Equal Representation (and the lack thereof)

Nancy Pelosi on Women in Politics

I stumbled across this video of Nancy Pelosi from about a year ago, speaking at the Radcliffe Institute about the state of women in politics, particularly within Congress. If you have 9 minutes to spare, I highly recommend taking the time to watch. Even just the question she is asked at the beginning frames some of the same discussions we have had in class. Pelosi talks about how the work of women such as Stanton and Anthony is still impacting us today, and how we still have work to do to reach the goals of political equality. The simple fact that we celebrate having women comprise 18.5% of Congress - the highest percentage in history - is troubling. Yes, we are making progress and increasing our numbers, but why are things still so unbalanced? In contrast to this, Sweden's incoming Prime Minister recently announced his cabinet, and half of the members are women. If you are interested, you can read about that here: Sweden reveals new 'feminist' cabinet