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Representations of Women Politicians in the Print Media

Module 3_Topic 7: Representations of Women Politicians in the Print Media

Representations of Women Politicians in the Print Media

At the completion of this topic, you will be able to: Present an overview of womens political participation in the Pacific region; Comment critically on efforts to involve Pacific Island women in political roles; Identify regional and global examples to demonstrate how women politicians are trivialised, presented as novelties and portrayed stereotypically by the media; and Discuss strategies for increasing womens political participation in the Pacific region.

Pacific Islands Forum Secretariat (2006), A Womans Place is in the House the House of Parliament: A Regional Study Presented in Five Reports available online at: http://www.forumsec.org.fj/resources/uploads/attachments/documents/Content_1-17.pdf

Representations of Women Politicians in the Print Media

This lecture begins with an overview of womens political participation in the Pacific region and then proceeds to outline some efforts to increase womens political representation in the region. Its main focus, however, is on how women politicians are underrepresented in the news and when present, are framed and packaged as mothers, wives and novelties. Womens Political Participation in the Pacific Region According to the International Parliamentary Union (IPU), women parliamentarians in the Pacific region comprise 13.9% (2008). Five out of the eight countries in the world without any women members in parliament are Pacific Island countries (Pacific Islands Forum Secretariat, 2006). In 2008, the number of women in parliament in the Pacific were as follows: American Samoa (0), Cook Islands (2), Fiji (8), French Polynesia (24), Kiribati (2), Marshall Islands (1), New Caledonia (24), Niue (4), Northern Mariana Islands (0), Palau (0), Papua New Guinea (1), Samoa (4), Solomon Islands (0), Tonga (1), Tuvalu (0), Vanuatu (2) and Wallis and Futuna (3) (IPU, 2008).

Why do women parliamentarians in the Pacific region comprise a startling minority? What can be done to increase womens political participation in the region?

Efforts to involve Pacific Island women in political roles were particularly intense from the 1990s when UNESCO and UNIFEM created a network of women activists and politicians to discuss the future of women in politics in the Asia-Pacific region (Corner, 2000, 36). At a meeting of Asia-Pacific women in Manilla in 1992, a decision was made to form the Centre for Asia-Pacific Women in Politics (CAPWIP). CAPWIP was represented by board members from Australia, Japan, Korea, Pakistan, Papua New Guinea, Philippines, Singapore, Thailand and the USA. Following the First Asia-Pacific Congress of Women in Manila in 1994, the Women in Politics Pacific Centre (WIPPAC) was born.

Representations of Women Politicians in the Print Media

WIPPAC initiated the First Regional Women Leaders Congress in the Pacific in July, 1995 around the theme: Effective Governance and Transformative Politics. The congress agreed that WIPAC would act as an informal networking group (with UNIFEM as the secretariat) for creating mechanisms and institutions that could further the advancement of women in politics in the Pacific. The Pacific network is now among the most active of the sub-regions in the CAPWIP network, having organised sub-regional WIPPAC congresses in 1995 and 1996, and regional training programmes in 1997, 1998 and 1999, and hosted the Third AsiaPacific Congress on Women in Politics in November 1996 (Corner, 2000, 37). In addition to involving more women in politics, WIPAC has also worked with womens non -governmental organisations in the Pacific to develop a strong womens electorate to support women candidates. UNIFEM (now UN Women) continues to play a critical role in promoting womens political empowerment in the Pacific Islands. It has formed National Women in Politics (WIP) organisations throughout the Pacific, identified prospective women leaders and assisted them to develop political skills and strategies, developed a database to monitor and advance the participation of Pacific women in decision-making positions throughout the region. To date, very few studies have been conducted in Pacific Island countries on the representation of women politicians in the mainstream media. In the sections below, we will briefly cite examples from the print media in Fiji and New Zealand to highlight the medias misogynistic portrayal of women politicians.

News Media Coverage of Male and Female Election Candidates in The Fiji Times At a paper presented at the 10th Pacific Islands Political Studies Association (PIPSA) Conference in December 2007, Shazia Usman and Katrina Mau offer an analysis of the news medias coverage of female and male election candidates in The Fiji Times. Their research is based on an analysis of 215 news stories published in The Fiji Times from 2 March to 5 May 2006. Usman and Mau pointed out that women candidates totalled only 18 out of 338 and therefore, it would not be fair to demand that female candidates be given 50-50 coverage in the media on the basis of gender equality (2007). They calculated instead a male to female candidate ratio of equal coverage at 5.33 percent.

The study showed that the news stories analysed had the following candidates as sources: 86 percent men, 3 percent women and 11 percent both men and women. The researchers noted that this figure (3 percent) was still below the percentage required for equal coverage of female candidates (5.33 percent) 4

Representations of Women Politicians in the Print Media

(Usman and Mau, 2007). Thus, it was uncovered that The Fiji Times presented male candidates as sources of information more often than female candidates. What can we conclude from these findings? Some researchers argue that differences in the quantity of coverage of male and female candidates may affect womens chances of being elected because they are less known to the public (see Everit 2003). As a result, voters may be less willing to vote for them. Drage (1995) highlights the relationship between womens underrepresentation in parliament and the low media coverage of women politicians: The media tends to cover female politicians less in the Pacific Islands because womens electoral success is very low when compa red with international figures. Joy Eggs, of the Pacific GMMP Network in Papua New Guinea reinforces this point with the following observation: On coding day, parliament was in session and given that womens representation in our parliament was 1%, there was that much chance of seeing a debate on the floor coming from a woman or being for women and related issues (GMMP Regional Report, 2009, 1). Therefore, for women from Fiji and the Pacific, the task of increasing womens participation in politics may be a stepp ing stone for increasing coverage of women politicians in the media.

Will increasing womens political participation necessarily lead to greater empowerment for women?

While the quantitative data presented in Usman and Maus study is useful for highlighting the underrepresentation of women parliamentarians in The Fiji Times, overall, it lacks an in-depth discussion of how women candidates are framed by the news media. New Zealand Elections and Women Candidates Representation In their article, The Don and Helen New Zealand Election 2005: A Media A-gender, Heather Devere and Sharyn Davies, move beyond quantitative analysis to a critical, qualitative account of how the media frames and packages information in a way that discriminates against women candidates. They offer a close comparison of print media and television coverage of the two main parties in the 2005 New

Representations of Women Politicians in the Print Media

Zealand general election campaign, Helen Clark (Labour Prime Minister) and Don Brash (leader of the main opposition National Party). While women in New Zealand attained national suffrage in 1893 and have participated in parliament from the 1970s, the New Zealand media has largely continued to under-represent women candidates. For example, in 1995 McGregor and Comrie uncovered 87 percent male sources and only 13 percent female sources in political stories (1995, 55). When women candidates or politicians are the primary subjects in political news stories, they are sometimes trivialised, presented as novelties, and portrayed stereotypically as motherly politicians or unwomanly politicians . Trivial details include an emphasis on the politicians appearance, marital and maternal status, the domestic aspects of a politically active womans life and personality or feelings rather than the policies and issues of debate (Devere & Davies, 2006, 65). Devere and Davies highlighted that the New Zealand news media constantly honed in on Helen Clarkes appearance and made reference to her childlessness: She was often portrayed as unfeminine, arrogant and insensitive (2006, 66). Other representations included the dragon lady and Darth Vader in drag (McGregor, 1995, 184). In 1989, Helen Clark pleaded to the media to focus on my hard work, not my haircut (cit. in McGregor 1995, 183). The medias tendency to focus on the outward appearance of women politicians is illustrated in the following comparison of Helen Clark and the National Partys Jenny Shipley as they vied for the position of Prime Minister: The difference appearance can make was apparent in Parliaments adjournment debate last month. Mrs Shipley was radiant in a stunning new cobalt blue suit, while Miss Clark was drab in olive. Miss Clarks speech was well-focused, strong on content and confidently delivered but it was the visual impression left by Mrs Shipley on the television news that was more striking (cit. in Devere & Davies, 2006, 68). Central to the representation of women politicians are the details offered about their statuses in the private/domestic spheres as wives and mothers. Women who enter politics are sometimes portrayed as abandoning their children (Devere and Davies, 2006, 65) while those who do not have children are criticised presented as unwomanly or unfeminine . Consider the following comparison between Clark and Shipley: Shipley tried to steer the debate toward motherhood. She attempted to distinguish herself from the childless Clark during the National Party broadcast with her often quoted line: Im a politician... but Im also a mum (Banducci, 2005, 51). In this way, the media and sometimes the women candidates themselves reinforce the male-political-public and female-personal-private

Representations of Women Politicians in the Print Media

dichotomy. Journalists also try to capture the constant shift in women politicians private (domestic) to their public (political) lives.

Can you cite any examples where the media has described a male politician in terms of his role as a father and husband in some detail?

In the 2005 Don Brash and Helen Clark election, the following comparison was offered of the two candidates: The Prime Minister didnt get to the top of the Labour Party and hold her position within the party by being ladylike. She is a tough, hardened, political operator and the reality is Don Brash is a gentleman (cit. in Thomson & Berry, 2005). Media discourses that framed Helen Clark as a feminist assumed a link between feminism and non-femininity. Because Clark did not fit the stereotypical feminine role, she was repeatedly presented as a threat to social order.

Representations of Women Politicians in the Print Media

Banducci, S., Gender and Leadership, In J. Vowles, P. Aimer, J. Karp, S. Banducci, R Miller & A Sullivan (Eds.). Proportional representation on trial: The 1999 New Zealand general election and the fate of MMP. Auckland: Auckland University Press, 2002, p. 50-65. Corner, Loraine (2000), Women in politics and good governance: Transformative politics in AsiaPacific, Development Bulletin, no. 51, pp. 36-38, available online at: http://devnet.anu.edu.au/GenderPacific/pdfs/07_gen_gov_corner.pdf [accessed 21 August, 2011] Devere, Heather & Sharyn Davies, The Don and Helen New Zealand Election 2005: A media a-gender? in Pacific Journalism Review, Volume 12, Issue 1, April 2006. Drage, J. (2005) Women and the 2005 General Election, Women Talking Politics: Newsletter of the Aotearoa/New Zealand Women, New Series Issue, No. 4, 5-8. Everitt, J. (2003) Media in the Maritimes: Do female candidates face a bias? Atlantis. Global Media Monitoring Project, Regional http://www.whomakesthenews.org/ [Accessed 2 April, 2011] Report, 2009, available at:

McGregor, J. & Comrie, M. (1995) Balance and fairness in broadcasting news 1985-1994. Palmerston North: Massey University. Nicholl, Rae, Electing Women to Parliament: Fiji and the Alternative Vote Electoral System in Pacific Journalism Review, 12 (1), 2006, p. 87-107. Pacific Islands Forum Secretariat (2006) A Womans Place is in the House the House of Parliament: A Regional Study Presented in Five Reports available online at: http://www.forumsec.org.fj/resources/uploads/attachments/documents/Content_1-17.pdf [accessed 22 August, 2011] Thomson, A. & Berry, R. (2005, August 24). Gentleman Don affronted by sexist tag, The New Zealand Herald, p. A5. Usman, Shazia and Katrina Mau, Female Election Candidates and the Media: An Analysis of News Media Coverage of Male and Female Election Candidates in The Fiji Times, Paper presented at the 10th Pacific Islands Political Studies Association (PIPSA) Conference, University of the South Pacific, Emalus Campus, Port Villa, Vanuatu, 7-8 December, 2007.