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★★★ 69 ★★★ Women in Congress Chapter 5 Women in Congress: Descriptive Representation and Democratic Governance Courtenay Daum ★★★ T he majority of the U.S. population and 52 percent of eligible voters—residents age eighteen and older—are women (U.S. Census Bureau 2003). Yet women occupy only 13.6 percent of the 535 seats in Congress. In 2003 there were seventy-three women in Congress—fifty-nine in the House of Representatives and fourteen in the Senate —and this figure was an all-time high. In fact, since the nation’s founding only 219 women have served in Congress (Center for American Women and Politics 2003). Like other previously disenfranchised groups, women had to overcome a series of obstacles to gain election to office that white male candidates did not have to face. Although the opportunities for women have expanded rapidly in the past few decades, women continue to struggle to achieve equality in elected offices in the United States. The reality is that at the current rate at which women are increasing their presence in Congress, it will be decades before women achieve parity. The current electoral system is not conducive to the election of large numbers of new female candidates, and this bias impedes effective democratic governance. This chapter examines the obstacles confronting female candidates running for national office in the United States and discusses alternative electoral systems that may reduce these obstacles and produce a more democratic system of government. First I discuss different theories of representation, including the merits of the descriptive representation of women in Congress. Then I examine the relationship between equitable representation of women and an increase in democratic governance . Finally, I briefly discuss alternatives to the existing congressional electoral system, including quota systems and cumulative voting schemes. I also introduce a third alternative: doubling up, which is designed to increase the representation of women in Congress to reflect the presence of women in the population and thereby further democratization. Theories of Representation Since the nation’s founding, political philosophers have debated theories of democracy and representation and their application in the United States—including what it means to live in a vibrant democracy and the role that representation plays in such a system. Traditional debates about representation focus on how representatives are expected to act once in office, who should be elected as representatives, and which actions and characteristics translate into legitimate representation . For example, should representatives act as delegates or trustees? As Stephen Wayne notes in chapter 1, the delegate model presupposes that individuals are elected to office to directly convey the interests of their constituents, whereas the trustee model presupposes that voters trust their representatives to act on their behalf and allows representatives a great deal of latitude in their P A R T I I : A D E M O C R A T I C C O N G R E S S ? ★★★ 70 ★★★ decision making (Hero and Tolbert 1995; Jacobson 1997; Weissberg 1978). In addition to the delegate/trustee and direct versus indirect representation debates , there is an ongoing dialogue about the merits of substantive versus descriptive representation . This discussion focuses on the demographic and attitudinal characteristics of representatives in addition to how they act once they are in office. Substantive representation is achieved when elected officials represent the needs of their constituent groups, either directly or indirectly, whereas descriptive representation is achieved when the representative body mirrors the demographic makeup of society (Pitkin 1969a; Swain 1995). In the United States, all federal and most state electoral systems are premised on achieving substantive representation. Candidates are elected to office and expected to engage in either indirect or direct substantive representation of their constituents’ interests . This process, however, fails to adequately take into account the interests of various marginalized groups—such as women and racial and ethnic minorities—that have not always benefited from substantive representation because they were systematically excluded from participating in elections and politics throughout much of American history. Members of these groups had to overcome a legacy of disenfranchisement and a variety of obstacles designed to keep them from running as candidates and winning election to political office in the United States. As a result , the structure of the current electoral system and the high value assigned to substantive representation may not be conducive to the election of women or members of racial and ethnic minorities. In contrast, an electoral system that is designed to ensure the descriptive representation of women and racial and ethnic...

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