Elle did a great piece last week about women leaders around the world and the role that they have played shaping the debate on many different topics - there is no question that strong women leaders of all political persuasions are seeking and winning elected office - but we have a long way to go until the United States is a leader on parity.
Emerge America launched a terrific campaign this week #WhySheRuns to highlight the many women who are running for office - please consider helping to spread the word about their new video or make your own WhySheRuns video!
The PhillyVoice reported on what looks like a very interesting new study by the City University of New York Institute for State and Local Governance's Equality Indicators, called "Who Runs Our Cities? The Political Gender Gap in the Top 100 U.S. Cities?"- here is a sobering nugget:
The study also found that the number of newly elected female mayors dropped by more than half in the early 2000s compared to the 1990s, when the U.S. saw a surge in women being elected into mayoral roles.
VoteRunLead is planning a 2nd Anniversary Celebration on Tuesday October 4th in New York City - it looks like a great event!
Traveling ambassador for women's equality Emma Watson met the Canada's Justin Trudeau who has challenged Canadian companies to reveal how many women are involved in leadership positions according to this piece in Vice.
Gloria Feldt had an interesting piece in TIME magazine on why we have not yet achieved gender parity - she concludes:
Let’s stop fooling ourselves and admit that many are afraid to give women a fair share of chairs at the table and equal say in the big decisions all humans have to face. And let’s face the reasons why and review the numbers that speak for themselves. Let’s end the fear and lead the way to a new paradigm that will benefit us all—women and men. Let’s check our language and the language we hear in public discourse and be honest about what we mean when we talk about the nature of leadership and power and what we need of both in this century.
According to a story in the Fairfax County Times, the AAUW is "pairing wine with activism" to raise money and awareness - this seems like a model for organizing that more of us might want to follow - any takers?
Heidi Hartmann sent along this snippet that the News Hour which "had a segment about women in Afghanistan noting that it was quite a shame that women are only 25% of its parliament; US only 20%." Indeed, different rules and different voting systems produce different electoral outcomes...
The terrific team at Presidential Gender Watch is tracking media coverage of the campaign and the debates closely - check out their infographic for debate watching tips through a gender lens:
Visit FairVote Maine's great website to see how you can support this effort and the League of Women Voters Maine page on ranked choice voting if you have any questions! There have been a lot of great personal videos on the ranked choice voting ballot measure in Maine - here is one of many!
Cynthia