Puzzles of women's rights in Brazil

Social Research, Fall, 2002 by Mala Htun

These examples show that men are able to serve as women's "representatives," especially when influenced by international norms and feminist interest groups. But is this all there is to representation? In one sense, representation can be construed as a principal-agent relationship in which the principal (the electorate) grants to the agent (the elected official) the authority to act and make binding decisions for the principal. A lawyer represents a person in court, a diplomat represents a country's positions at the United Nations. This is the type of representation needed for the "aggregative function" of decision making--when representatives need to ensure that all interests are weighed equally in the event of conflicts (Mansbridge, 1999).

However, representation may connote not just the representation of interests, but also the shared identity of a certain group or category of people. The representative should resemble the socioeconomic background, sex, race, ethnicity, views, or feelings of the represented. There is a pressing need for women's actual presence in power to fulfill this latter sense of representation, also known as "descriptive representation." Democratic decision making, moreover, involves not just the aggregation of interests but also deliberation about common values and policy agendas. In this "deliberative function" of decision making, when interests are uncrystallized, new issues emerge, and the broad outlines of public policy are decided upon (Mansbridge, 1999), it is important to have representatives that share an identity or background with the represented.

Do women in power need a feminist consciousness to represent other women? There is a saying in Latin America that "cuerpo de mujer no significa consciencia de genero" (a woman's body does not imply a gender consciousness). Some feminists complain that many women in power, although they share a nominal gender identity with other women, fail to represent women adequately in the aggregative or deliberative aspects of decision making. As a result, it is not enough to be a woman; one must also have a feminist consciousness. Many Brazilian feminists were thus skeptical of Roseana Sarney's pre-candidacy in the 2002 presidential elections. According to political scientist Lucia Avelar, "we all know that [Roseana] is not a feminist, she is the daughter of the oligarchy.... Roseana's candidacy represents the oligarchical continuity of traditional Brazilian politics in defense of its interests." Feminist writer Rose Marie Muraro commented that "Roseana is co-opting feminist discourse in an abstract way, without concrete proposals.... I don't believe that a person who has sold out can do anything for women, or for men.... [E]verything indicates that [Roseana] and her marketing strategists are using a woman's figure merely as part of a flamboyant electoral strategy" (Femea, January 2002).

Yet there is evidence that even women without connections to the feminist movement or a history of struggle for women's rights bring changes beneficial to democracy. The effects of women's presence may be seen, not necessarily in their views about specific issues, but in the changes women bring to the style of making decisions; in other words, not to substance but to process. One conclusion from a recent study on women in foreign policy, for example, found that women have a distinctive leadership style that improved decision making and negotiations. Interviewees from Latin America, the United States, and at international financial institutions reported that women are better listeners, more grounded, less confrontational, more teamwork oriented, less hierarchical, and more inclusive than men. Some interviewees added that women are more practical, more detail oriented, and more willing to make tough decisions. One senior trade negotiator said in an interview that "a woman approaches something in a way that doesn't need all the chest puffing or the rooster syndrome. Often when you get two male negotiators in the room who haven't met each other or worked with each other, you can visibly watch them puff out their chests and start showing. It is really like one of those Discovery [channel] things on television in the animal world, just watching it." (9) In short, the changes women make to democratic decision making may be subtle. Women's influence may not be visible in explicit political platforms or legislative agendas, but in the fresh perspectives they give to the interstices of political life, to informal conversations in the corridors of congress, to questions raised at committee hearings, and to personal dealings with staff members. Over the longer term, these incremental changes may accumulate and produce larger transformations.