Seeing Women, Strengthening Democracy

Seeing Women, Strengthening Democracy PDF Author: Magda Hinojosa
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0197526950
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 181

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Book Description
Under what conditions do citizens most effectively connect to the democratic process? We tend to think that factors like education, income, and workforce participation are most important, but research has shown that they exert less influence than expected when it comes to women's attitudes and engagement. Scholars have begun to look more closely at how political context affects engagement. This book asks how contexts promote women's interest and connection to democracy, and it looks to Latin America for answers. The region provides a good test case as the institution of gender quotas has led to more recent and dramatic increases in women's political representation. Specifically, Magda Hinojosa and Miki Caul Kittilson argue that the election of women to political office--particularly where women's presence is highly visible to the public--strengthens the connections between women and the democratic process. For women, seeing more "people like me" in politics changes attitudes and orientations toward government and politics. The authors untangle the effects of gender quotas and the subsequent rise in women's share of elected positions, finding that the latter exerts greater impact on women's connections to the democratic process. Women citizens are more knowledgeable, interested, and efficacious when they see women holding elected office. They also express more trust in government and in political institutions and greater satisfaction with democracy when they see more women in politics. The authors look at comparative data from across Latin America, but focus on an in-depth case study of Uruguay. Here, the authors find that gender gaps in political engagement declined significantly after a doubling of women's representation in the Senate. The authors therefore argue that far-reaching gender gaps can be overcome by more equitable representation in our political institutions.

Seeing Women, Strengthening Democracy

Seeing Women, Strengthening Democracy PDF Author: Magda Hinojosa
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0197526950
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 181

Get Book Here

Book Description
Under what conditions do citizens most effectively connect to the democratic process? We tend to think that factors like education, income, and workforce participation are most important, but research has shown that they exert less influence than expected when it comes to women's attitudes and engagement. Scholars have begun to look more closely at how political context affects engagement. This book asks how contexts promote women's interest and connection to democracy, and it looks to Latin America for answers. The region provides a good test case as the institution of gender quotas has led to more recent and dramatic increases in women's political representation. Specifically, Magda Hinojosa and Miki Caul Kittilson argue that the election of women to political office--particularly where women's presence is highly visible to the public--strengthens the connections between women and the democratic process. For women, seeing more "people like me" in politics changes attitudes and orientations toward government and politics. The authors untangle the effects of gender quotas and the subsequent rise in women's share of elected positions, finding that the latter exerts greater impact on women's connections to the democratic process. Women citizens are more knowledgeable, interested, and efficacious when they see women holding elected office. They also express more trust in government and in political institutions and greater satisfaction with democracy when they see more women in politics. The authors look at comparative data from across Latin America, but focus on an in-depth case study of Uruguay. Here, the authors find that gender gaps in political engagement declined significantly after a doubling of women's representation in the Senate. The authors therefore argue that far-reaching gender gaps can be overcome by more equitable representation in our political institutions.

Feminist Agendas and Democracy in Latin America

Feminist Agendas and Democracy in Latin America PDF Author: Jane S. Jaquette
Publisher: Duke University Press
ISBN: 0822392569
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 272

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Book Description
Latin American women’s movements played important roles in the democratic transitions in South America during the 1980s and in Central America during the 1990s. However, very little has been written on what has become of these movements and their agendas since the return to democracy. This timely collection examines how women’s movements have responded to the dramatic political, economic, and social changes of the last twenty years. In these essays, leading scholar-activists focus on the various strategies women’s movements have adopted and assess their successes and failures. The book is organized around three broad topics. The first, women’s access to political power at the national level, is addressed by essays on the election of Michelle Bachelet in Chile, gender quotas in Argentina and Brazil, and the responses of the women’s movement to the “Bolivarian revolution” in Venezuela. The second topic, the use of legal strategies, is taken up in essays on women’s rights across the board in Argentina, violence against women in Brazil, and gender in the work of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission in Peru. Finally, the international impact of Latin American feminists is explored through an account of their participation in the World Social Forum, an assessment of a Chilean-led project carried out by women’s organizations in several countries to hold governments to the promises they made at international conferences in Cairo and Beijing, and an account of cross-border organizing to address femicides and domestic abuse in the Juárez-El Paso border region. Jane S. Jaquette provides the historical and political context of women’s movement activism in her introduction, and concludes the volume by engaging contemporary debates about feminism, civil society, and democracy. Contributors. Jutta Borner, Mariana Caminotti, Alina Donoso, Gioconda Espina, Jane S. Jaquette, Beatriz Kohen, Julissa Mantilla Falcón, Jutta Marx, Gabriela L. Montoya, Flávia Piovesan, Marcela Ríos Tobar, Kathleen Staudt, Teresa Valdés, Virginia Vargas

Strengthening Electoral Integrity

Strengthening Electoral Integrity PDF Author: Pippa Norris
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 1108508766
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 391

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Book Description
Today a general mood of pessimism surrounds Western efforts to strengthen elections and democracy abroad. If elections are often deeply flawed or even broken in many countries around the world, can anything be done to fix them? To counter the prevailing ethos, Pippa Norris presents new evidence for why programs of international electoral assistance work. She evaluates the effectiveness of several practical remedies, including efforts designed to reform electoral laws, strengthen women's representation, build effective electoral management bodies, promote balanced campaign communications, regulate political money, and improve voter registration. Pippa Norris argues that it would be a tragedy to undermine progress by withdrawing from international engagement. Instead, the international community needs to learn the lessons of what works best to strengthen electoral integrity, to focus activities and resources upon the most effective programs, and to innovate after a quarter century of efforts to strengthen electoral integrity.

Mobilizing for Democracy

Mobilizing for Democracy PDF Author: Vera Schatten Coelho
Publisher: Zed Books Ltd.
ISBN: 1848139152
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 214

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Book Description
Mobilizing for Democracy is an in-depth study into how ordinary citizens and their organizations mobilize to deepen democracy. Featuring a collection of new empirical case studies from Angola, Bangladesh, Brazil, India, Kenya, Nigeria and South Africa, this important new book illustrates how forms of political mobilization, such as protests, social participation, activism, litigation and lobbying, engage with the formal institutions of representative democracy in ways that are core to the development of democratic politics. No other volume has brought together examples from such a broad Southern spectrum and covering such a diversity of actors: rural and urban dwellers, transnational activists, religious groups, politicians and social leaders. The cases illuminate the crucial contribution that citizen mobilization makes to democratization and the building of state institutions, and reflect the uneasy relationship between citizens and the institutions that are designed to foster their political participation.

It Takes a Candidate

It Takes a Candidate PDF Author: Jennifer L. Lawless
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 9780521857451
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 224

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Book Description
It Takes a Candidate serves as the first systematic, nationwide empirical account of the manner in which gender affects political ambition. Based on data from the Citizen Political Ambition Study, a national survey conducted on almost 3,800 'potential candidates', we find that women, even in the highest tiers of professional accomplishment, are substantially less likely than men to demonstrate ambition to seek elected office. Women are less likely than men to be recruited to run for office. They are less likely than men to think they are 'qualified' to run for office. And they are less likely than men to express a willingness to run for office in the future. This gender gap in political ambition persists across generations. Despite cultural evolution and society's changing attitudes toward women in politics, running for public office remains a much less attractive and feasible endeavor for women than men.

Reimagining the Judiciary

Reimagining the Judiciary PDF Author: Maria C. Escobar-Lemmon
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0198861575
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 216

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Book Description
This book analyzes high courts on a global scale and identifying the role of domestic actors and institutions, and international influences upon women appointments.

It's Up to the Women

It's Up to the Women PDF Author: Eleanor Roosevelt
Publisher: Hachette UK
ISBN: 1568585950
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 146

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Book Description
"Eleanor Roosevelt never wanted her husband to run for president. When he won, she . . . went on a national tour to crusade on behalf of women. She wrote a regular newspaper column. She became a champion of women's rights and of civil rights. And she decided to write a book." -- Jill Lepore, from the Introduction "Women, whether subtly or vociferously, have always been a tremendous power in the destiny of the world," Eleanor Roosevelt wrote in It's Up to the Women, her book of advice to women of all ages on every aspect of life. Written at the height of the Great Depression, she called on women particularly to do their part -- cutting costs where needed, spending reasonably, and taking personal responsibility for keeping the economy going. Whether it's the recommendation that working women take time for themselves in order to fully enjoy time spent with their families, recipes for cheap but wholesome home-cooked meals, or America's obligation to women as they take a leading role in the new social order, many of the opinions expressed here are as fresh as if they were written today.

The Rights of Women in Comparative Constitutional Law

The Rights of Women in Comparative Constitutional Law PDF Author: Irene Spigno
Publisher: Taylor & Francis
ISBN: 1000874443
Category : Law
Languages : en
Pages : 244

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Book Description
Through a comparative analysis involving 13 countries from Africa, America, Asia and Europe, this book provides an invaluable assessment of women’s equality at the global level. The work focuses on formal constitutional provisions as well as the substantial level of protection women’s equality has achieved in the systems analysed. The investigations look at the relevant gender-related legislation, the participation of women in the institutional arena and the constitutional interpretation made by constitutional justice on gender issues. Furthermore, the book highlights women’s contributions in their roles as judges, parliamentarians, activists and academics, thus increasing the visibility of their participation in the public sphere. The work will be of interest to academics, researchers and policy-makers working in the areas of Constitutional Law, Comparative Law, Human Rights Law and Women’s and Gender Studies.

Working Together

Working Together PDF Author: Cynthia Estlund
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 9780198035954
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 260

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Book Description
The typical workplace is a hotbed of human relationships--of friendships, conflicts, feuds, alliances, partnerships, coexistence and cooperation. Here, problems are solved, progress is made, and rifts are mended because they need to be - because the work has to get done. And it has to get done among increasingly diverse groups of co-workers. At a time when communal ties in American society are increasingly frayed and segregation persists, the workplace is more than ever the site where Americans from different ethnic, religious, and racial backgrounds meet and forge serviceable and sometimes lasting bonds. What do these highly structured workplace relationships mean for a society still divided by gender and race? Structure and rules are, in fact, central to the answer. Workplace interactions are constrained by economic power and necessity, and often by legal regulation. They exist far from the civic ideal of free and equal citizens voluntarily associating for shared ends. Yet it is the very involuntariness of these interactions that helps to make the often-troubled project of racial integration comparatively successful at work. People can be forced to get along-not without friction, but often with surprising success. This highly original exploration of the paradoxical nature--and the paramount importance--of workplace bonds concludes with concrete suggestions for how law can further realize the democratic possibilities of working together. In linking workplace integration and connectedness beyond work, Estlund suggests a novel and promising strategy for addressing the most profound challenges facing American society.

Democracy

Democracy PDF Author: Condoleezza Y Rice
Publisher: Hachette+ORM
ISBN: 1455540196
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 403

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Book Description
From the former secretary of state and bestselling author -- a sweeping look at the global struggle for democracy and why America must continue to support the cause of human freedom. "This heartfelt and at times very moving book shows why democracy proponents are so committed to their work...Both supporters and skeptics of democracy promotion will come away from this book wiser and better informed." -- The New York Times From the end of the Cold War and the collapse of the Soviet Union to the ongoing struggle for human rights in the Middle East, Condoleezza Rice has served on the front lines of history. As a child, she was an eyewitness to a third awakening of freedom, when her hometown of Birmingham, Alabama, became the epicenter of the civil rights movement for black Americans. In this book, Rice explains what these epochal events teach us about democracy. At a time when people around the world are wondering whether democracy is in decline, Rice shares insights from her experiences as a policymaker, scholar, and citizen, in order to put democracy's challenges into perspective. When the United States was founded, it was the only attempt at self-government in the world. Today more than half of all countries qualify as democracies, and in the long run that number will continue to grow. Yet nothing worthwhile ever comes easily. Using America's long struggle as a template, Rice draws lessons for democracy around the world -- from Russia, Poland, and Ukraine, to Kenya, Colombia, and the Middle East. She finds that no transitions to democracy are the same because every country starts in a different place. Pathways diverge and sometimes circle backward. Time frames for success vary dramatically, and countries often suffer false starts before getting it right. But, Rice argues, that does not mean they should not try. While the ideal conditions for democracy are well known in academia, they never exist in the real world. The question is not how to create perfect circumstances but how to move forward under difficult ones. These same insights apply in overcoming the challenges faced by governments today. The pursuit of democracy is a continuing struggle shared by people around the world, whether they are opposing authoritarian regimes, establishing new democratic institutions, or reforming mature democracies to better live up to their ideals. The work of securing it is never finished. NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER