Chapter 10 Politics, Prison, and the Military

Chapter Introduction

After an opening discussion of gender and politics in Iceland, this chapter focuses on gender in electoral politics, in the military, and in the criminal justice system. It closes by considering the roles that women are playing in contemporary social movements.

Politics and the State

States are entities that organize and wield power in society, extract resources through taxation, and have authority over particular territories and populations. States can operate at several levels within a country. In the United States, the state includes the Supreme Court, the president, the Armed Forces, the IRS, the Census Bureau, and Congress at the federal level, as well as governors, legislatures, and more local bodies like city councils, school systems, welfare offices, and local police departments. Elected officials, the military and the criminal justice system, are all part of the state. Men and women have different roles and experiences in these arenas. Who is elected to office, how individuals participate in military operations, and how people are treated by the criminal justice system all involve gendered relations and structures.

Electoral Politics

Elections in the U.S. are gendered. Elections are dominated by men. Candidates, campaign strategists, pollsters, media experts, reporters, news anchors, and fundraisers are often men. Gendered language draws from the masculine domains of war and sports. We expect leaders to be manly—tough, dominant, assertive.

Voting Rights

For at least a century gender and race were the key criteria determining whether a person could exercise the right to suffrage. In 1870, the Fifteenth Amendment extended suffrage to black men, although in practice few could vote. In 1920, Congress passed the Nineteenth Amendment, giving women the right to vote. New Zealand was the first nation to allow women to vote (1893), followed by Australia (except Aboriginal women), Canada (except First Nations women), and several European nations before 1920. France, Italy, and Japan did not pass women’s suffrage until the 1940s. Kuwait in 2005 most recently allowed women to vote. In 2015, Saudi Arabia became the last nation to grant women the right to vote. Women now make up the majority (51.8%) of Americans eligible to vote. American women are more likely than men to vote.

The Gender Gap in Voting

The gender gap (differences between women and men in their political opinions and for whom they vote) grew during the 1990s as men shifted their loyalties to Republicans. Women are more likely than men to favor an activist role for government, are more supportive of programs to guarantee quality health care and meet basic human needs, are more supportive of restrictions on guns, are more supportive of affirmative action programs, are more critical of business, are more pessimistic about the performance of the economy, are less likely to say they have little confidence in Congress, and are less likely to believe the government wastes our tax dollars. The gender gap is also affected by labor force participation. Employed women and college educated women are much more likely to support Democrats. Race ethnicity alters the gender gap. Whites were more likely to support Republican candidates, while African Americans were solidly behind Democrats. Puerto Rican American women are strongly Democratic, but Cuban Americans have been likely to be Republicans. There are also gaps between married and single voters, between rich and poor, between urban and rural, and between blacks and whites.

Women Elected Officials

The numbers of women in public office have slowly increased in the U.S. since the first woman, Jeanette Rankin, was elected to Congress from the state of Montana in 1917. In 2017, the U.S. was ranked 96th out of 122 countries in the U.N. in terms of political empowerment of women, placing it between Pakistan (95) and Vietnam (97). Around the world, progress for women has been uneven. Women were heads of state in 22 nations in 2008. The most woman-dominated government is that of Finland. Table 10-4 shows the proportion of women in national legislatures or parliaments. Women make up an average of 17% of legislators globally. Only 35 countries have so far managed to reach the 30% threshold of women in national parliaments, the point at which women can make a meaningful impact. Rwanda currently has the largest proportion of women in the parliament, with about 61% of the seats. Rwanda has implemented important affirmative action policies that assigned to women 30% of decision-making related positions and allocated local funds and micro-credits for production projects led by women.

What Difference Does It Make?

Four benefits derive from increasing the numbers of elected women officials: increased democratic justice and equity; more possibility of addressing the interests of women, such as health care, sexual harassment, and family leave; better use of all available resources; and more money for your district.

Why So Few Women?

First, women don’t run for office very often. Second, when they do run, it is hard to win office against incumbents, who are usually men. Third, in different nations some voters still hold negative stereotypes about women in political office or associate good leadership with masculine stereotypes. Fourth, women are still more likely than are men to be outside the paid labor force and therefore less likely to participate in electoral politics. Fifth, family obligations and lack of time inhibit women’s political participation. Sixth, the media cover women candidates less than they cover men, and journalists often trivialize women candidates by focusing on their clothing and their families.

Gender and Campaigns

When a woman enters the race against a man, men change their campaign strategy in two ways. First, they avoid aggressive confrontations. Second, they go to greater lengths to show they are in touch with women’s issues.

Three Models for Reform

Meritocratic Remedies

The meritocratic model assumes that those who merit a reward will gain it. This model suggests encouraging women to run for office, training them for candidacy, and funding their campaigns.

Affirmative Action Remedies

The affirmative action model advocates setting target numbers and quotas for women in political office.

Radical Remedies

The third model is a radical one that calls for restructuring political institutions. American elections (two parties, electoral college, gerrymandered districts, winner-take-all voting) lock many people out of political representation, especially women and racial ethnic groups. Structural change would include increasing numbers of representatives, term limits, increasing the number of political parties, providing day care and keeping family-friendly hours, and changing the political culture from confrontational to cooperative.

Political Institutions: Courts and Prisons

Men represent about 50% of the population, but 75% of those who are arrested and more than 90% of the prison population. They are more likely than women to serve jail time. Prostitution is the only crime for which significantly more women than men are arrested. Women prisoners may be incarcerated a long way from their homes and their prisons have fewer training or recreational facilities and libraries and less medical care. Women prisoners also have special health needs that are not served in prison. Congress has banned the use of federal funds for abortions for women prisoners. If an incarcerated woman continues with a pregnancy she is unlikely to receive adequate prenatal care, her prison diet won’t meet minimum standards for pregnant women, and she may be forced to go through labor and delivery while shackled. Prison officials take babies from mothers almost immediately after birth.

Sexual violence against women prisoners in the United States is widespread. Women are raped and sexually abused at the hands of the male staff and do not have adequate recourse (see Box 10-1).

Young People in the Criminal Justice System

Boys are arrested much more often than are girls, but arrests of girls have increased dramatically in recent years. Girls are likely to be arrested for status offenses: being out after curfew, running away, or drinking alcohol. But running away may often be a survival response by girls (and boys) who are sexually abused.

Girls increasingly are members of their own or boys’ gangs. Sexual assault and other kinds of abuse of girls are common in gangs, although girls claim that sexual assault is more of a problem when they are not in gangs. Girls in gangs use weapons, although they tend to avoid guns and rely on fists and knives. Because police are less suspicious of girls, they are useful for disguising the criminal activities of the men.

Why Are Men So Much More Likely to Be in Prison?

1. Masculinity theory holds that being aggressive, pushy, hard-headed, and violent make men more prone to commit crimes. As expectations about the behavior of women become more masculinized, women will commit more crimes and become a larger proportion of the prison population.

2. Opportunity theory asserts that as women enter the workplace, they gain skills, social connections, and opportunities to commit crimes. For the same reason, they are more able to leave abusive relationships before they escalate to assault or murder of a husband or boyfriend. Opportunity theorists predict that as women continue to enter paid jobs, we will see women committing more property crimes but fewer violent crimes.

3. Economic marginalization theorists predict that women’s criminal involvement will increase as women become more economically independent of men but still less able to provide for themselves and their families.

4. Chivalry theory maintains that women’s criminal behavior was similar to men’s in the past, but that similarity was obscured by leniency in the system making women appear to be less criminal. As chivalry falls away, women’s true criminal activity will become more visible and will appear to be greater than in previous decades.

Political Institutions: The Military

Women’s participation in the U.S. military has traditionally been restricted, with official bans on combat roles lifted by the Pentagon beginning in 2016. Women’s military participation has been increasing steady over the past several decades. Three factors have caused women to enter the military: demand for personnel; demographic or economic changes that alter the supply of potential recruits; and a shift cultural values towards gender equality.

Women and Men in the Military Today

While policy regarding women has changed, some military men resist the idea of women serving alongside them (see Table 10-6).

Gender Harassment in the Military

Some forms of gender harassment include male soldiers who refuse to follow directions from female superiors, constant surveillance by men who are waiting for women to make a mistake, gossip and rumors about women’s sexuality, sabotage of equipment and tools used by women, and rape and indirect threats of rape.

Why the Hostility Against Women in the Military?

Many military men believe that women have easier physical training standards, that they take advantage of pregnancy to limit their physical training, and that they receive better educational opportunities, better assignments, or undeserved promotions while men are relegated to combat jobs. White men believe that minorities also receive similar advantages.

Masculinity and Heterosexuality in the Military

In the 1950s, the U.S. military explicitly barred gay men and lesbians from military service. A newer policy is commonly known as “don’t ask, don’t tell” (DADT). President Obama signed a bill repealing DADT on Dec. 22, 2010 and allowing gay and lesbian soldiers to serve opening. The first official military wedding for a same-sex couple took place in 2012. Controversy surrounding the service of transgender soldiers persists. In 2018, President Donald Trump enacted a ban of transgender service members wit a Presidential memo.

Why Are Differences in the Treatment of Women in the Military Important?

Gender inequality in the military supports the continuation of cultural images of femininity and masculinity. Barring women from some activities in the military limited their access to power and resources such as jobs, job training, or educational benefits. The association of military service with citizenship means that discrimination in the military can help perpetuate gender inequality in the legal rights of citizens.

Gender Equality: In War, Prison, and Beyond?

In the case of electoral politics, making women more equal to men would benefit women, men, and the community. In the case of the criminal justice system, the forces that seem to be associated with greater criminal activity of women, such as greater public participation by women, especially in economic activities, are good, and perhaps criminal activity is just part of the package. In the case of the military, bringing women into the armed forces on an equal footing with men has some benefits because the military is an important source of jobs and because it is a powerful institution from which women do not want to be excluded. But should our goal be to encourage women to be as skilled warriors as men? Or should our goal be to make men better at the ideas and behaviors associated with women like cooperation, compromise, reconciliation, and pacifism?

Women and Peace

Women have been integrally involved in peace-building processes, but they are seldom included in formal peace processes. Women have a history of peacemaking, and even in the most difficult areas of conflict they have built coalitions across national borders to work for peace.

Women from Africa, Eastern Europe, the U.S., and Latin America have drawn upon their moral authority as mothers, wives, or daughters to call for an end to armed conflict. The concerns these groups have about their children give them a social legitimacy and help them to link with women from different sides of the conflict. Women’s social position as outsiders, parents, and citizens with weaker ties to political and economic interests suits them for this work. Nurturance, cooperation, and aversion to conflict are part of the social construction of femininity. Perhaps we could reconstruct masculinity to include these traits as well and thereby build a more peaceful world where gender did not push men (and women) in the direction of war.

What Is Political?

This chapter suggests that women’s political invisibility reflects the narrowly masculine sphere of formal politics. Men are much more likely than women to be politically active in formal positions as elected officials. But women and some men are also part of informal, nongovernmental organizations, and women are a driving force in organizations concerned with peace, human rights, economic justice, and environmental protection.

Gender Matters

Gender plays a prominent role in the electoral system, the criminal justice system, and the military, three sections of the political world. Women’s “outsider” roles in these political areas leave us with the choice either to try to gain access for women or to challenge the institutions to allow men to pull away from the dangerous and inhumane territories of war and crime.

Short-Answer Essay Questions

1. In what ways are elections gendered?
2. What is the meritocratic model of election reform?
3. What is the affirmative action model of election reform?
4. What is the radical model of election reform?
5. How is the prison population in the U.S. gendered? What part does race ethnicity play in the prison population?
6. Explain the different explanations for disparities in the prison population in the U.S.: masculinity theory, opportunity theory, economic marginalization theory, and chivalry theory.
7. What are some explanations for hostility against women in the military?
8. In what ways have women been involved in peace movements?

Long-Answer Essay Questions

1. In 2004, the General Social Survey found that 75% of 3,000 respondents questioned disagreed with the statement, “Most men are better suited emotionally for politics than are most women,” up from slightly more than half who disagreed in 1972, with women being slightly more likely to disagree. In 1998, 90% of all respondents answered “yes” to the question, “If your party nominated a woman for president, would you vote for her if she was qualified for the job?” This rate was up by 10% from the same question posed in 1974. Again, there was little gender difference in the responses.

How do you explain these responses? What is the underlying implication of the question about emotional suitability for politics? Were you surprised that there was little gender difference in the responses? Explain why or why not. How do you explain that more respondents would vote for a woman president than said they thought women were as emotionally suited as men to politics? (adapted from Kimmel and Aronson, Sociology Now. Boston: Allyn and Bacon 2009, 312–313)

2. Parts of Chapter 10 and Chapter 8 describe the explosive increase in the incarceration of women and of people of color in the U.S. Write an essay that explains the origins of this imprisonment using one or more theories explained in the chapter. What do you think are some of the consequences of the increased punishment of these large populations? For example, many if not most incarcerated people are parents. Imprisonment for long periods of time and a prison record reduce or eliminate people’s chances to find jobs when they are released. What other consequences can you imagine?

3. The media routinely report on the activities of political figures. Ask students to analyze the gendered aspects of political coverage in the media. Watch a public affairs interview program (Sunday morning programs would be one source, for example) and analyze the coverage of the issue being discussed. Note the gender of the guests and the interviewers and their assumptions (stated or implicit) about gender as they discuss issues such as war, crime, national politics, and the like. Try to think of what views about gender are left out of the discussion. The same analysis can be applied to any newspaper or magazine story. Then find an alternate source of news (students can find these sources by Googling the Huffington Report, the Daily Kos, and other blogs, Alternet, Common Dreams, and DemocracyNow.org or by going to print sources such as The Nation, In These Times, or The Progressive) and ask yourself the same questions.

4. Explore women’s peace politics from differing international perspectives. Websites for learning about women’s global peace politics include Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom, the Women Waging Peace Network, the Women Building Peace Campaign, Code Pink (U.S.), the Coalition of Women for Peace (Israel/Palestine), UNIFEM, Women for Peace (Australia), and Peacewomen Across the Globe. Try Googling “women and peace” for access to many other sites. Pick one site and write a paper describing the following:

• What region, group, or country is represented on this site?
• What are the issues taken up on this site?
• How does the site present the issues? Are there case studies or descriptions of the problems they identify?
• What did you learn about peacemaking from this site?

5. Bring a song that has contemporary political significance to class and be prepared to discuss its political message.

Critical Thinking Exercises

1. Find local news coverage of a recent election on the Internet and analyze the language used to describe the campaigns. How is it gendered? What kinds of metaphors are used? How could the report(s) be rewritten as gender-neutral?
2. Which of the theories about the disparities in the prison population (masculinity theory, opportunity theory, economic marginalization theory, and chivalry theory) do you agree with, and why?
3. Do you think women should be in combat? Why or why not?

Multiple Choice Questions

1. When did women in the United States get the right to vote?
   1. 1860
   2. 1890
   3. 1920
   4. 1937
2. Studies show that, as politicians, _________ tend to address women’s interests more often and also tend to secure more funding for their districts they represent.
   1. Democrats
   2. Republican women
   3. Democratic women
   4. Women regardless of party affiliation
3. How do men and women in the United States vote differently?
   1. Men are more likely to favor white candidates; women are more likely to favor candidates of color.
   2. Women are more likely to favor white candidates; men are more likely to favor candidates of color.
   3. More men vote Democrat; more women vote Republican.
   4. More men vote Republican; more women vote Democrat.
4. What nation has the largest proportion of women in its parliament?
   1. Sweden
   2. Rwanda
   3. Finland
   4. Poland
5. The ______ Amendment of U.S. Constitution, by law, gave black men the right to vote. The ______ Amendment granted voting rights to women.
   1. 15^th/19^th
   2. 13^th/ 15^th
   3. 19^th/ 13^th
   4. 15^th/21st
6. What is the radical model of political reform?
   1. A model that sees women as deficient and seeks to remedy their shortcomings
   2. A model that emphasizes the need for policies that can give women a “leg up” to overcome historical discrimination
   3. A model that claims that women should take over the U.S. government
   4. A model that asserts that the system may need major overhauling
7. Men make up _____ % of those who are arrested.
   1. 51
   2. 60
   3. 75
   4. 90
8. What percent of the U.S. prison population is women?
   1. Less than 10%
   2. 15%
   3. 22%
   4. 35%
9. In what year did the U.S. military began lifting its bans on women in combat?
   1. 1947
   2. 1973
   3. 1997
   4. 2016
10. What is “Women in Black”?
    1. A group of military widows
    2. A militant women’s rights group
    3. A female Black Power contingent
    4. An international women’s peace organization
11. The _____ model for reforming government to increase women’s participation holds women responsible for change and believes that, if women run successful campaigns, they will be elected.
    1. Meritocratic
    2. Affirmative Action
    3. Radical
    4. Feminist
12. According to 2018 data, in which of the following three nations were women more than 50% of legislators (the three highest in the world)?
    1. Iceland, Sweden, and Norway
    2. Iceland, Finland, and the Netherlands
    3. Rwanda, Cuba, and Bolivia
    4. Rwanda, Iceland, and the United States
13. When female candidates are scrutinized unfairly in media, a bystander effect may result. What does this refer to?
    1. More women are compelled to run for office as a way of challenging unfair stereotypes.
    2. Other women are discouraged from running for office for fear of similar treatment.
    3. Voters exposed to the media coverage are less likely to vote for these candidates.
    4. Other media organizations are likely to provide negative coverage as well.
14. The _____ theory for explaining why more men are arrested and incarcerated than women says that women commit crimes at much higher rates than they are arrested but are treated more leniently by police and courts.
    1. masculinity
    2. opportunity
    3. economic marginalization
    4. chivalry
15. What was DADT (don’t ask, don’t tell)?
    1. A policy that made it legal for gay men and lesbians to serve in the U.S. military
    2. A policy that ended routine investigation of service members’ sexuality.
    3. A policy that ended the practice of investigating gender harassment in the military.
    4. Both a. and b. are correct.
16. Gender harassment differs from sexual harassment in that it __________.
    1. is perpetrated by women against other women
    2. is used to police traditional gender roles and make violators feel unwelcome
    3. is not necessarily sexual
    4. Both b. and c. are correct.
17. Many military insiders believe that a prominent factor explaining high rates of mistreatment and bias against women in the military is male service members’ perception that __________.
    1. women are allowed to perform to lower physical standards than men.
    2. women and men cannot work together in combat settings without men becoming sexually distracted.
    3. gender equality is taking place too quickly with women constituting nearly half of all new recruits in nearly every branch of the military.
    4. All of the above.
18. Political parties and states that reserve a certain proportion of appointed and elected seats for women are attempting to address gender inequality in politics through a ________ gender reform model.
    1. Democratic
    2. meritocratic
    3. affirmative action
    4. radical
19. Who was the first woman elected to Congress in the United States?
    1. Carol Mosley Braun of Illinois in 1993
    2. Patricia Shroeder of Colorado in 1973
    3. Shirley Chisholm of New York in 1969
    4. Jeanette Rankin of Montana in 1916
20. Ninety percent of fathers who are incarcerated report that their children are being cared for by their children’s mothers. Mothers who are incarcerated most often report that their children’s _________ are taking care of their children.
    1. fathers
    2. foster parents
    3. grandmothers
    4. aunts
21. _______ was the first nation to grant women suffrage in 1893, but it did not extend these rights to the indigenous women of the nation.
    1. New Zealand
    2. Australia
    3. Canada
    4. The United States