{"id":8650,"date":"2024-06-03T16:50:05","date_gmt":"2024-06-03T20:50:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/latinamericasecurityreport.com\/?p=8650"},"modified":"2024-06-03T16:50:05","modified_gmt":"2024-06-03T20:50:05","slug":"mexico-elects-first-female-president-%e2%88%92-but-will-that-improve-the-lot-of-countrys-women","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/latinamericasecurityreport.com\/?p=8650","title":{"rendered":"Mexico Elects First Female President \u2212 but Will That Improve the Lot of Country\u2019s Women?"},"content":{"rendered":"
President-elect Claudia Sheinbaum celebrates historic win. AP Photo\/Marco Ugarte<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Xavier Medina Vidal<\/a>, University of Texas at Arlington<\/a><\/em> and Christopher Chambers-Ju<\/a>, University of Texas at Arlington<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

Mexico will have its first woman president following a landmark vote<\/a> on June 2, 2024.<\/p>\n

After an election period marred by violence<\/a>, ruling Morena party candidate Claudia Sheinbaum, a former Mexico City mayor, emerged as the victor with about 60% of the vote \u2013 a larger share of the vote than her mentor and predecessor, President Andr\u00e9s Manuel L\u00f3pez Obrador, won in 2018. Sheinbaum beat rival X\u00f3chitl G\u00e1lvez, a senator for the center-right National Action Party, who trailed with less than 30% of the vote.<\/p>\n

Acknowledging the significance of the occasion, Sheinbaum said<\/a>: \u201cFor the first time in the 200 years of the republic I will become the first woman president of Mexico.\u201d<\/p>\n

But as scholars who study politics<\/a> and gender in Mexico<\/a>, we know that optics are one thing, actual power another. Seventy years after women won the right to vote<\/a> in Mexico, is the country moving any closer to making changes that would give women real equality?<\/p>\n

Uneven fight for gender equality<\/strong><\/p>\n

Women now represent half of Congress<\/a>, after electoral reforms nearly a decade ago mandated gender parity in nominations to Mexico\u2019s legislatures. And two women, Ana Lilia Rivera and Marcela Guerra Castillo, occupy the top posts in both chambers of Congress. Meanwhile, Norma Luc\u00eda Pi\u00f1a is the first woman to serve as chief justice<\/a> of Mexico\u2019s Supreme Court. Preliminary election night results also favor Sheinbaum\u2019s Morena party, giving them a supermajority in Congress<\/a>. As such, Sheinbaum will very likely have ample support for a feminist political agenda should she pursue one.<\/p>\n

But electing women to high office doesn\u2019t necessarily shift power in meaningful ways. It\u2019s what experts on women in politics call \u201cdescriptive representation<\/a>\u201d \u2013 when political leaders resemble a group of voters but fail to set policies designed to protect them. In contrast, \u201csubstantive representation<\/a>\u201d occurs when officials enact laws that truly benefit the groups that they claim to represent.<\/p>\n

Scholars who study the difference between the two, including Sonia Alvarez<\/a>, Mala Htun<\/a> and Jennifer Piscopo<\/a>, have found that wins in public spheres, such as the right to vote or hold office, have rarely led to progress for women in private spaces \u2013 such as the right to reproductive freedom or protections against domestic violence.<\/p>\n

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\"A
Members of feminist organizations demonstrate on Sept. 28, 2023, in Mexico City in favor of the decriminalization of abortion. Silvana Flores\/AFP via Getty Images<\/figcaption><\/figure><\/figure>\n

In other words, Mexico may have surpassed many countries, including the U.S., in promoting women to political leadership positions, but it still hasn\u2019t shed its stigma of machismo<\/a> and its history of authoritarianism<\/a>.<\/p>\n

In the 1990s, a resurgent feminist movement<\/a> throughout Latin America led to major breakthroughs in women\u2019s rights. By the end of the decade, many countries had passed legislation against gender-based violence and reforms requiring gender quotas in party nomination lists. In the past 17 years, seven women have been elected president across Central and South America.<\/p>\n

Yet the fight for gender equality has advanced unevenly. Mexico is a country still rattled by high rates of femicide<\/a>. Government data shows that, on average, 10 women and girls are killed every day<\/a> by partners or family members.<\/p>\n

Government accused of harassment<\/strong><\/p>\n

A big question now is whether Sheinbaum will be able to address the issue of gender violence, which her predecessors failed to do.<\/p>\n

Any skepticism surrounding the willingness of Sheinbaum\u2019s government to implement a truly feminist agenda would be justified: Her campaign theme was one of continuity, and she has hesitated, to date, to deviate much, if at all, from L\u00f3pez Obrador\u2019s agenda<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Under L\u00f3pez Obrador, Morena was accused of downplaying the extent of the femicide crisis, with at least one critic claiming that L\u00f3pez Obrador was \u201cthe first president to outright deny<\/a>\u201d the violence.<\/p>\n

Rather, L\u00f3pez Obrador used his daily \u201cma\u00f1anera\u201d news conference to issue verbal assaults against women<\/a> in office, including Sheinbaum\u2019s defeated rival, G\u00e1lvez. In July 2023, the independent National Electoral Institute<\/a> found L\u00f3pez Obrador guilty of targeting G\u00e1lvez in derogatory statements related to her gender.<\/p>\n

L\u00f3pez Obrador also denounced Pi\u00f1a, the Supreme Court chief justice, in what Mexico\u2019s National Association of Judges has described as hate speech<\/a> and the federal judiciary condemned as \u201cgender-based violence<\/a>\u201d and hatred against her. His statements at a rally in March<\/a> incited his followers to burn Pi\u00f1a in effigy<\/a>, prompting critics to suggest that such attacks don\u2019t simply reflect L\u00f3pez Obrador\u2019s distaste for checks and balances but aim to undermine women<\/a> in positions of power.<\/p>\n

Mexico\u2019s patronage politics<\/strong><\/p>\n

Observers see Sheinbaum as L\u00f3pez Obrador\u2019s handpicked successor: He publicly endorsed her, and she has vowed to continue his \u201cfourth transformation,\u201d a campaign promise to end government corruption and reduce poverty that\u2019s had mixed results<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Sheinbaum\u2019s record as mayor of Mexico City is equally mixed. She has publicly described herself as a feminist<\/a> and has criticized<\/a> state prosecutors for covering up the killing of Ariadna Lopez, a 27-year-old woman. At the same time, Sheinbaum attempted to criminalize participants<\/a> of a mass protest over the thousands of women who\u2019ve disappeared in recent years, claiming that these demonstrations were violent.<\/p>\n

Political scientists have shown that even when the faces of politics change, the operatives behind the scenes can stay the same \u2013 especially in Mexico, where political parties are mired in patronage politics<\/a> \u2013 when party leaders reward loyalty by deciding who gets to run for office and who gets to keep their jobs when the government is handed over to a new administration.<\/p>\n

Sheinbaum will likely still be beholden to the Morena coalition and will rely to a large degree on L\u00f3pez Obrador to help push through her policies.<\/p>\n

A feminist future?<\/strong><\/p>\n

On the campaign trail, Sheinbaum, along with her rival, G\u00e1lvez, championed women<\/a> and shared their experiences as women<\/a>.<\/p>\n

But in the closing stages of the campaign, neither Sheinbaum nor G\u00e1lvez offered much more than the \u201chistoric first\u201d argument to potential voters. As a result, the extension of women\u2019s rights under the new government remains uncertain.<\/p>\n

Aside from front-line politics, women\u2019s rights in Mexico have moved forward when leaders have committed to substantive change.<\/p>\n

Notably, Mexico\u2019s Supreme Court under Pin\u00e3 has declared all federal and state laws prohibiting abortion unconstitutional<\/a>. When Pi\u00f1a took office, she promised to take on women\u2019s rights<\/a> in her agenda. So far, she\u2019s delivered.<\/p>\n

If Sheinbaum hopes to have similar success, she\u2019ll need to follow Pin\u00e3\u2019s lead by centering her platforms on the issues that most affect women in their day-to-day lives, beginning with rising femicide rates. Women may be gaining political power in Mexico, but the question now is whether they\u2019ll use it to fight for the women they represent.<\/p>\n

This is an updated version of an article originally published<\/a> on Nov. 13, 2023.<\/em>\"The<\/p>\n

Xavier Medina Vidal<\/a>, Associate Professor of Political Science and Director of the Center for Mexican American Studies, University of Texas at Arlington<\/a><\/em> and Christopher Chambers-Ju<\/a>, Assistant Professor of Political Science, University of Texas at Arlington<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

This article is republished from The Conversation<\/a> under a Creative Commons license.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Xavier Medina Vidal, University of Texas at Arlington and Christopher Chambers-Ju, University of Texas at Arlington Mexico will have its first woman president following a landmark vote on June 2, 2024. After an election period marred by violence, ruling Morena party candidate Claudia Sheinbaum, a former Mexico City mayor, emerged as the victor with about…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":124,"featured_media":8651,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/images.theconversation.com\/files\/598026\/original\/file-20240603-19-2o9bv8.jpg","fifu_image_alt":"Mexico Elects First Female President \u2212 but Will That Improve the Lot of Country\u2019s Women?","footnotes":""},"categories":[192],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8650","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-polity-governance"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/latinamericasecurityreport.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8650","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/latinamericasecurityreport.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/latinamericasecurityreport.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/latinamericasecurityreport.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/124"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/latinamericasecurityreport.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=8650"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/latinamericasecurityreport.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8650\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8652,"href":"https:\/\/latinamericasecurityreport.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8650\/revisions\/8652"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/latinamericasecurityreport.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/8651"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/latinamericasecurityreport.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=8650"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/latinamericasecurityreport.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=8650"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/latinamericasecurityreport.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=8650"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}