How Julia Gillard's experience inspires or discourages women to enter politics

How Gillard’s experience inspires or discourages women to enter politics

  

Does being reminded of the sexism that Julia Gillard faced as Australia’s first female prime minister challenge women to enter politics or discourage them?

“We found a polarising effect with women responding in different ways depending on their attitudes to gender roles,” said Dr Christopher Hunt, lead author of the research from the University of Sydney’s School of Psychology.

Hunt, together with the School’s Dr Karen Gonsalkorale and Dr Lisa Zadro published their findings in the European Journal of Social Psychology, last month.

“For women who hold traditional gender values - those who think that women should be modest, place their families before themselves and put a lot of importance in taking care of their home and their physical appearance - being reminded of Julia Gillard’s experiences made them want to avoid politics,” Dr Hunt said.

“However for women who rate themselves as non-conformists in regards to gender values, being reminded of Gillard’s difficulties motivated them to go into politics - she appears to be a role model for this group.”

These effects were not related to any changes in women’s belief in their ability to lead. 

“So the changes seem to be driven by thinking about how others will react to them – about the possibility of a backlash,” Dr Hunt said.

“International research shows that women in countries with more women politicians display greater interest in politics than women from countries with lower female representation. Our research suggests such role model influence changes according to women’s other beliefs and values.”

The study assessed 167 Australian undergraduate students on a measure of conformity to gender norms. They then either read statements about generic difficulties experienced by leaders or the gender-based difficulties experienced by Gillard before completing a questionnaire on their attitudes to leadership and certain occupations.

For male participants, those with high conformity to masculine norms showed a greater belief in their own leadership capabilities after reading about Gillard’s gender-based difficulties than when reading about generic difficulties, while low conforming men showed the opposite pattern.

“This suggests that Gillard’s example provoked a defensive reporting of leadership capability  -  consistent with research showing that women who succeed in traditionally male domains are often perceived to be threatening,” said Dr Hunt.

The next step in continuing this work is to see if these findings were specific to politics or whether the same findings would apply to other professions.

“It would be interesting to apply this research to the business community where research has suggested gender roles are even more strictly enforced than in politics.”

The Australian Minister for Women is clearly not capable of understanding his role

The Australian 26 March 2011

On 30 December 2014 The Sydney Morning Herald reported:

The number of women on government boards has slipped below the 40 per cent target and a new report says men made up 75 per cent of new appointees within Tony Abbott's own Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet this year.

The Prime Minister, who is also the Minister for Women, has assured voters he is committed to the gender diversity target but the opposition says the statistics should "set the bells ringing".

The annual Gender Balance on Australian Government Boards Report says overall female representation slipped from its peak of 41.7 per cent under Labor in 2013 to 39.7 under the Coalition in 2014.

The Coalition drastically slashed the number of board positions from 4039 to 3206 when it came into government as part of its deregulation agenda.

The report, prepared by the Office for Women, which sits in the Prime Minister's Department, PM&C, said there were 639 new appointments to boards as of June 2014.

63.5 per cent of those positions were offered to men, meaning 36.5 per cent went to women……

"The government is committed to the 40:60 target and the Minister Assisting the Prime Minister for Women is working with colleagues to ensure this target is achieved," said a spokesman for Mr Abbott….

Not only has female board representation slipped significantly, the self-appointed Minister for Women clearly does not understand the gender diversity policy he is supposed to support.

A 40:60 target? One presumably giving 40 positions to women and 60 to men?

No, the real target is 40:40:20.

Where women hold at least 40 per cent of Australian Government board positions, men hold another 40 per cent of these positions and the remaining 20 per cent can be held by either gender.

That he doesn’t understand or chooses to ignore this target is clearly demonstrated by his own Department of Prime Minister and Cabinet with its 16 boards and 170 active positions, where only 50 women (29.4%) hold any of these positions, and of the 87 new board appointments in this particular portfolio in 2013-14 only 21 were female.

The gender imbalance becomes more pointed when one realises that the Gender Balance On Australian Government Boards Report 2013-14 only includes those boards covered by the Public Governance, Performance and Accountability Act 2013 (PGPA Act) which have some level of input or sign-off from particular representatives of the Government.

That is:

* the Prime Minister alone;

* one or more Australian Government ministers;

* the Governor-General in Council; and

* the Cabinet.

Overall the Abbott Government is exceeding the gender diversity target’s set quota for male government board members and failing to meet the set board member quota for females.

Here is the breakdown of gender diversity by portfolio:

The Sydney Morning Herald 14 December 2014

"I hope you are not going to say I am a sexist misogynist" - Australian Finance Minister Mathias Cormann

The problem that the Labor Party has today is that Bill Shorten is an economic girlie man. [Australian Finance Minister Senator Mathias Cormann, Sky News Agenda, 18 October 2014]

On 18 October 2014 another Liberal Party politician was caught dragging his knuckles along the ground, when Finance Minister Mathias Cormann called Opposition Leader Bill Shorten an economic girlie man.

He obviously wasn't expecting the reaction to this comment and sought to douse the flames in a somewhat unusual manner:

The Belgian-born MP argued that “girlie man’’ was a gender free zone. “I am not talking about girls. I am talking about economic girlie men,’’ he said.

“I don’t think there’s anything gender specific here. Not girls, girlies, it’s very different. I hope you are not going to say I am a sexist misogynist.’’

[Mathias Cormann, Herald Sun, 18 October 2014]

Mathias Cormann's hope he would not seen as a sexist misogynist was short-lived.

As women reacted negatively to his initial insult and subsequent 'excuse', Cormann decided to try another tack the next day:

"It is not in any way intended as a reflection on girls, it is entirely intended as a reflection on Bill Shorten".

“Girlie” according to my Australian dictionary is a colloquial term for girl (a female child or young female) and, when this word is combined with “man”  the user is implying that a man is acting like the stereotypical weak young girl - a characterization which seems to uniquely inhabit the minds of chauvinistic individuals.

Even lexicographers don't support Cormann's assertion that the term is not linked negatively to the female gender:

girlie man. noun. A male who is wimpy or soft; a male who likes to participate in activities or events thought to be mainly feminine: That girly man loves chick flicks. [The Dictionary of American Slang, Fourth Edition by Barbara Ann Kipfer, PhD. and Robert L. Chapman, Ph.D.]

In the aftermath of his bizarre and unsuccessful attempts to characterize the derogatory term “girlie man” as having nothing to do with a sexist view of females, perhaps he would rather be seen as an ignorant excuse for a member of parliament instead.

* Photograph found at Google Images

Sexism in the National Party of Australia - why am I not surprised?

It’s boys behaving badly again in a political party – this time the NSW Nationals.

The Sydney Morning Herald 4 July 2014:

A NSW Nationals MP verbally attacked a female cabinet minister, threatening to "tear her a new orifice" and saying she had "never had a real man", because he was angry at her department's decision.

The attack on then environment minister Robyn Parker was made by Murray-Darling MP John Williams in front of about 100 Nationals members during his bid for preselection for the upper house in April. 

Ms Parker was raped as a teenager, and had spoken about her ordeal in parliament in 2004, recalling she nailed her bedroom windows shut in the aftermath.

Multiple sources who attended the Nationals preselection meeting on April 4 at Parliament House said they were offended by Mr Williams' comments. The event was filmed, but the slurs went uncensured by party leaders in the room, including deputy premier Andrew Stoner.

Mr Williams emerged as an endorsed candidate, albeit in the almost unwinnable fourth position.

Critics said the attack highlighted a "boys' club" culture within the Nationals that was alienating women from politics. The leak of the incident comes as the number of women in the NSW upper house from all parties is set to plummet…..