Pages tagged "Author:Cynthia Richie Terrell"
Peer-Reviewed Article: Election Reform & Women's Representation: Ranked Choice Voting in the U.S.
Released: June 2021
In 2021, we published an article in Politics and Governance on the history and impact of single- and multi-winner ranked choice voting on women’s representation in the U.S. In addition to revisiting some of the research from our 2016 and 2020 reports, this article allowed us to dig deeper into the available literature on ranked choice voting and identify knowledge gaps that should be addressed in future research.
Report: 2020 Gender Parity Index
To quantify progress towards gender parity in elected and appointed office, RepresentWomen developed the Gender Parity Index (GPI). Each year, a Gender Parity Score and grade is calculated for each of the 50 states and for the United States as a whole. The Gender Parity Score reflects women's recent electoral successes at the local, state, and national levels on a scale of 0 (if no women were elected to any offices) to 100 (if women held all elected offices). The key advantage of the GPI is that it enables comparisons to be made over time and among states.
Chapter: Women and the Presidency
In 2020 "Women and the Presidency" was published as a chapter in the book The Best Candidate: Presidential Nomination in Polarized Times.
This chapter looks at the women who have run for the presidency and vice presidency of the United States. Some of these women were qualified candidates who were never given a fair shot. Others were people who should never have sought executive office in the first place. After examining this history, this chapter provides a closer examination of the structural barriers that women in the United States face in politics, as well as the innovative strategies that will enable more women to run, win, serve, and lead at all levels of government. These strategies include reforming how women’s campaigns are financed, changing the candidate recruitment rules used by parties, implementing ranked choice voting, and promoting balanced media coverage. The strategies discussed in this chapter are designed to expand the pool of women candidates and to translate that success into the likelihood that a woman will eventually attain the highest office in the land (332).
Report: In Ranked Choice Elections, Women WIN
Released: July 2020
Our 2020 ranked choice voting report, "In Ranked Choice Elections, Women WIN" provides a thorough review of ranked choice voting in the United States and how it is impacting women's representation in the cities that have implemented it. From 2010-2019, 19 cities and counties used ranked choice voting to elect their city officials, including 13 mayors and the city councilmembers in 14 jurisdictions. In that decade, women won 48% of all municipal elections.
Report: PACs and Donors: Agents of Change for Women's Representation
PACs should set funding targets for cis-women, transgender folk, and nonbinary candidates as well as increase those targets every election cycle until our elected bodies reflect the gender diversity of the population. With public pressure, equal funding for male, female, and genderqueer candidates may become a value proposition for PACs. The PAC environment is highly competitive and they are always looking for new ways to look different from other PACs to appeal to donors.
Read more about the breakdown of PAC giving in 2018 and our recommendations for PACs and donors in our 2020 PACs and Donors report.
Report: Achieving Gender Parity - Systems Strategies Around the World
In many countries around the world, women are entering political office at higher rates than in the United States. As of January 2022, the U.S. was tied with Egypt and the Philippines in 72nd place for the number of women (120 of 433, or 28%) in the lower legislature, the U.S. House of Representatives. Twenty years ago, there were half as many women in the U.S. House, and the country ranked 59th for women's representation.
In 2020, RepresentWomen released a report analyzing the impact electoral rules and systems have on women's representation. We found that countries with proportional systems and gender quotas were more likely to have women present in their national legislature. Our report, "Achieving Gender Parity: Systems Strategies Around the World," also introduces new research on women heads of state and government, women in executive cabinets around the world, the use of ranked-choice voting internationally, and the role women's representation has on democratic rankings.
Report: International Women's Representation
Progress toward gender parity in elected office in the United States has been slow, especially in comparison to other nations. Most countries that rank above the United States for women's political representation have adopted recruitment rules and voting systems that level the playing field for women candidates. When examining these other countries, it is clear that reaching gender parity in elected and appointed office requires intentional action and policy reform.
Report: 2019 Gender Parity Index
To quantify progress towards gender parity in elected and appointed office, RepresentWomen developed the Gender Parity Index (GPI). Each year, a Gender Parity Score and grade is calculated for each of the 50 states and for the United States as a whole. The Gender Parity Score reflects women's recent electoral successes at the local, state, and national levels on a scale of 0 (if no women were elected to any offices) to 100 (if women held all elected offices). The key advantage of the GPI is that it enables comparisons to be made over time and among states.
Report: Why Rules and Systems Matter Lessons from Around the World
Women won a record number of races in the November 2018 midterm elections and now hold 102 seats in the U.S. House of Representatives. According to the Inter-Parliamentary Union, which tracks women's representation in national legislatures, the U.S. now ranks 77th in the world for women in politics; in 1998, the U.S. ranked 60th. The U.S. ranks further behind the rest of the world than it did 20 years ago - even with significant gains for women - because other nations have adopted recruitment practices and voting systems that create more opportunities for women to run, win, serve, and lead.
Report: 2018 Gender Parity Index
To quantify progress towards gender parity in elected and appointed office, RepresentWomen developed the Gender Parity Index (GPI). Each year, a Gender Parity Score and grade is calculated for each of the 50 states and for the United States as a whole. The Gender Parity Score reflects women's recent electoral successes at the local, state, and national levels on a scale of 0 (if no women were elected to any offices) to 100 (if women held all elected offices). The key advantage of the GPI is that it enables comparisons to be made over time and among states.