Although, I'm quite the feminist, but maybe there is a lack of interest in politics amongst women? Instead of looking at just the # of women in politics today, It would be interesting to know what the comparative statistics are for the growth of the number of women involved in the political arena in the past 5 decades. is there an increase/decrease/no change?

Unfortunately in American politics, women are held under a harsher standard than men. The old boys network is still alive and well in certain places in government. Whether they're married or not and have children, the spin doctors point fingers that she's being a bad mother if she's not the one directly rearing her children. I have yet to see male politicians taken to task about how much time they spend with their children. If she's too aggressive then she's a witch but if a man acts in the same manner then he's being strong.

I remember somewhat the story about when Chelsea Clinton was in grade school and was asked to give an emergency number contact. Apparently she said something along the lines of how it was better to get a hold of her dad as opposed to her mom because she's more busy than him. Clinton was governor at the time and I think the press had a field day with that one.

Although there have been improvements with backing women candidates and the creation of EMILY's list, there's still a long road ahead. I was just kid when Geraldine Ferraro was the running mate with Mondale. Instead of focusing on the issues, the media criticized her hair, makeup, and outfits. With Carol Mosley Braun there was such a hoopla over a relationship with some man his name escapes me. I have yet to see men in Congress to be held as accountable. Although with recent scandals that is starting to change.

Someone on GC posted a story about how a female political candidate in Washington state was being taken to task for her involvement in college organizations. No one did a background check on her opponent and the number of times he had probably worshipped at the porcelain God while he was in college.

Perhaps countries that traditionally value males more than females have more female politicians because they are more "family oriented", and see female leaders as "mothers of the country"? Since women are the leaders of the household in these cultures, perhaps they see the country itself as a large home, and the women politicians as the "Moms". Since Mom knows what's best for the home, then perhaps female politicians would know what's best for the country? I don't know, just a thought.

It has everything to do with fewer women in government, and what makes you think that I was talking about a head of government? I was talking about parliamentary forms of government, many of which use proportional representation.

ETA read this article: http://www.mtholyoke.edu/acad/polit/...men_electe.htm

Re: Women in politics
 

http://www.fairvote.org/library/geog/europe/systems.htm
Sweden: proportional representation.
New Zealand: proportional representation.
Argentina: proportional representation.

I haven't located anything on the African nations listed, but I'm willing to bet that they have parliaments with proportional representation.

A woman commander and chief . . . I dunno.

Ummm, this may explain the situation in European countries and in Australia and New Zeland, but it not for countries such as India or China that values males more.

Anyway, this is my mom's take on women, government and countries with an emerginc community:

Everything is put on fast forward in these countries. They are experiencing what the Europe and North America experienced in the 1800s and the early 1900s. Back then, women had relatively few rights. However, at the same time, the emerging middle classes in these countries wanted their women to be "accomplished" (I can go on about this because my master's thesis was on women's education). Today, countries with an emerging economy also believe that women should be accomplished, but to go along with the times and the culture in western countries, the girls are going to universities. Since there is western influence and therefore a more open ground, they are able to compete with the guys they graduate with at an easier rate than in other countries. This is the new middle class over there. These countries, too, have an Old Boys' Network....every patriarchal culture does...but instead of the Old Boys being professionals, they were land owners, and the status was therefore unattainable by many.

In Hong Kong, for example, many of the "higher ups" are later baby-boomers, people who are now in their mid 40s. They were in elementary school during Second Wave feminism and university students or new grads when Hong Kong's economy took off in the 80s. Post war Hong Kong was still very colonial, and most people did not have much money. "Middle class" basically meant that you had a very successful shop. Finance was almost always out of reach. There wasn't and still isn't an elected government (today, only certain people can vote). Just a thought.

Ummm, it explains it in every single parliamentary democracy that uses proportional representation. This thread was never about authoritarian governments. China is not a democracy, and this may come as a shocker, but India has had more than one female head of state.

In fact, India completely kills your little theory about cultural context.

See the second explanation for India....India's female leaders were in office during the second half of the 20th century, Russ. Women were already transitioning between the period of where they were educated to become "accomplished" to catch husbands to becoming "accomplished" for themselves (as well as to catch a husband).

Look. Its very simple. The issue of the percentage of female legislators in democratically elected bodies has almost nothing to do with culture. Its almost purely systemic. The U.S. (which is the focus of the original post in this thread) has a culture that is among the most progressive in the world with regard to the treatment of women. The U.S. Congress does not reflect this. India, for example, has a culturally less progressive attitude towards women, but their Parliament has always had a higher percentage of women in it than the U.S. Congress. There is clearly no correlation between culture and outcome. The variable is the type of elective system of the representative bodies.

If you don't agree with this, disprove it. Its not that difficult, time consuming maybe, but not difficult. All that you have to do is compile a table with democratic nations, method of election for representative bodies, and the percentage of elected women in these bodies. Its that simple.

Anyone who takes the time to research this (or take a basic Poli Sci class that deals with this sort of thing,) will quickly learn that democratic nations with lower percentages of women, who are elected representatives, are in nations without proportional representation. Also, most (if not all) of these systems with proportional representation use a parliamentary form of government.

What is the percentage of female candidates in the US vs the percentage of female candidates in India? Maybe we should also look at the attitudes of women in these respective countries as well. We shouldn't just look at outcome.

http://www.guide2womenleaders.com/Premier_Ministers.htm

Many of the women heads of government listed here (especially those from cultures that are patriarchal) are daughters or wives of important men. Perhaps their name and connections gave them this advantage? IMHO, I really don't think they'd be able to get this far as easily without that.

Examples (from the above link):

Sirimavo Ratwatte Dias Bandaranaike, Sri Lanka: "She was the widow of Solomon B., Premier of Ceylon 1956-59 until he was assassinated. Her father Mr. Ratwatte was a Senator. "

Indira Ghandi, India: "She was daughter of Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru (1947-64(†))"

Benazir Bhutto, Pakistan: "Benazir is daughter of Zulfikar Ali Bhutto, the former President and Prime Minister, who was executed after the coup d’ Etat in 1979."

Begum Khaleda Zia, Bangladesh: "Her husband, President Zia-ur-Rahman, was Premier Minister 1976-77 and President 1977-81 until he was assassinated."

Political campaigns
 

The fact is in the US, the US census stated that highly educated women with advanced degrees can make 98% on the dollar compared to a married man with a wife and children... However, this woman must remain unmarried and childless...

Political campaigns cost money... Many women have difficulty to finance their campaigns without seeking some male support...

It seems ironic that in the 1960's and 1970's we had this huge women's liberation movement that advance careers of many female politicians, however these faces have not changed that much over the course of 30 years... So is there this "tenure factor"??? Where is this "old boys network"?

The US is also a republic--representation of a group of people...

Some groups just do not want to be represented by women or vice versa...

IMO, it is difficult for women of little means to run for public office... I am amazed that I meet many women who are highly educated that are destituted due to something that happened in their lives--usually related to domestic violence... Some related to drugs...

IMO, women who are high powered, childless and unmarried start to have too many personally questions asked of them rather than can they represent the people they serve--essentially do the best job they are running for...

And the women who are high powered, have children and maybe married... It is truly a daunting task to balance all those activities...

But these are just my opinions...

AKA_Monet,

I think it takes longer than 30 years to change things around, as we have to wait until the older crowd is phased out. I think this may actually take another 20 or so years, and it will be a slow change. I girl I went to high school with has an aunt who was born during WWII. When she went to law school in the early 60s, she was one of three women. A couple of years ago, this same law school graduated slightly more women than men. But that was only a couple of years ago. The University of Toronto is not alone in this, as many other law schools are looking at more female students than men. The same goes for medical school. I think it would take another decade, at least, until these female grads are better established, to really see any sort of change.

I have no idea what your point is - introducing China into the discussion is such a bizarre non sequitur that I'm seriously baffled.

Your first sentence here is a point I've supported, and my post was made only in reference to the situation in the US. Note that I was not really extending to the point of comparison with other nations, as I don't think there is a valid means of comparison (Russ did a beautiful job of illustrating this).