Hi! Welcome to my first blog post of Zan va Siyasat: Women & Politics!
I appreciate you taking the time to explore this blog and I hope it intrigues, inspires and hopefully encourages more women to lead their own path in politics.
Who Am I:
I am a Canadian-Iranian woman who immigrated with her family to Canada when I was five. Growing up, my family was never really political but my parents voted and they tended to gravitate towards the Liberal Party, as most immigrant families did who came to this country in the 1980s.
My interest in politics really came to fruition during my undergraduate years where I found myself taking more courses on Canadian history, US politics, and became immersed in political philosophy and the works of Aristotle, Plato and my favourite, Machiavelli.
This interest developed into pursuing a Master’s degree in International Relations and the hopes of working in a post-war institution like the United Nations or International Monetary Fund.
I graduated in 2008 during the global recession, and my international dreams weren’t playing out as I had hoped. I was living in Amsterdam at the time and decided to come back to Toronto and try my luck with a local NGO.
I started working with the Canadian International Peace Project which fostered relationships among separated communities in Toronto i.e. Somali youth being paired with Jewish business and sector leaders for mentorship and employment opportunities.
From there I started interacting with government officials and getting more acquainted with provincial and federal representatives. Willingly, I was recruited to work on a provincial campaign which then led to multiple employment opportunities and the building of my career in politics.
I have worked in six government ministries for Ontario, and managed four successful campaigns where my candidates were elected or re-elected to municipal, provincial and federal levels.
During the last year I was the campaign manager for a former Cabinet Minister, Michael Coteau, to become the Leader of the Ontario Liberal Party. My campaign became the runner up in the race and despite it being my first campaign loss, I was grateful for the opportunity.
I was the first woman of a minority background to be the campaign manager for a provincial leadership campaign of a major political party in Ontario.
And my hope is that more women will take on this challenge in the future, whether as campaign managers or candidates.
Women have a fire that burns deep inside of them. We are multifaceted and we can wear multiple hats at the same time, and be good at it all.
I see this strength in my brilliant friends, the women in my family and the colleagues that I have had the privilege of working alongside with throughout the years.
Regardless of our capabilities and capacities, I often find myself and I see it in others, that more often than men, we question our leadership abilities and whether we are cut out to take on certain roles.
I certainly did that when Michael asked me to run his campaign back in 2019. And a year later, I couldn’t be happier with my decision to join his campaign.
I am going to give you the straight goods in this blog:
Politics is fickle and driven by public opinion. The public can love you one day and hate you the next. Loyalty is bartered like any other commodity. Friends can become foes and foes become friends. Politics can lift you high on top of the clouds and ground you just as fast.
It’s a messy business and it can be intimidating, especially for women.
What use to be known as typically an “old white man’s club” is far more diverse now. We have come some ways in our progress in diversity and gender parity with record numbers of women candidates both running in the 2018 US Primaries and the 2019 Canadian Federal Elections.
But we still have ways to go, especially having more visible minorities in the political arena.
Why blog about women and politics:
Women like me don’t necessarily share their experience and observations in politics, fundamentally because I have never been elected or done anything crazy enough to make the papers (I did make it into the Globe and Mail during my time in government…but we will leave that for another day).
There are so many great and talented women who work in politics and have incredible insights that would be helpful to any one ever considering a career or a run at public office. And I want to be one of those voices!
This blog will explore the opportunities and challenges that women face when it comes to working in politics and being elected.
I have heard pundits say that a woman needs to be asked three times to run for public office before she seriously considers it. As oppose to men, who tend to ponder why they weren’t asked sooner.
I want to talk about what motivates and discourages women from putting their name on a ballot and why women experience greater ridicule then men in politics.
I will also talk about us, the general public, and how we are complicit in the inherit problems that prevents women from seeking public office.
My views:
Full disclaimer: this blog isn’t to become the battle of the sexes or by any means meant to demonize men. There are a lot of good men in politics and other sectors who support and encourage women around them to do more and be successful.
I am a liberal. My personal politics falls right of centre. I believe being fiscally responsible but socially responsive to the needs of our day. I believe education is an economic imperative and I subscribe to the notion that the progressiveness of a society should be measured by the way that they treat their women. How their laws response to the issues that impact women and the resources they dedicate to support child care and economic prosperity.
Who Runs the World?
As much I love Beyoncé and her empowering lyrics, the numbers don’t exactly paint the same picture.
Women are 50% of the world’s population but only 7% are world leaders according to the United Nations, out of 195 nations.
As of March 2020, there were twenty-one women world leaders with Scandinavian countries leading in the number of female leaders and striving for gender parity around the Cabinet tables.
Cabinet Ministers are the heads for the various executive branches in a government i.e. Minister of Education, Health or Trade.
Angela Merkel, the Chancellor of Germany, is the longest serving female leader in the world. She was elected in 2005 and currently serving her last term.
In addition to Merkel, the most notable female world leaders include Tsai Ing-wen, President of Taiwan, also dubbed as Asia’s Angela Merkel, Jacinda Ardern, Prime Minister of New Zealand, and Sanna Marin, Prime Minister of Finland, who is also the youngest world leader at 34.
Fun fact: Finland has five major political parties and all five are currently led by women!
All the mentioned names above have also received international praise for their respective handling of the COVID-19 Pandemic and their countries’ responses to flattening the curve. These women have all re-opened their economies and their countries are being used as models for the rest of the world to follow suit.
A subsequent blog post will delve deeper into the handling of COVID-19 by female world leader – stay tuned!
For a complete list of countries that are currently led by women please click here.
Canadian Women and Politics:
In Canada, out of 300 First Ministers: Prime Ministers of Canada and Premiers of provinces and territories, only twelve have been women, that’s 4%.
In her podcast “No Second Chances,” Kate Graham, a professor of political science at Western University and a former leadership candidate for the Ontario Liberal Party, states that “women are half of Canada’s population and only represent 25% of elected seats.”
In 2019, Graham travelled across Canada to speak to Canada’s 12 First Ministers and other female candidates to gather their stories and their political insights for her podcast.
I will be exploring and reflecting on Graham’s findings throughout this blog and I strongly encourage you to listen to “No Second Chances.”
Overlooked or overlooking ourselves?:
I mentioned that female candidates have to be asked three times before they seriously consider running for public office.
Why is that?
Well there are a number of reasons and variables that are weighed.
A common reason is that when we look at professional opportunities especially in leadership roles, we quickly scan and dissect our credentials until kingdom come and heavily question whether we are cut out for it. This usually isn’t the case with men.
Sheryl Sandberg, the Chief Operating Officer of Facebook and the author of “Lean In” describes women overlooking themselves as a “self-fulfilling prophesy” as they are reflective of “gender stereotypes introduced in childhood.”
She goes on to explain that “most leadership positions are held by men, so women don’t expect to achieve them, and that becomes one of the reasons they don’t.”[i]
I tend to agree with this because when I was growing up, I was constantly reminded to be a lady, and not to overstep my boundaries. In other words not to emasculate men by my opinions or avoid taking charge in a situation.
During the early years of my career, I would always be mindful of not overtly expressing my opinions, to be agreeable and to appease. Even though in most references I was confident that my insights were better but afraid of sharing in case someone could have been offended.
And then I grew up and learnt that no one will give you want you want unless you speak up. That’s when you earn your respect!
The other prominent consideration for women when considering public office is their families. Whether they already have children or maybe want to have children in the near future; they often think about the impact that it would have and don’t want to compromise their family’s well-being.
When you are an elected official, there is an expectation of accessibility and being present. And that expectation comes at all hours of the day, evenings and weekends. Therefore, finding that work-life balance could become challenging between legislative duties, community meetings/events and managing stakeholders.
Lastly, it’s the nastiness of politics that deters women from being a part of it. The layers of sexism, harassment and personal attacks that men aren’t subjected to.
I worked in Kathleen Wynne’s government. And regardless of the various opinions on her policies, she was subjected to a crazy amount of attacks about her lesbian agenda, the way she looked, the scarfs she wore, the type of mother or grandmother she was and the list went on.
I would hear people say “I don’t like her” or “she is awful” all the time and when I asked about what exactly it was that they disliked about her, I could never get an answer. People heard so much negativity about her that they could never actually verbalize what it was that turned them off.
In the podcast, Susan Delacourt, a political journalist with the Toronto Star points out that the more politics becomes like sports, essentially like wrestling, the less comfortable women are entering into the arena.
So what needs to change? Well we do, as a society, and the inherit biases that we subconsciously hold against women and being leaders. There are plenty of societies that have allowed women to become leaders of their countries and are reaping the benefits of it. And its only fair that we enjoy the same!
I am looking forward to delving into all of the topics raised and much more in posts to come. Posts will be on a weekly to bi-weekly basis.
I hope you stay tuned and please subscribe so you can get alerts on new posts!
Until next time – keep safe and healthy!
[i] Sherly Sanberg, “Lean In” p. 22
Sara Alimardani 