Women and Politics Final

Title IX of the Education Amendments (CH 1: Equality Unfulfilled)

• Passed in 1972

• Prohibited discrimination based on sex in educational programming, including school-sponsored sports

The Promise and the Reality of Title IX (CH 1: Equality Unfulfilled)

• “No person in the United States shall, on the basis of sex, be excluded from participation in, be denied the benefits of, or be subjected to discrimination under any education program…” 

• While equitable opportunities for women have expanded over the past half century, the promise of full equity remains unfulfilled, particularly in athletics 

Institutional Conditions of Title IX (CH 1: Equality Unfulfilled)

• Sex-segregated athletic  training and competition blocks coalition formation among student-athletes 

• Organizational culture inhabits progressive leadership among women working as coaches and administrators in college athletics by conserving their preferences 

• Sex-segregated youth athletic experiences inevitably socialize young men to accept the marginalization of women 

• The economic pressures from college sports fans who prefer the status quo impede reform

Context and Case Logic: Civil Rights and the Unfinished Journey to Equality (CH 1: Equality Unfulfilled)

• Although equality constitutes a core tenet of full citizenship in democratic societies,  history and feminist critique demonstrate that ascriptively liberal political orders can still fall short on the full incorporation of women into society and public life 

• Gendered Backlash 

  • Describe conservative political pushback to the feminist movement’s policy success 

    • This is imminent

 Why has gender equality stalled, and what role does athletic leadership play? ( Ch 4 Equality Unfulfilled)

• The “top down” source of policy change 

• Policymaking on gender equity takes 2 forms: federal-level policies and NCAA policies (lawmakers and college athletic leadership) 

  • NCAA is a non-governmental organization and doesn’t enforce Title IX, but it supports member institutions in doing so

Who governs? ( Ch 4 Equality Unfulfilled)

• Why don't leaders advocate for more gender equity initiatives? 

  • Need to identify the population and what their relationship to NCAA policy is

    • 55% of administrators and 23% of coaches responded to sampling

Who are the policymakers ( Ch 4 Equality Unfulfilled)

• 70% of administrators were men 

• Overly male and overly white

Connection to descriptive representation ( Ch 4 Equality Unfulfilled)

• There are fewer female role models 

  • Shared lived experiences would cause them to be more sympathetic and aware of female discrimination and gender equity policy 

• For potential change to occur from the top down, the admin/coaches must be invested in change  

• We are that the legacy of Title XI establishes a cultural context, normalizes gender inequality, and focuses on Title XI compliance instead of real change 

Queen Bee Mentality ( Ch 4 Equality Unfulfilled)

• Causes women who progress to leadership roles to be complacent and conform to the preexisting system as a coping strategy 

  • Causes women who progress to leadership roles to be complacent and conform to the preexisting system as a coping strategy 

    • • Support leadership initiatives that may inhibit other marginalized people from progressing in their roles 

• Female head coaches would be less likely to support female initiatives than their counterparts in lower-level positions 

  • Moving up requires more assimilation into the culture 

Race in College Sports (Ch. 6 Equality Unfulfilled)

• Brown v Board of Education outlawed separate but equal 

  • Yet, sex segregation persists in sports 

• De facto segregation ( by behavior) difficult to eradicate, but de jure segregation still present 

  • Even still, calls for more diversity among college leadership: only 30% of college presidents are women; only 31% of full-time faculty are female; 21% female head coaches 

• Sports are about competition and “fair play” that assumes women require competitive venues of their own 

• Examples of alternative venues of sex desegregation in sports 

What is the Clery Act (Understanding Title IX Today )

• Standards for campus crime reporting did not exist in 1986 

  • Jeanne Clery was raped and murdered in her college dorms 

    • Parents put into motion transformative change for college campuses 

• The Cleary Act is a consumer protection law that aims to provide transparency around campus crime policy and statistics

Annual Security Reporting (Understanding Title IX Today )

Colleges and universities that receive federal funding to disseminate a public security report to employees and students every October 1st

It must include

Statistics of campus crime for the preceding 3 calender years, plus details about efforts taken to improve campus safety

Include policy statements regarding (but not limited to) crime reporting, campus faculity security, and access, law enforcement authority

Incidents of alcohol and drug use and the prevention of/response to sexual assault, domestic or dating violence, and stalking

Crime reporting geography and availability (Understanding Title IX Today )

• Is not strictly limited to events that occur on campus or within campus buildings and residences 

• Institutiona must include statistics for crime occuring in any of these geographical areas 

  • On campus 

  • On campus student housing 

  • Public property within campus bounds 

  • Public property immediately adjacent to the campus 

  • Noncampus buildings and property owned or controlled by the organization that are used for education purposes and frequently used by students but not a part of the core campus

  • Those owned or controlled by a student organization officially recognized by the institution 

Crime Categories (Understanding Title IX Today )

• Institutions of higher education must include 

  • Criminal offences 

  • Hate crimes 

  • VAWA offenses 

  • Arrest and referrals for disciplinary action

Timely Warnings and Emergency Notifications (Understanding Title IX Today )

When a crime covered by the act occurs, campus officials are required to evaluate if there is a serious or ongoing threat to the campus community that needs notification

Victim Rights, Options, and Resources (Understanding Title IX Today )

Victims of sexual assault, domestic violence, dating violence, and stalking have specific rights, options, and resources guaranteed to them

Prevention education (Understanding Title IX Today )

Required to provide prevention and awareness programs on the crimes covered on an introductory and ongoing basis

Materials on bystander intervention and risk reduction aimed at reorganizing the warning signs of these crimes must be included.

Displinary Proceedings (Understanding Title IX Today )

All proceedings must be conducted by trained parties at the institution

Proceedings are required to be prompt, fair, and impartial and must confer certain procedural rights to both the accuser and the accused

New York State 129-B (Understanding Title IX Today )

• Enough is enough law 

  • Submit annual aggregate data reports concerning incidents of sexual assault, dating violence, domestic violence, and stalking 

• Policies our campus has 

  • Title IX Grievance Policy 

  • Sexual Violence Response Policy

Organizational Culture and Representation (Ch 6. Equality Unfulfilled)

Women's leadership is necessary but not sufficient for change

Policy Feedback, Market Demands, and Socialization (Ch 6. Equality Unfulfilled)

• A dynamic that shapes policy success over time is the reactions of those who have a stake in the policy itself 

  • How does this connect to the findings regarding men who played sports in high school?

Institutional Reforms (Ch 6 Equality Unfulfilled )

• College sports to move towards sex desegregation 

  • Cis and trans experiences 

• Alter leadership structures of college sports, including hiring of women/gender diverse candidates 

• Ensure market insulation for college sports 

• Forward thinking involves acknowledging how equality remains unfilled

What stories does the author begin the article with and why ( The Politics of Bathroom Access and Exclusion in the United States )

• A young boy diagnosed with a tumor had accommodating bathroom arrangements

• Trans youth at school 

• It's not just about the bathroom, but  much bigger 

  • Belonging in public spaces and dignity 

    • Social engagement to peers and the world around them is inhibited

What is the author's overarching argument? (The Politics of Bathroom Access and Exclusion in the United States )

• By not having public spaces available to everyone, it portrays a message that they do not belong in these places 

  • Social citizenship

Bathroom and social citizenship (The Politics of Bathroom Access and Exclusion in the United States )

Social citizenship goes beyond formal or legal citizenship and requires that individuals not only be legal members of society but also have full access to opportunities and dignity

Marshall described social citizenship as “the whole range from the right to a modicum of economic welfare and security to the right to share to the full in the social heritage and to live of a civilized being according to the standards prevailing in the society

Three components of full citizenship (The Politics of Bathroom Access and Exclusion in the United States )

• Civil citizenship 

  • Rights such as free speech 

• Political citizenship 

  • Ability to participate fully in democratic politics 

• Social citizenship 

  • Initially focused on wages, housing, and citizenship (1950s) 

What is the author's connection with social citizenship and bathroom access? (The Politics of Bathroom Access and Exclusion in the United States )

• If you do not have access to a bathroom, you are not able to participate in society. 

• Socioecological and Belonging 

  • Especially when targeted at specific groups 

3 areas: Gender and gender roles, gender identity, and disability (The Politics of Bathroom Access and Exclusion in the United States )

• Expand or restrict bathroom access 

• Identify the date when the policy was enacted

1880s (The Politics of Bathroom Access and Exclusion in the United States )

• Also, see statutes re sex-segregated bathrooms 

• What was the motivation behind these laws 

  • Women were leaving the house more and needed protection 

4 interrelated purposes (The Politics of Bathroom Access and Exclusion in the United States )

• Public space was dangerous 

• Social morality and preserving domestic womenhood 

• Separation leads to sanitation 

• Modesty and morality

Public Toilets and Pay toilets (The Politics of Bathroom Access and Exclusion in the United States )

• Progressive era 1890s -1920s 

  • How is this era connected to bathrooms?

    • Push to increase the number of public restrooms and was connected to the Teperance movement and keeping men away from bars 

What shift begins to take place through from public vs private? (The Politics of Bathroom Access and Exclusion in the United States )

It's not the government's responsibility to supply public restrooms, but businesses can do so too

Federalism and Social Citizenship (The Politics of Bathroom Access and Exclusion in the United States )

• Many of the policies related to restrooms fall under the police powers (regulations that impact health safety and morals), which are an area of traditional state control under the US Constitution 

  • Causes different expansion/exclusion across states 

  • Fragmented policy 

  • Red states and Blue states 

    • Only adopting policies from other states of the same polarization 

Bathrooms, gender, and gender roles (The Politics of Bathroom Access and Exclusion in the United States )

• What is in restorooms is impacted by social norms/expectations surrounding gender roles 

• Changing tables in men's restrooms 

  • State law varied. BABIES Act in 2016 required changing tables in men's restrooms in federal buildings 

    • Only in state or municipal buildings

How is access to menstrual products related to social citizenship? (The Politics of Bathroom Access and Exclusion in the United States )

• Sends messages to individuals about belongingness 

• Ability to participate in the external world

Why frame as “equity and civic participation” as opposed to sanitation and public health? (The Politics of Bathroom Access and Exclusion in the United States )

• Safety issues as well 

  • Transgender individuals

Menstrual Products (The Politics of Bathroom Access and Exclusion in the United States )

• How is access to menstrual products related to social citizenship? 

  • Why frame as “equality and civic participation” as opposed to sanitation and public health

Bathrooms and Gender Identity (The Politics of Bathroom Access and Exclusion in the United States )

• Requiring people to use restrooms that match their “biological sex” 

• How are arguments surrounding “bathroom bills” connected to children? 

  • 2021 the court denied to hear a case that would directly address trans bathrooms in k-12 schools 

    • But children do not have full citizenship rights 

      • “Protection of children” 

        • Aim to change future political landscapes by targeting trans youth in schools 

    • All gender bathrooms extend past trans individuals 

      • Aid other groups and identities

Disability Access (The Politics of Bathroom Access and Exclusion in the United States )

• To be sure, people w/ disabilities face more architectural barriers than just in restrooms 

• Americans with disabilities act (ADA) 1990 

  • “Arcitectural barriers are another significant obstacle to the full participation of Americans with disabilities in mainstream society. The presence of physical barriers not only effectively bars people with certain disabilities from visiting social, commercial, and recreational establishments, but also enhances the population with disabilites’ perception that they are unwelcome” 

  • “A civil rights bill with an economic loophole built in” 

    • Unfunded federal mandate 

      • Can bypass if not “ realistically achievable” 

        • Must balance with cost and money commitment 

Ally’s Law, also known as the Restroom Access Act (RAA) or the Crohn’s and Colitis Fairness Act (The Politics of Bathroom Access and Exclusion in the United States )

• First enacted in 1987 ; 23 states adopted in 2023 

• Allows for people with specific medical conditions to use an employees bathroom when a general bathroom is unavailable

Rep. Ayanna Pressley (D-MA) (Sister Styles Ch 1 )

• “As a Black woman, the personal is political. My hair story is no exception.” 

• The decision to go public about her health condition (alopecia) was based on the fact that girls looked up to her

  • Hair is political 

Hudgins v. Wright (Sister Styles Ch 1 )

• Claimed that they were entitled to freedom because they were descendants of free American Indian women and based on the phenotype 

• Their white enslaver contended that the Wrights were the descendants of an enslaved Black woman and an American Indian man and, thus, were not entitled to freedom 

• “ Nature has stampt upon the African and his descendants two characteristic marks, besides difference of complexion, which often remain visible long after the characteristic distinction of colour either disappears or becomes doubtful, a flat nose and wooly head of hair. The latter of these disappears the last of all”

Methodological approach (Sister Styles Ch 1 )

• To systematically examine black women due to their phenotype and connect to their political actions 

• The project requires an interpretivist approach and in-depth qualitative methods, not only because quantitative metrics have yet to be designed for this type of study, but also because we seek to make meaning of the experiences of Black women political elites and their evaluations by voters 

•  The Study combines aspects of positivism and interpretivism 

  • Positivism places value on experience in general 

    • What about the issue of sample size? 

      • Individual case studies have substance too ,,

  • Interpretivism calls for subjective meaning 

    • Value empathy and interpretation

Research Question ( Sister Style Ch 7 )

Intracommunity comparison of black women voters and black women candidates based on skin tone and hairstyles

Data Method ( Sister Style Ch 7 )

• 506 respondents 

• Used Adobe Photoshop Creative Cloud to alter skin tone and hairstyles

Findings ( Sister Styles Ch 7)

Afrocentric phenotypes were closer to “blackness’ and would care more about African American issues and policy

Both descriptive and substantive representations

Black male respondents found women with darker skin and straighter hair to be closer to “blackness.”

Black women viewed them as competent leaders

Shows that there is a level of essentialism, but that the black population is not homogenous

Experiment Two ( Sister Styles Ch 7)

• How do responders react to Black female candidates who have a more Afrocentric appearance and a more Eurocentric appearance? How do they differ 

  • Black men believed that the darker-skinned candidate was more likely to win

Research Question (Sister Style Ch 8 )

• Does the appearance of black women candidates influence the “linked fate” theory of black voters 

  • Linked fate is the phenomenon that if one member of a group is harmed, it has the power to mobilize due to believing in a similar fate. This connects to descriptive representation

Findings (Sister Style Ch 8)

Skintones and hairstyles don't necessarily demonstrate a phenomenon of linked fate

Inconsistent findings

Implications (Sister Style Ch 8)

• How often does this scenario occur in elections? 

  • Black women v Black women

Authors Note (Sister Style Ch 8)

• Adding phenotype and hair appearance 

  • This literal descriptive representation has implications 

    • Can signal campaign strategy (straightening hair) 

  • Want to regard  appearance as a personal decision, but that is not the case 

• Making a key methodological and substantive contribution to research 

  • Focus groups do not occur often in Political science 

    • This research contributes a lot 

• Self-presentations of political elites are extremely curated and representative of cultural norms 

  • Can be strategic but not necessarily political 

• These are important insights for campaign advisors 

  • Should stop telling black Canadians to straighten their hair 

• Black female candidates should hold agency over their appearance 

  • Politics of respectability 

• Voters should be aware of their inherent biases when examining candidates 

• Should also examine what is considered “respectable” within the black community itself

Dr. Brown Class Visit

• black women political elites are not the same

• Either black men or white women

  • “There is no difference in Black women” .

• Why Black hair?

  • has social implications for how Black women are treated

• Historical factors continue to mediate Black women

• Black women redefine their hair

• Voters evaluate black women based on their hair texture/style

  • Legislative experiences are connected to what they look like

• The book theorizes skin tone, hair, and body size politics

• Hair salon Kamala example