Day 6: Nov. 18, 2008

Photo (l to r): Paulina Steffens and Carol Hardy-Fanta. Paulina is Chilean and a recent graduate of the Center's Program for Women in Politics and Public Policy. The photo shown here is from her balcony in the Las Condes section of Santiago, with a view of the Andes in the background. Paulina and her husband are the proud parents of 4-week-old Francisco.

Today was a day of contemplation of what I had learned so far. In many ways, it seemed that there were so many commonalities between the obstacles facing women in Chile and the US in terms of increasing their numbers in elected office. The fact that the US is not so far ahead of Chile according to data from the Inter-Parliamentary Union (see graph below): the US ranks 71st and Chile 79th out of 137 countries in the % women in the lower houses of congress/parliament, with 17% in the US and 15% in Chile. The municipal levels are also not dissimilar, with 22% of municipal council posts held by women in Chile and about 28% in the US.

When talking to women leaders this week about the importance of getting more women to run for elected office, I discovered that there are many fewer opportunities for women in Chile. There are no state legislatures, for example, and the regional governors are nominated by the President. This eliminates thousands of electoral opportunities, and, if there is a "pipeline" (which is debatable), such a top-heavy electoral system precludes women moving from local office to state legislative seats, to the congress. Also, since there are only about 300 mayoral positions, 120 seats in the lower-house (Cámara de Diputados) and 38 in the Senate, the number of possible openings for women is much smaller overall than in the US.
Another feature of Chilean politics is the argument that coming from a "political family" is almost essential for gaining access to one of the coveted appointed or elected offices at any level. One's "appellido" (family name) makes a huge difference. While Michelle Bachelet had a father who was a well-known general in the armed forces and she gained some political capital from the fact that he was tortured and died during the Pinochet regime, it turns out that this fact helped her as part of her personal story but she did not come from a political family.