Carol Moseley Braun

http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/pdf/10.1300/J501v27n01_04

From the Journal of Women, Politics and Policy, the article 'Gender and Black Presidential Politics From Chisholm to Moseley Braun' talks about the current political environment for Black female candidates and focuses on how Carol Moseley Braun's entrance into the Democratic Presidential primaries in 2003 shone the spotlight onto gender and race issues in America.

One of the issues that the article looks at is the political life of a black women and why that affects their success in politics. The article states that 'black women live in the intersection of race and gender', suggesting that the difficulties that are faced by female politicians, such as Carol Moseley Braun, is firstly due to their race and then their gender. The article then looks back to times when it was said that there were 'no room for black women' because 'all women were white and all the blacks were men' so they had to fight to become acknowledged, which then gave them the image of being
a 'strong black woman' as they were able to stand up against men who tried to supress them. This suppression is also said to be with white women as well and that black women had to 'deal with White women's racism', which caused black women to abandon movements to better themselves. The argument the article makes is that the position of black women in political positions aren't seen to be taken seriously as they aren't respected by their white counter-parts or others from the black community as black women are seen by men as only to be of help to them and the home.

The article also raises the issue of the lack of work and research that has been done on female black political candidates. The article argues that 'although research has been done on female political candidates and on Black (i.e. male) political candidates, there has been virtually nothing done on Black women's political involvement and much less on Black women as candidates'. However, the work that has been done on female black candidates shows that they have to take a different and more difficult road into politics as they are 'rendered invisible in political life' and have to fight to be noticed and to be appointed into and political position. The lack o research done on female black candidates make it hard to understand how they campaign and how voters perceive them even with the stereotypes that are associated with African Americans and women.

The focus drawn onto Carol Moseley Braun in this article is due to the fact that she was one of the first black woman to actually become successful in the political world, but lose out on an opportunity to run for President because of her race and gender. Even with little name recognition, she was said to 'represent an important demographic within the Democratic Party and the anti-Iraq war movement' and 'articulated a much needed voice'. She was see as the most credible candidate to be able to represent the issues and concerns of the black community, and women in general. This was evidenced by an early poll which said that 46% of Democratic voters said there was at least some chance that they would vote for her. Unfortunately, despite all the support from women's groups, black Americans appeared 'more willing to support a Black man unfavourable to 70% than a Black women with the skills and credentials to move forward issues of concern to blacks'. This shows that gender had a great deal to do with her unsuccessful run to Presidency and also shows the prejudice felt even within the black community towards black women as it goes against their perceived and traditional views that their role should be within the home and not within influencing politics.