American democracy will not have allowed a woman to become President of the United States. In France, the glass ceiling also prevents women from exercising full power: barely 25% of parliamentarians, 16% of mayors and, never in history, as President of the Republic, the National Assembly or the Senate. Do our democratic institutions bribe women?
I - THE TOTAL ABSENCE OF KEY POSITIONS IN THE EXERCISE OF POWER
It is not yet the year 2016 that will see a woman become President of the United States for the first time. Not only will Hillary Clinton not be the first female president of the United States, but it can be argued that she will never be. First because of his age, then the tacit American rule that we do not represent a losing candidate. It will remain "only" in the history of democracy and women as the first Democratic Party candidate in the US presidential election.
In the United States, therefore, no woman has so far been elected to the presidency, or to the presidency of the Senate or the House. No woman has ever been a candidate for the vice-presidency or appointed to the head of the Department of Defense, and the share of female governors has stagnated for a long time before rising very slightly. Women are therefore represented at the grassroots level, but absent from key positions in American democracy.
In France, the situation is hardly better: no woman has ever been President of the Republic, Ségolène Royal (Socialist Party) is the only one to have reached the second round of a presidential election. Only one woman has ever been appointed Prime Minister (Edith Cresson, Socialist Party) and has the record of the smallest exercise period (ten months). No woman has ever been Speaker of the National Assembly or Speaker of the Senate. They still represent only 25% of parliamentarians. They represent 52% of the population and 40.3% of the members of the municipal councils. As in the United States, it is clear that women are actors of political life in France but face the glass ceiling, this invisible ceiling which prevents access to higher posts and a massive and real exercise of power .
II - FEW WOMEN MAYORS IN EUROPE
Since the last municipal elections, several observers have stressed a supposed "wave" of women elected mayors, of all political tendencies, in the big cities of Europe. (Paris Socialist Party, 2014), Johanna Roland in Nantes (Socialist Party, 2014), Nathalie Appere in Rennes (Socialist Party, 2014), Manuela Carmena in Madrid (Now, Madrid, 2015) - his predecessor was also a Ada Colau in Barcelona (Barcelona in common, 2015), Virginia Raggi in Rome (5-Star Movement, 2015) ... would be supposed to embody this generation of political women who have "taken the power".
They joined Martine Aubry (Socialist Party, Lille, since 2008) and the list of women mayors of medium-sized cities, such as Maryse Joissains-Masini (Les Républicans, Aix-en-Provence since 2001) (France), Hanna Gronkiewicz-Waltz (Civic Platform, Warsaw since 2006), Natacha Bouchart (The Republicans, Calais, since 2008), Brigitte Fouré (UDI, Amiens, 2014), Karin Wanngård The Swedish Social Democratic Party of Workers, Stockholm, 2014), Henriette Reker (without label, Cologne, 2015), Chiara Appendino (5-star Movement, Turin, 2015) ... In appearance, an impressive list that gives the illusion of "Great replacement" to reprise the sinister expression. Yet nothing is less true.
For instance, in a detailed study of the situation in Paris, the 100% female duel in the second round of the last municipal elections between Anne Hidalgo and Nathalie Kosciusko-Morizet masked the reality: out of 20 arrondissements, 12 had men for mayors And 8 women (Florence Berthout, LR, in the 5th arrondissement, Rachida Dati, LR, in the 7th, Jeanne d’Hauteserre, LR, in the 8th, Delphine Bürkli, LR, in the 9th Catherine Baratti -Elbaz, PS, in the 12th, Carine Petit, PS, in the 14th, Brigitte Kuster, LR, in the 17th, Frédérique Calandra, PS, in the 20th. The parity is not there, but the diversity, though. With about 40% of women mayors, Paris is an exception not representative of the rest of France.
Because in all, only 16% of the cities of France have women as mayors. They were 13.8% in 2008 (and 1.1% in 1965!). In the last municipal elections in 2014, 17% of the list heads were women. This means that a significant proportion of the top women have been elected. The French are now ready to vote for a woman, if only one is presented. It is no longer a brake.Moreover, according to a study by Ifop published just before the last municipal elections in France, 70% of the respondents indicated that they wanted "more women mayors".
The idea that they are presently numerous is therefore due to the "Smurfette syndrome" ,which means that we see a single woman among a group of men. A woman mayor = ten articles on the theme "a woman mayor! "; Ten men mayors = no article to find that again, ten men are elected mayors.
III - HOW COMMUNITIES OF COMMUNES INCREASE INEQUALITIES
In municipal councils, women represent about 40% of elected officials (48% in cities with more than 1 000 inhabitants). An almost parity of "base" which leads, as we saw above, to the election of a man as mayor in 75% of the cases (the use that the head of list chosen upstream be elected mayor During the municipal council of installation). If this basic parity is already encountering the glass ceiling for the election of the mayor, it encounters another problem: according to the gendered distribution of the delegations.
The vast majority of municipal councils entrust women in sectors such as early childhood, women's rights, health, social affairs, education ... and to men, finance, transport and human resources. Roles is based on gender stereotypes that assign to women supposedly maternal and feminine qualities - what is called care - and to men of supposedly manly qualities, linked to money and decision-making for all - in short , As Donald Trump would say, to management "as a good father".
Among other bodies, beyond the municipal councils, it is noteworthy that the communities of communes have no obligation and therefore operate according to the following rule: no parity is the jungle. According to the General Code of Local and Regional Authorities, the communities of municipalities are: "public establishments of inter-municipal co-operation grouping together several communes in one piece and without enclave. Their purpose is to involve municipalities within an area of solidarity, with a view to the elaboration of a common project for the development and management of space ".
They are composed of members of the municipal councils, they manage community competences and entrust delegations to the mayors of these municipalities which are statistically, as we have seen, mostly ... men. The community of communes is thus a machine to reproduce the inequality between women and men in a democracy, and creates an additional forum where men in essence gain access to even more power and widen inequalities.
IV - DEPARTMENT AND REGION: THE MOST EQUITABLE AT THE BOTTOM, THE LEAST MIXED AT THE TOP
If the county councils are now equal since the law on the binominal vote (law accompanied by a geographical redistribution), they are like the municipal councils predominantly presided by men.Since the last departmental elections in 2015, only 10% of the county councils are presided over by women. Again, from a parity base (this time strictly), we manage to elect men, almost exclusively, to the mandates of presidents.
The other most equitable mandate in terms of the distribution of women and men and the allocation of delegations remains that of regional councilor, according to the Inequalities Observatory, which estimates that more than 48% of women in The regional councils. But as for municipal and departmental councils, a glass ceiling prevents women from taking up the highest positions: 3 out of 13 regional presidents (since redistribution) are presidents - Carole Delga (PS, Occitanie), Valérie Pécresse (LR, Île-de-France) and Marie-Guite Dufay (PS, Burgundy-Franche-Comté).
V - SENATE: DISCRIMINATION AMONG MAJOR ELECTORS
In the Senate, the share of women has increased ten-fold in 62 years: from 2.5% in 1952, we have reached 25% in 2014. The very principle of the assembly, with a vote by major voters , Encourages the presentation of candidates already elected. Since the majority of elected officials are men, it may be considered logical that senators should be predominantly men. Indeed, what better way to present a regional president or a department president in the Senate (or to present a senator to the regional presidency)? The argument "it is already known" seems to work.
To increase the number of women senators, increasing the number of local elected officials with responsibilities - which are a pool of candidates - seems necessary. Mechanically, in turn, the number of potential candidates will increase and the choice of candidates will be made between men and women with equivalent responsibilities.
In addition, the selection of electors for the Senate could be regulated. Currently, the great voters are elected representatives and delegates appointed by municipal councils. The parity does not apply. Thus, militants of political parties are often referred to, the majority of whom are men .Overall, 52% of voters are voters. Parity in the big voters is therefore a minimum service for representativeness. The current, non-paritarian mode of designation of large voters could give rise to seizure for discrimination. It is in any case undemocratic, since it arbitrarily confiscates women's representativeness.
Moreover, the law on parity in the senatorial lists is easily countered by the right which has not deprived in several places of presenting two lists with men at the head of lists for example, to elect two men and no wife.
VI - NATIONAL ASSEMBLY: THE PRACTICE OF SEXISM
Since 2012, of the 280 Socialist and related elected deputies, 106 are women. 38% of socialist deputies are women. It is the absolute record, both in number and proportion, of women elected to the National Assembly. However, the other groups are far from this share (the LR group has 26 women).
In all the groups, 26.9% of the members of the National Assembly are women. France is, since 2012, above the world average (19.7%), but in the European ranking it nevertheless arrives after Sweden, Finland, the Netherlands, Belgium, Spain, Germany and Switzerland. No woman has ever been President of the National Assembly.
Beyond the figures, the National Assembly seems to be the place par excellence of the exercise of the sexism in the behaviors. We no longer count the whistles of ministers or parliamentarians women in robes (Cécile Duflot, but not only), cries of chicken when a woman expresses herself from the Minister of Families, Children and Women's Rights Laurence Rossignol when she denounces the wage inequalities between women and men ...
VII - PERVERSE EFFECTS AND TABOOS OF THE ARITHMETIC PARITY
It is impossible to formalize an analysis of the inequalities of access to elective mandates between men and women without evoking the perverse effects of arithmetic parity. Parity is necessary to enable women to access elective mandates, as noted above. It almost never happens on its own. On the other hand, parity induces certain negative elements for democracy.The mandatory ballot, for example, prevents two women from forming.
Parity encourages the apparatuses to go to women outside the political parties, the latter not counting enough activists within them, as we have seen above. This means that women in civil society have access to elective mandates, which is good news for democracy. On the other hand, since men are overrepresented in political parties, a civil society man will have little mathematical chance of integrating a list since it would require that an already elected man give up his place .Renewal is done by young women who also fulfill the "new face" quota. A young man will therefore be less likely to enter an application. Outgoing men and men from political parties fill the male quotas, and women from civil society the missing female quotas. Beyond depriving themselves of a generation of men who are no doubt as talented, this places women in a position of inferiority: there are "sachants" (men leaving political parties) and women who do not decide In the devices, because they come from the civil society and / or newcomers in the mandates.
VIII - HOW POLITICS DISGUSTS (OFTEN) WOMEN
It is regrettable that women are less often elected and in positions stereotyped or inferior to those of men. But it is clear that women themselves are less involved in politics than men. It is a fact.Women are the majority of volunteers and engaged in associations, but they are very much a minority within political parties. Traditional practices of "invisible work" and non-remunerative, many practice self-censorship by not contemplating conducting a list or running for office.
Only 30% of the members of the Socialist Party would be women. The right-wing parties are no better on the subject: even women executives at Les Républicains accuse their party of being "anti-women" or declare themselves publicly "disappointed" by the lack of respect for parity and the absence Of women in organizational charts. Many women even come to refuse places offered to them on electoral lists.
This can be explained by a number of interrelated factors: first, the difficulties of reconciling work and family life. The impossibility of adding a militant life, while in 76% of the families the woman is solely responsible for the missions related to the school life and that it carries out 80% of the household tasks on average, while being paid 20 % less. 98% of parental leave is taken by women. Women are therefore still largely in charge of children and the organization of the family.A principle of economic reality prevents single mothers, the most precarious social category, from being able to pay a babysitter to keep their children at meetings, committees and municipal councils (often during school breaks). Now, militant and political life has been built by men for centuries and takes no account of organizational constraints. Moreover, what the Catalyst Institute designates as the "male norms of power" reigns there: competition and constant competition, refusal of emotion, spirit of clan ...
As for women's solidarity between women politicians on the same side, it is difficult to achieve, with parity having the perverse effect of placing women in competition with each other for mandates and generating sometimes negative reactions among women politicians Were elected before parity, such as "Why would younger women benefit from facilities when my journey has been marked by so many difficulties? ".
Beyond the hissing or boosing mentioned above, which obviously do not want to throw themselves into the arena to many women, beyond the sexist rumors erected in political discourse or judgments on the family life of women politicians (One remembers the media debate on the post- maternity recovery of Rachida Dati or Najat Vallaud-Belkacem, referred to as a "bad mother" by Closer magazine), one can note a sexist treatment of media. For example, Anne Hidalgo led a policy in Paris that was fully in line with that of Bertrand Delanoë. Yet she gets nicknames showing her genre (like "Notre Dame de Paris"). Politicians supporting a politician is a support committee. Political women supporting a politician are groupies. Women politicians supporting a political woman are a "band of girlfriends," as had been said of the agreements between Martine Aubry and Cécile Duflot for the 2012 legislative elections. Discouragement may arise in the face of these public attacks.
Moreover, women seem to attach more importance than men to the real impact of their action.The share of women renouncing political commitment after a single term is much higher than that of men who renounce it. Women are often referred to as the last resort, such as Theresa May in London, and sometimes also play as Valerie Pécresse proclaiming "What better way than a woman to do the housework? "During the regional election campaign in the Île-de-France region in 2015.
IX - VOTING FOR WOMEN'S RIGHTS, DIFFERENT FROM "WOMEN'S VOTE"
Finally, one could be the advocate of the devil and ask why, finally, electing women would be so important in a democracy. The analysis of the vote results for Donald Trump shows us that the majority of white women voted for him, not for his competing Hillary Clinton. She would have been the first female president of the United States, but she would also have been a feminist candidate, backed by egalitarian movements. Its program included the creation of a genuine national maternity leave, the right to abortion and equal pay for men and women. Donald Trump, the candidate who campaigns against abortion, believes that the women who resort to it must be punished, humiliates his ex-women publicly and boasts of being the perpetrator of sexual assault.
Despite this, women voted against their own interests and for this candidate, validating the "enchanted submission" of the women described by Bourdieu . This confirms that there is no monolithic "vote of women". And that the vote "for women's rights" is different from the so-called "women's vote". This also shows us - and it is more difficult to say - that women as a whole do not necessarily seek to be represented by other women, and that women as a whole do not always seek To consolidate their rights or to acquire new ones. Not only is being a woman impede access to certain responsibilities, but it is also not an electoral argument, even among women themselves.
Why then organize to allow more women to exercise power? Because it must be the essence of democracy. This is what differentiates this regime from totalitarianism. As Alexis de Tocqueville wrote, democracy can lead to nepotism and it is perfectible, but to achieve equality, there must be no less democracy, more is needed. And democracy consists in "giving rights to each citizen or giving it to no one" .
In the media :
"In politics, women are considered the last resort", interview with Marlène Schiappa ( LePoint.fr , November 15, 2016)
"In politics, women are considered the last resort", interview with Marlène Schiappa ( LePoint.fr , November 15, 2016)
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