Gloria Steinem had a compelling op-ed in the New York Times this morning that reminded me a lot of one of Ennis’ previous posts about women leaders in rural India. First, some excerpts from “Women Are Never Frontrunners:”
THE woman in question became a lawyer after some years as a community organizer, married a corporate lawyer and is the mother of two little girls, ages 9 and 6. Herself the daughter of a white American mother and a black African father — in this race-conscious country, she is considered black — she served as a state legislator for eight years, and became an inspirational voice for national unity.
Be honest: Do you think this is the biography of someone who could be elected to the United States Senate? After less than one term there, do you believe she could be a viable candidate to head the most powerful nation on earth?
If you answered no to either question, you’re not alone. Gender is probably the most restricting force in American life, whether the question is who must be in the kitchen or who could be in the White House. This country is way down the list of countries electing women and, according to one study, it polarizes gender roles more than the average democracy. [Link]
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p>Of course, there is another equally compelling argument for why the media “gives Clinton a hard time” and why the voters are so quick to discount her considerable experience, to the point of bringing her to tears. Many voters (like the majority in Iowa) may just want a clean break from the past. They don’t care whether Clinton is more capable than Obama or not. They don’t care if she’d be “a better President on day one.” They just want to rid themselves of the Bush/Clinton/Bush/Clinton monarchy and the baggage that comes with it. Perhaps, as Obama says, offering people hope and possibility and having the ability to bring new blood into the broken political process will make up for the experience and insider-Washington-knowledge needed to survive and be an effective President in Washington. There is a lot of credibility behind that argument. Then again, Steinem might also be right:
If the lawyer described above had been just as charismatic but named, say, Achola Obama instead of Barack Obama, her goose would have been cooked long ago. Indeed, neither she nor Hillary Clinton could have used Mr. Obama’s public style — or Bill Clinton’s either — without being considered too emotional by Washington pundits. [Link]
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p>And that brings us to Ennis’s post and the study
by Esther Duflo and Petia Topalova about women elected to local office in rural India:
Using opinion surveys and data on local “public goods”–like schools, roads, and water pumps–Duflo and Topalova find that the villages headed by women invested in more services that benefited the entire community than did those with gender-neutral elections, nearly all of which were won by men. But as the opinion polls showed, for all their effectiveness, the women’s governance was literally a thankless effort, with the new leaders getting lower approval ratings than their male counterparts.
Why study the experiences of Indian villagers to understand the costs and benefits of female leadership? Countries that come closest to gender parity in government, like Sweden and Finland, are economically advanced democracies with universal health care, child care, and generous maternity and paternity leave policies. Contrast this with the list of nations with zero women in national legislatures–Kyrgyzstan and Saudi Arabia, for example–and the pattern becomes clear: Women in government are associated with lots of good things… [Link]
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p>Is it any wonder why Clinton might have cried? It is entirely possible that she has a lot in common with a rural Indian woman 🙂
First, the encouraging news from India’s social experiment with female leadership. Duflo and Topalova found that communities with women as pradhans had larger quantities of key public services overall. Nor was quality sacrificed for quantity–facilities in the women-led villages were of at least as high quality on average as in the communities with traditional male leadership. The greatest improvement was in drinking water, the public amenity found to be most valued by women in earlier research (PDF)–with 30 percent more taps and hand pumps in the women-pradhan villages. So while the female pradhans were working for the general good, they were working particularly hard to provide the services valued by their fellow women. They were also less corrupt–villagers with female-headed councils were 25 percent less likely to report having to pay bribes to access basic services like getting ration cards or receiving medical attention.
Now, the bad news. India’s female pradhans were remarkably unappreciated for their efforts. Despite the objective upgrades in village amenities, both men and women living in villages headed by women expressed lower satisfaction with public services. This was true even for water–the level of dissatisfaction was 13 percent higher in women-led communities. In fact, there was even greater dissatisfaction about health facilities, a public service not even controlled by the local village council… [Link]
As of the time of this posting, Clinton is up in the New Hampshire primary with a 40% to 35% lead over Obama (with roughly 30% of the vote counted). If she wins (a huge comeback based on all New Hampshire polls up until today), people are going to ask if the tears were for real, and if that’s what gave her the edge. They are also going to use exit polling data to figure out which group of voters were most responsible for her victory. Even if she loses but comes close, people are still going to ask what caused the “surge.” Maybe, just maybe, the women out there knew that even if the tears were fake, the gender bias may be real.
42 · Camille said
Even if Black men did get the right to vote earlier than women, black men were lynched or were coerced (usually by force) by their white counterparts, if they attempted to vote after the end of Reconstruction. I don’t remember anything in history about women being lynched after receiving the right to vote in 1920. And Native Americans weren’t allowed to vote until the 1970’s.
WHAT!?!?!
Even if Black men did get the right to vote earlier than women, black men were lynched or were coerced (usually by force) by their white counterparts, if they attempted to vote after the end of Reconstruction
Exactly. it’s not like the red carpet was rolled out and wine and cheeses were set up to make sure black men could exercise that well deserved right to vote. After ratification of the 19th amendment, 1920 was the first election where women voted, and candidates during this time sought after prominent women to secure their vote.
However, in the 1890s (20 years after the 15th amendment passing) literacy tests, and poll taxes and just general intimidation prevented black men from seriously voting at the same level of their white counterparts. Really, black people didnt get the right to vote until the voting rights act of 1965.
152 · Amitabh said
I think he meant 1924. Let’s just hope that it was because, he had a few pints that the 7 looked like a 2.
Secondly, because of social history, one could easily make it difficult for a racial demographic to cast their vote. Whether it be by brute intimidation (in the 1890s, etc..) or long lines, sub standard equipment, and voter removal by companies such as diebold (circa 2000)
But how pray-tell does one intimidate the women vote directly? Where is the equivalent of the amazonian jungle where women disproportionately live ?
Maybe he meant at the Oscars?
There is the small matter of many of the actual positions of power being disproportionately controlled by non-women. Sort of like the urban jungles where “certain racial demographics” disproportionately live, and are still disenfranchised through brute intimidation.
153 · HMF said
HMF, you bring up a great point. To me, bringing up the “enfranchisement” of Black men was the most specious assertion in her piece.
155 · HMF said
Vassar?
156 · Rahul said
I might have misunderstood your point. Maybe you meant that intimidation does require all female ghettoes. I don’t see why that is the case though. Although I am not sure why this point is important because most reasonable people will agree that race/class based vote suppression is the problem today though, not sex based suppression.
Poughkeepsie, NY’s voting machines work just fine
Although I am not sure why this point is important because most reasonable people will agree that race/class based vote suppression is the problem today though,
Exactly, so bringing up the fact that women got the right to vote after black males is irrelevent.
definitely
Or maybe port should just run for office 🙂
Huey, thanks for elaborating on the point. My questions were rhetorical, but I appreciate the answers nonetheless 🙂
Manju, I said reasonable people, not republican election directors 🙂
I can’t, dear lady; Arnold and I have a problem in common. But should I find myself in a high office somewhere, in need of an intern, I hope that you would deign to oblige.
Arnold and I have a problem in common
You both harass women? or did you mean this arnold.
I’m assuming she means both foreign-born, and thus constitutionally ineligible for the office of U.S. President.
I’m assuming she means both foreign-born, and thus constitutionally ineligible for the office of U.S. President.
ooooohhh.. my next thought was perhaps they both indulged in this, but according to Arnie, it’s not a drug, it’s a ‘leaf‘
166 HMF said
Pot calling the kettle black?
The major difference between you and me, dear HMF, people feel flattered when I proposition them. I’m told that my suggestiveness is quite tasteful.
Also, I’m a racist as well. See how I used the word “black” connoting something negative in my post. Saving you the trouble of calling me out on that. Have a nice day 🙂
167 · Camille said
Camille, girl, you always hit the right note. Wanna make some music together?
The major difference between you and me, dear HMF
Hmm. seems like this might be the major difference between you and me.
Pot calling the kettle black
so it was this.
no, daah-ling, i believe in equal opportunity. my bounties are available to all meritorious candidates, regardless of gender.
’twas. So Camille, my belle du jour, to clarify:
HMF are you saying you’re not a lesbian?!
You two are too funny 🙂 Although I am from California, I am sorry to say port that I can no longer afford to intern, but I am happy to back up your soundtrack.
Is that what the kids are calling it these days?
No – he’s pretty militant, isn’t he?, but he was jilted by Crosby.
Speaking of presidential politics, I think we need a candidate who says it as he sees it.
Based on past experience, I can guarantee that you’ll add an octave to your range. Unlike Sally and Shangrila, this promise isn’t a fake.
Sounds like Xanadu to me!
In Xanadu did Kubla Khan A stately pleasure-dome decree: Where Alph, the sacred river, ran Through caverns measureless to man Down to a sunless sea.
That‘s what the kids are calling it these days.
Very nice post by Judith Warner on Teargate (can I claim dibs on it? Is it a “-gate” even if it might have a positive impact? Can I call it Floodgate?)
I’d prefer: Salt-watergate.
sorry, SaltWatergate (TM)
I don’t know anything else about the author, but Judith Warner does a good job at the NY Times website. Especially here:
Also, she points out that the woman who asked the question voted for Obama.
An interesting question to ask is, had Hil won Iowa, would this lady have asked the same question, and would Hil have answered the same way.
Judith Warner’s column is not particularly spectacular analysis. I’m just annoyed that people think if a woman talks about anything vaguely “feminine,” her very intellect and credibility come into question. It’s cool if the public at large wants to elect a president they can have a beer with; heaven forbid, if I were to discuss “ladies” problems with a woman president. Why does a woman’s intellectual reputation vary in inverse proportion to the number of times she mentions what are considered traditionally feminine concerns? And why this blind unscientific privileging of “emotion” over “reason”? Moral philosophers and neuroscientists (the intersecting field is “hot,” and is known as neuroethics) are finding out that our apparently reasoned moral judgments are actually made in a flash, based on our instinct. We make utilitarian or deontological or whatever moral judgments subsequently, especially when plodded by others, “Why do you think so? Why did you make that choice?” These studies are, of course, very new and not entirely conlusive yet, but have prompted to psychologists, neuroscientists, and philosophers to re-examine how they view “reason” and “emotion.” (See the work of Jonathan Haidt and Joshua Cohen on this).
Well, I don’t know where you get that idea from but you know that is not true. But people (read many men, or in Obama’s case, many nonblacks) are afraid of someone with a dominant women’s agenda (or in Obama’s case, a black rights agenda) coming to power—because they don’t know how to get their way in a setup like that.
While the whole race has degenerated into a competition about women vs blacks, it isn’t so. They both have two choices—do you play to your base (women /blacks) or do you make the others comfortable with you? Now, this is where the two campaigns may diverge. Obama gets nothing by playing to the black support—they aren’t as many. Hillary does. Ergo, the current differences in their campaigns, and the reason that the establishment fears Hillary more now.
Personally, I am a guy, I support Hillary and I think her tears were fake. But the way I see it, it is no different from the way others are playing the game—Huckabee “bonds” with the working class, Obama has wishy washy messages, Clinton has tears.
All crooks out to get their day in the sun—the question that remains is which crook will not harm you, or harm you the least? It is small wonder that at least the DBD community is overwhelmingly (though it hardly matters) for Clinton.
The dems will cry and find their voices, talk about change in deep baritones and get $400 haircuts. In the end, its going to be President John McCain.
In the end, its going to be President John McCain.
Oh yes, John “we’re winning in Iraq” McCain, who boasts of his recent visit there, one that needed a 300 armed guard humvee escort.
186 · bytewords said
yeah, cynical me agrees with you on this, but i don’t think that hrc’s tears were fake. and rahul makes this point above: obama seems less of a crook, just because he’s been in the game for a much smaller period of time.
life 🙂 personally speaking, i do not think it’s true, but i find that women in professional settings have to consciously suppress anything that makes them appear to be “girly.” professionalism is one thing, personal censorship entirely another. this phenomenon of actively suppressing certain forms of legal public expression which you do because you fear professional or general societal disapproval (remember that story of korean women and younger korean men who basically drank with their bosses even if they did not wish to just because it was the “done” thing; or black stewardesses not being allowed to wear cornrows or ethnic jewelery) is called “covering,” and i just remembered that kenji yoshino, a law professor at yale writes about this (mainly wrt to homosexuality and cultural expression). from a random book review:
also, i agree that this race should be not focus on women v. blacks angle, and i find (happy-making) that most people who discuss the democratic race rightly do not consider both obama and clinton in this light, but focus on their broader policy commitments.
but i find that women in professional settings have to consciously suppress anything that makes them appear to be “girly.”
When you say “girly” you’re essentially implying there is some inherent “girly” nature, ie, inherent gender differences, correct?
So I wonder, what do you mean by conscious supression? Don’t men have to suppress some things that revel in traditional gender roles? I can’t walk over to a female co worker and say , “get me some coffee” can I?
Besides, isn’t work entire based on “conscious suppression” ie, even if you’re tired, bored, etc… you must suppress that to collect the check?
Depends on which country you are in.
I’m assuming US was the context that pm made the comment.
HMF, you might find this article that describes the expectations from men and women in the workplace interesting.
And, not to cite this as proof, but this is related: This is why I thought Legally Blonde was such a good movie. While it exaggerated things for effect with a frothy plotline and a bubbly Reese Witherspoon, it actually was reasonable commentary on the effect of image and stereotypes in the professional arena.
My, my , my how opportunistic are we? Most ABDs support rabid rightwingers in India like Modi. The BJP gets a lot of funding and support from the US. Yet, when it comes to the good ol’ USA, ABDs suddenly become liberal, left wingers.
153 · HMF said
aSuffragettes were in fact beaten and jailed for their efforts.
And I’d say having one’s right to vote being challanged is not quite the same as one not having the right to vote at all.
^cc, Jim Crow was no joke. When the South came out with black codes and grandfather clauses (i.e. refused to allow black men to vote if their grandfather was a slave, which 99.999999% right), they didn’t do it as a joke, they really didn’t want blacks to vote. It wasn’t just challenged, it was freaking denied. And it went beyond just beatings; they were lynched. They violated an Amendment in the Constitution, and the law didn’t give a damn, because treating a black person with respect (along with being allowed to vote), was against the laws of Man and God in their bigoted eyes.
152 · Amitabh said
I may be off a decade, but it was past the midpoint of the 20th Century. It’s sad to believe that the indigenous people in the US weren’t even recognized as citizens IN THEIR OWN COUNTRY, until 1924.
And I’d say having one’s right to vote being challanged is not quite the same as one not having the right to vote at all.
“If you vote you get hanged” is not ‘challenging’ the right to vote, as Huey put it. If the 15th amendment was authentic, why pass the Voting Rights act at all?
Dadgummit, ‘dis here boy sure does the hokey-folky so well my laughter was louder than the squeals of a stuck hog. Sure is gooder than grits!
198 · HMF said
Let’s say only five black men in the whole country were the only ones to vote after they passed that law. It’s still five more than women got for another half century.
No, after the law was passed, everything was NOT hunky dory. Yes, racism continue to exist. But the point is, black men got their official rights granted before women did AS ACCORDING TO THE LAW. That’s just historical fact.