Perhaps, feminist achievements are the most debated subjects in the contemporary society. Judging from the impacts of feminism ideologies in society, the whole idea of feminism is politics in itself. Although feminism represents a major transformation in representing gender equality in society, it has achieved minimal success in challenging male-dominated politics (Connell, 1997). This paper limits itself to the discussion of extend of feminism achieving its goals and all the underlying factors that impede the realization of such goals.
As opposed to the field of politics, feminism has registered phenomenal success in societal areas such as increased equalization among the sexes, feminization of the workplace, increased admission of women in institutions of higher learning, and enhanced self-confidence among women. Undeniably, the entire concept of feminism and feminist ideologies has played a fundamental role in reshaping gender relations. On the contrary, the sexual equality on political agendas is a subject that faces increased criticisms and male resistance, even from government agencies. Even though feminist political theory has advanced in addressing a rich diversity of gender issues, it is yet to address the issue of women subordination in political circles. Even in academic literatures, the trend is still the same because “politics and feminism” are areas that attract little attention from researchers (Rina, 2012).
Feminism as a movement has a long history. The feminism movements’ history is partitioned into three “waves” namely; The First Wave, The Second Wave, and The Third Wave. The waves aimed at addressing different issues regarding the female gender.
The First Wave
This feminism wave took place in the end of the 19th century and beginning of the 20th century. It officially started at the Seneca Falls Convention of 19 July 1948. The event was convened by New York women and resulted in outlining the political strategies and ideologies for the movement (Lindgerg, 2009). In the early 1850’s a feminist movement with its headquarters Langham, London was formed. In Langham Women assembled to discuss issues affecting them and published the English Woman’s Journal.
In both the United States and the United Kingdom, the wave aimed at promoting equality in education, employment, contracts, marriage, women property, and parenting rights of women. By the beginning of the 20th century, the wave focused mainly on gaining powers politically, especially the voting rights. Most of those who were behind the feminism movements asserted that the women had moral superiority compared to men, and their inclusion in politics help in improving the political environment and the behavior of the public.
In Britain’s Australasian colonies such as South Australia and New Zealand at the end of 19th century, women had been granted a voting right. Additionally, Australia gave permission to the female gender to contest for parliamentary seats. In Britain, the Representation of the People Act was enacted in 1918 giving women over 30 years to vote and reduced to 21 years a decade later. In the United States, the constitution was amended in 1919 allowing the women to vote in all the states (Zangara, 2002).
The Second Wave
This wave took place between 1960s and the 1990s and was mainly associated with the then social movements including the civil rights and the Anti-Vietnam war demonstrations. The key figures behind the second wave were the American feminists and philanthropists, Betty Friedan and Gloria Steinem. In 1968, the Feminists activists protested against the Miss America Pageant saying that it degraded the women and reduced them to objects of beauty. The wave was characterized by the formation of women organizations such as The National Organization for Women (N.O.W.)
Although the wave advocated for the key economic and social issues such as employment equality and sexual harassment, it was also motivated by disparities between men and women and the political costs of those differences Lindgerg, 2009). Just like the “first wave,” there was a belief that women would help in bringing about a serene world. The second wave was based on a combination of psychoanalytical and neo-Marxism theory, and embarked on relating the suppression of women with broader issues of capitalism, patriarchal system and their roles as wives and mothers. This led to the differentiation between Gender and sex. They began to concentrating on ridding the society of sexism from top to bottom that is from the children to the governmental levels.
The Third Wave
The third and the last wave started in the mid-1990s as an answer to apparent disappointments of the second wave. It aimed at shunning what is considered as ‘essentialists’ second wave definition of femininity, which emphasized the upper-class white women (Lindgerg, 2009). The third wave mainly focused on “Micro-politics and the use of the new interpretation of sex and gender.
Radical feminism
Historically, the development of radical feminism dates back to the 1960’s, and it encompasses group of feminist seeking to challenge the status quo system responsible for feminine segregation in areas inclusive of the political systems. Precisely, radical feminism embraces the initiation of privileges for feminine gender despite the existence of issues aligned to it. Arguably, radical feminism has been postulated to be a movement intertwined with sexist concerns (Singh 2007). Conversely, radical feminism allows integration of women as the mutual participants in both the social and the political contexts. For this reason, radical feminist have risen beyond the scope of gender segregation in achieving milestones particularly in the political context.
Undeniably, radical feminists purpose for improvement of conditions of the women in the contemporary society. They further believe in widening of women’s expectations towards creation of a society that allows for equal gender domination in various sectors. In fact, women feminist stretch beyond their limits in finding the feasible “routes” significant in realization of their aspirations (Rhodes 2005). The relentless attitude exhibited by feminists can be attributed to their increasing achievements in the political sector. Radical feminists believe that the struggle and opposition existent among them and the dominating parties occur as an essential factor towards achievement of mutual balance amongst the two parties. Consequently, radical feminism can be exhibited as a civil movement responsible for initiating women dominance in the political sector. Despite the segregation and prejudice prevalent in the society concerning radical feminism, have made essential contribution to political development of women, as they have fostered for efforts against patriarchy.
Radical feminism has often been purported to be concerned with equal opportunities for both male and female genders. In fact, radical feminism is often perceived to be against the masculine gender. Nonetheless, religious concerns, particularly Christian believes, perceive women to be inferior when compared to men. This has thus been a hindrance in the progress of women in different sectors including the political sector (Rhodes 2005). Undoubtedly, a high prevalence of women have joined the political settings but have failed to make feasible progress due to existing believes aligned to religion, perceiving women to be less superior. As such, radical feminism does not guarantee feasible feminine dominance in the political sector due to factors inclusive of those aligned to religion.
Arguably, the increasing number of female-headed households can further be attributed to radical feminism. This has given an insight on women to seek higher grounds of dominance, which entail the political context. As such, women dominance in domestic concerns occurs as a contributing factor in shaping women towards dominance in political setting (Calhoun 2000). Precisely, ability of a woman to have mutual and flourishing family dominance guarantees a high ability for achievement of political goals upon progression into the political land scope. In other contexts, racisms have had its own contribution in the female dominance in achievement of political goals. Definitely, racism created some sense in the white men because consideration of women rights would provide a viable avenue for enduring white supremacy. For this reason, the white began fostering for women rights, hence allowing for achievement of varied goals inclusive of political goals by the women. Deductively, radical feminism can be attributed as an essential factor in female dominance in various spheres of life inclusive of the political sector.
Feminist Methodologies
This entails the level of measuring the extent with which feminist ideologies have managed to exert power to politics and political practices. Generally, feminist methodologies have incorporated issues like differential experiences of male and females and as well, the sensitivity of roles played by gender within the society (Letherby, 2003). Many a feminist ideologies seek to outline different relationships of women within the society and examines the manner with which such relationships can bring transformations within the society. However, such relationships have been less influential in enabling political agendas because much attention is concentrated towards the realization of equality,
Feminists and Power
Ideally, feminist ideologies were aimed at challenging the mainstream or “male-stream” knowledge. The dominant perspectives of voices raised by women were deep-rooted in the level of suffering and marginalization of women (Kathryn, 2008). For this reason, their centre of concern was aimed at transforming such areas and finding justice. Based on this approach, less feminist power was allocated towards engagement in political issues thereby leading to the avoidance of gendered power relations. Women aimed at obtaining power and leadership roles in places such as homes, the work place, and educational institutions but neglected seeking challenging roles in political situations (Kathryn, 2008). For instance, a woman’s voice is well represented in family politics in the contemporary society as compared to the role it played in traditional institutions.
Politics and the Media
Over the past few decades, the media has been the main source of providing people with information regarding politics, and it has continued to be a major platform for encouraging people to air their concerns and gather support. The second-wave of feminist movements did improve the manner in which women viewed the world with respect to tactics, goals, and other ideologies that affected those (Mendes, 2011). While the media has been on the forefront in giving attention to the feminist ideologies, the manner with which it portrays feminist participation in politics.
Generally, media coverage of feminist issues can be categorized into three distinct categories; opposition for feminist movement, support for the movement, and portraying the movement as being complex and contradictory. In all instances, the media has played a significant role in trying to shape the manner with which the public approaches the concept of feminism and politics. However, the media, largely, has portrayed women as being not ready to undertake political roles. News for women liberation are treated with mixed opinions from the different divides,
Power Relations and education
The field of education is perhaps one of the greatest sectors where feminist ideologies have managed to bring transformations. Traditionally, education systems were a preserve for the men and women were not allowed to pursue education past a certain level. However, with socialist movement and feminist waves, fighting for equality in educational platforms proved to be the main agenda (Mendes, 2011). Pressing for equal representation of women and equal support in the education system became inherent. The gender-as-a-variable principle became applicable in pressing for the realization of this objective and soon, it led to strong representation of women in the education (Mendes, 2011). With regard to the power of politics in education, it is apparent that feminism has managed to realize its goals of equal representation of women in education.
Political Communication
This tool represents the struggle for influence and power among different interest groups. During such struggles, it is emphatically crucial that politicians employ particular mechanisms in order to win the confidence of voters instead of depending on the power of their arguments. Things like personality and power to convince voters in debates and arguments become critical in such situations. Communication becomes an important tool in such an instance because it gives politicians the equal abilities to air positions to the electorate. This rudimentary standard of female representation has been rarely satisfied among the feminist circles because it has failed to bring out the desired objectives (Zangara, 2002). Therefore, lack of political communication has been a factor that has contributed to a lower realization of political goals in feminism.
Low Status of Women in Society
This issue has been a major setback in the realization of feminist objectives. According to statistics from the UN gender development, there is little change in the female advances in the political arena, and this can be attributed to the low status of many women in society (McAdam, 2010). Throughout the world, women movements are made up of few dispersed groups of women fighting for policy advocacies. This makes it difficult for them to garner the requisite strength and purpose to enable them realize political change.
Women and Politics in the Present-day Society
In the contemporary society, there are no longer movements organized by feminists aimed at influencing the lives of women and engage their support in politics. However, there are a number of Organizations in professional groups and the trade unions, which battle for the women’s rights.
There has been an increasing trend of women participating and being elected as head of governments or states for different countries. Currently about 20 countries are headed by women and some countries are looking for actions that will increase the participation of women in the national politics. From the Inter-Parliamentary Union Data, of the total 46,056 members of parliaments, 8,990 are women and this account for only 19.6%. This clearly shows the disparity between men and women. Since the 2008 elections, Rwanda was the first country with majority of MPs being women (more than 50%).
There have been many challenges, which have hindered feminism political objective. Women have not been able to get a fair political playground thus not being able to compete with men. These can be attributed to the following reasons;
1. Financial Constraints
Women have not been able to finance their campaigns and they are not always ready to resolve to fundraising. Apparently, women have relatively little resources at their disposal compared to their male competitors. Most women politicians are regularly challengers, thus making it impossible to draw investments from the key political players. In the third world countries, there is unavailability of fundraising base.
2. Time Constraints
As fact in every society setting, women have enormous responsibilities in their families and hence holding a public office will not be favorable for them.
3. Information Constraint.
Most women especially in the developing countries have limited access to media. Women also have problems in mastering issues, for example if a woman is asked to vie for apolitical position, she will feel that she lacks enough information concerning the current issues thus not qualified for the position. First time contestants are always not confident about public speech delivery, public appearances, and media management, which are the key contemporary politics.
4. Hostile Environment
Politics always create a hostile atmosphere for women aspirants. Additionally, women will always evade politics because it has a culture, which they cannot cope with. They will not always like to associate themselves with the so-called ‘dirty politics’ including corruption. This will make them to have a desire of changing things from outside rather than engaging themselves in politics.
Conclusion
Arguing that feminism has not achieved its political goals would be an understatement but on the other hand, the feminist progress in realizing its political goals is not so promising all together. This raises the question of how feminist success in political objectives is defined. Successes from the first, second, and third feminist waves is a clear indication that feminist ideologies and proponents have made a big stride in realizing their objectives. Political objectives on matters relating to gender equality and representation in several sectors of the society have been phenomenal. For instance, representation in education, leadership roles in the work place, and roles within the family has been satisfied. However, civic and parliamentary representation has been very low and this can be attributed to a plethora of factors within the society.
As earlier mentioned, feminism has registered exceptional success in various sectors of society. These areas include feminization of the workplace, equalization among the sexes, enhanced self-confidence among women, and increased admission of women in institutions of higher learning. Majority of women in parliament have depended on reserved seats or nominations and very few have qualified by being chosen by the electorate. Equally, there have been very few women political parties due to poor engagement of women in political issues. Such forms of engagement include low levels of lobbying, weak wing of women politics, poor support of women political parties, and a low number of women vying for positions of power. Such factors have contributed largely to weak level of progress in satisfying feminist political goals. While there have been exceptional successes in other feminist interests, the extent of achieving success in the political wing is low.
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