Women and Politics ─ The Pursuit of Equality

Women and Politics is a comprehensive examination of women’s use of politics and the political system in pursuit of gender equality. Women’s claims to equality are complicated by a paradox: How can demands for gender equality be reconciled with sex differences? Resolving this paradox has proceeded along two paths: the legal equality doctrine, which emphasizes gender neutrality, and the fairness doctrine, which recognizes differences between men and women. The text’s in-depth analysis and clear presentation of theory and history helps students to think critically about the challenges faced by women in politics, and about how public policies in education, labor and the economy, and family and reproductive health, impact gender equality. The inclusion of cutting-edge scholarship on the intersections of race, class, and gender and extensive coverage of diversity among women, including new material on Hispanic and Latina women and conservative women, further bolster the text’s two-path framework.

The fourth edition has been fully revised and updated to include coverage of new critical perspectives and recent political events and controversies, including the 2016 presidential election and Hillary Clinton’s campaign for president. It also includes new discussions of the impact of recent policy developments in immigration, LGBT rights, and women in the military, and examines current challenges women face in the pursuit of equality.

Lynne E. Ford is Associate Vice President for the Academic Experience and professor of political science at the College of Charleston in Charleston, South Carolina. Ford earned her B.A. degree from The Pennsylvania State University and her M.A. and Ph.D. degrees from the University of Maryland, College Park. Her teaching and research interests are in American politics with an emphasis on women and politics, elections and voting behavior, and civic engagement. She is author of Women and Politics: The Pursuit of Equality and The Encyclopedia of Women and American Politics, which was named one of the top twenty reference books by the New York Public Library in 2009. She is also a coauthor of American Government & Politics Today. She serves on the editorial board for two political science journals and has served in a variety of leadership roles with the American Political Science Association and the Southern Political Science Association including the Status of Women Committee for both organizations and the APSA Departmental Services Committee.