• Florida currently ranks 20th out of the 50 states in total percentages of women in the state legislature.
• Public attitudes of women in politics continue to be a major roadblock for women who desire to enter into the political arena. On the policy side, women are widely judged to be better than men when dealing with social issues such as health and education. The public views women to generally make better political leaders than men.
• There are three overarching structural barriers that prevent women from achieving success in electoral politics: incumbency, outsider status, and candidate eligibility pool (Sanbonmatsu 2003).
• Running against an incumbent is a detriment to the likelihood of winning, decreases and discourages potential female candidates from running for office. Incumbency is an important barrier facing women today. Once a candidate wins and becomes an office holder, that candidate becomes an incumbent, having substantial advantages over new candidates. Women, for that matter, have a harder time winning seats due to most incumbents being men.
• The second major barrier to women’s political success is ‘outsider’ status. Outsider status keeps women out of politics because women have been socialized away from entering a male -dominated field. Since, historically, women have been restricted from having a career in politics, women are still finding it hard to think of themselves as politicians simply because they do not depict the experience or backgrounds normally pertaining to the role. Therefore, women believe they are minimally qualified for a political career. Lack of confidence and the belief that men are far more politically prepared than women has removed women from the inner world of politics, leaving them with an outsider status. To understand women’s reluctance to run for an electoral campaign, one must understand the perceptual process that women subconsciously go through at the very moment they are faced with the decision of whether or not to seek elective office.
• Candidate Eligibility Pool The third major barrier to women’s political success is the candidate eligibility pool. The candidate eligibility pool is one of the major factors that determine the success of candidates that run for office. Thus, the candidate eligibility pool depicts a pool of initial prospective candidates (Lawless and Fox 2010). Figure 1.5 depicts Florida candidates and their progress to elected office. Of the pool of candidates (1st step) on the 2010 ballots, only 211 women considered a candidacy and ran for office (2nd step). The third step of the candidate emergence process is how many women won primaries. One hundred thirty nine women were qualified and won primaries. Of those women, only 92 women won the general election and currently hold office.
• In 1972, Paula Hawkins became the first woman elected to statewide office in Florida by winning a seat on the Florida Public Service Commission, and later became the first woman ever elected to a full term in the Senate without a family connection, in 1980. As of 2011, Hawkins is the only woman elected to the U.S. Senate from Florida.
• In 1992, at the age of 26, Debbie Wasserman Schultz became the youngest female legislator in the state’s history and the first female to lead the Democratic National Committee.
• Seminole County Commissioner Brenda K. Carey was the first woman elected to serve in the new millennium in the county
• Race And Ethnicity: All Women Florida vs.United States– 50.8% vs. 50.7% White 79.4% vs. 79.6% African American 16.1% vs. 12.9% Hispanic 21.5% vs. 15.8% Asian American 2.4% vs. 4.6% Native American 0.5% vs. 1.0% Other/ Two or More 1.6% vs. 1.9% Source: U.S. Census Bureau
• In 2011, Florida welcomed Pam Bondi as the state’s first female Attorney General.
• Thumbs Up: The number of women serving in statewide elective executives increased by one since Alex Sink, Chief Financial Officer. In 2011, Florida welcomed Florida’s first female African American Lieutenant Governor, Jennifer Carroll and the state’s first female Attorney General, Pam Bondi. Thumbs Up The number of women serving in Florida’s Legislative office increased following the highly anticipated November 2010 general election, from 38 in 2009 to 40 in 2011. Thumbs Down Women currently hold 6 (22 %) of the 25 seats in the U.S. House. No female elected official currently holds a seat in the U.S. Senate. Thumbs Down Of the 120 seats in the State House Assembly, 27 of those seats are held by women while only 13 women currently hold a seat in Florida’s Senat
• Thumbs Down: Women hold two of the seven Judicial Seats in the Florida Supreme Court. Women hold a total of 23% of Judicial Seats, while men make up a total of 77% percent in Florida District Courts. Only 18, or 37.5% currently serving in Florida’s government are women of color.
• What country has the highest percentage of seats held by women in parliament or federal government?
Check out http://www.ipu.org/wmn-e/classif.htm
• In 2017 there are 435 seats in US House of Representatives, 83 women, which represents 19.4%.
• US Senate,of the 100 seats, 21 are women, 21%
• Out of 193 nations, US is 101st.
• Rwanda is #1 with 61.3% of their House comprised of women, and 38.5% of their Senate.
• Women in Florida Kathy Castor, Loranne Ausley, Elizabeth W. Porter Tracie Davis, Kimberly Daniels, Cyndi Stevenson, Jennifer Sullivan Amber Mariano Colleen Burton Amy Mercado Rene Plasencia Erin Grall Jackie Toledo Janet Cruz Kathleen Peters Heather Fitzenhagen MaryLynn Magar Lori Berman Emily Slosberg Kristin Jacobs Katie Edwards Sharon Pritchett Barbara Watson Cynthia Stafford, Daisy Baez Jeanette Núñez, Holly Merrill Raschein
• These states have never had a female govenor: Arkansas, California, Colorado, Florida, Georgia, Idaho, Illinois,Indiana, Iowa, Maine, Maryland, Minnesota, Mississippi, Missouri, Nevada, New York, North Dakota, Pennsylvania, South Dakota, Tennessee, Virginia, West Virginia and Wisconsin.
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