When Will Women Finally Be Equally Represented in American Politics?

The U.S. has recently seen a lot of progress when it comes to women in politics, including our first woman vice president and a record-breaking number of congressional seats held by women. Yet we still have a long way to go toward reaching equality in politics. The record-breaking 141 congressional seats held by women still only compose 27% of Congress, and this country has yet to elect a woman president or have a woman Supreme Court chief justice.

The reason for this slow progress can be found in a vicious cycle that prevents women from pursuing positions of political power. Women who want to run for office face many hurdles in becoming a candidate, and even if they do, sexist assumptions still prevent them from winning elections.

This cycle starts early in the election process. Many potential candidates are discouraged from running for office after they see how other female politicians were treated during their past candidacies.

Take, for instance, the effect of how presidential candidate Hillary Clinton was treated during the 2016 election — with plenty of sexism. There are plenty of examples of horrendous treatment in lower-level races, too — like Iowa Democrat Kim Weaver, who ran for Congress in 2016. She faced sexist and anti-Semitic abuse, multiple threats, and a “For Sale” sign was even put up on her property, which led her to withdraw from the race.

This treatment of women who run for office only adds to the self-doubt many potential female candidates already have. According to recent research, women are far more likely to doubt that they are qualified to run for office (60%) than men (40%). Some might argue that this demonstrates women are simply not confident enough for politics, but the confidence gap is in turn attributed to a structural problem in our society: namely, according to the same study, that society rewards “men for ambition, but not necessarily women … [who] are socialized to be hesitant about promoting themselves.”

Even when women do overcome these obstacles and choose to run for office, they are frequently unable to win as voters believe male candidates have a higher chance of winning. In the 2020 presidential election, the Democratic primary had a much more diverse range of candidates (including six women) than in the past, yet it was Joe Biden who was elected as the party nominee. According to the Pew Research Center, 41% of registered Democratic voters said that “they are bothered that the likely Democratic nominee … is a white man in his 70s,” but apparently didn't think a female candidate would be able to beat Trump. As one voter told NPR, “I think there’s a lot of men out there that would never vote for a woman. I hate to say that, but I think that.” Political scientist Regina Bates has identified this phenomenon as “strategic discrimination,” which happens “when a party leader, donor or primary voter worries that others will object to a candidate’s identity.”

Ultimately, electing more women to office is an endless chicken and egg situation: voters don’t vote for women because they don’t think female candidates can win — but how can women ever win if the people never vote for them?

As a society, we need to start making changes. We need to normalize treating all candidates fairly and encouraging political ambition in both men and women from the start. We can’t expect to break this cycle unless we encourage political ambition in women earlier and improve voter education to fix how women are treated on the campaign trail.