive.
Read through a non-US situation with similar context. genderstan.wordpress.com
We are struggling with getting women to be in parliament.