|
||
Presidential Campaign Staffs Dominated By Men: Giuliani The Worst Offender
By Zephyr Teachout and Kelly Nuxoll
The following piece was produced by the Huffington Post's OffTheBus project.
The leadership of the major presidential campaigns is dominated by men, with the Democratic campaigns slightly more balanced than Republicans.
An analysis of recently released federal disclosure documents reveals that while women make up 40% of overall staff, they hold 32% of the 88 senior positions among the top eight national campaigns. Click here to see the numbers, broken down by campaign.
Power is difficult to discern, but the relative influence of women within presidential campaigns can be partially gauged by gender ratios among salaried operatives playing strategic leadership and advisory roles, the top twenty best-paid individuals, and staff who were paid more than $9000 in the last quarter.
The campaign of Republican Mike Huckabee achieves the closest gender balance at a near 50% division between men and women on all measures (it is also the smallest of all the major campaigns). The campaigns of Democrats Hillary Clinton and Bill Richardson, and Republican Mitt Romney are also fairly balanced, with Clinton's somewhat favoring women and Richardson's and Romney's somewhat favoring men. The most gender-skewed campaign, in contrast, is that of Rudy Giuliani.
In the campaign of the former New York mayor Giuliani, there is only one senior female staffer, who holds the title of Communications Director. Fewer than one-third of Giuliani's staff who earned $9000 or more in the last quarter are women, and just a quarter of his top twenty paid staff are women.
The Democrats' campaigns are more gender-balanced than Republicans'. Just over thirty percent of Republican senior staffers are women, compared to just under 33% of Democratic senior staffers. And there are ten more top salaried women in Democratic campaigns: 32 of 80 (40%) compared to 21 of 74 (28%) in Republican campaigns.
Each campaign has its own organizational structure but this review focuses on traditional senior staff: campaign manager, deputy campaign manager, and directors of critical campaign functions, including operations, finance, communications, field, policy, research, Internet, and political strategy. In addition, the review considered chief pollsters and lead media consultants, as well as senior advisors confirmed by the campaign staff and who appeared on the FEC reports as making more than $20,000 in the last quarter.
Among the campaigns reviewed -- those of Clinton, Edwards, Huckabee, Obama, Richardson, Romney, and Thompson -- women play all these strategic leadership roles, with the exception of pollster and Political Director. However, women are far more likely to hold positions in finance and internal operations.
Some studies of gender and leadership suggest that less-balanced campaigns may be hindering themselves by not employing a more substantial number of women in their most senior positions. "Evidence of a link between the bottom line and women at the top is growing," writes the Financial Times, summing up research on a number of recent studies correlating corporate success with significant female leadership.
A just-released report by the management consulting firm McKinsey suggests that "companies where women are most strongly represented at board or top-management level are also the companies that perform best"--not only financially, but also in accountability, innovation, and work environment. The Harvard Business Review, in a separate study, found that to benefit from women's participation, a corporate board needs at least three female directors.
Arguably, female leadership on presidential campaigns is even more important than in the boardroom. After all, presidential campaigns must engage the American public--including an electorate that is majority female.
Here's a cumulative ranking of senior staff gender breakdown of the major campaigns:
HUCKABEE--Balanced, slightly favors women
Senior Staff: 4 of 6 (Communications Director, Finance Director, Field Director, Policy Director)
Top 15 paid staff: 8 women, 7 men
All paid over $9K/3rd quarter: 8 of 15 (53%)
CLINTON--Balanced, but favors women
Senior Staff: 8 of 14 (Campaign Manager, Chief Media Strategist, Traveling Chief of Staff, Policy Director, Director of Operations, 3 well-paid Senior Advisors)
Top 20 paid staff: 12 women, 8 men
All paid over $9K/3rd quarter: 85 of 161 (52%)
RICHARDSON--Balanced, but favors men
Senior Staff: 4 of 11 (Deputy Campaign Manager, Finance Director, Internet Director, one Senior Finance Advisor)
Top 20 paid staff: 8 women, 12 men
All paid over $9K/3rd quarter: 15 of 38 (39%)
ROMNEY--Balanced, but favors men
Senior Staff: 4 of 11 (Campaign Manager, Policy Director, Operations Director, Internet Director)
Top 20 paid staff: 7 women, 13 men
All paid over $9K/3rd quarter: 51 of 126 (40%)
OBAMA--Few women the top
Senior Staff: 3 of 12 (Research Director, COO, Finance Director)
Top 20 paid staff: 5 women, 15 men
All paid over $9K/3rd quarter: 67 out of 150 gender identified (45%)
EDWARDS--Few women at the top
Senior Staff: 2 of 15 (Research Director, Chief of Staff)
Top 20 paid staff: 7 women, 13 men
All paid over $9K/3rd quarter: 34 of 92 (37%)
THOMPSON--Few women at the top
Senior Staff: 2 of 9 (Research Director, Finance Director)
Top 20 paid staff: 4 women, 16 men
All paid over $9K/3rd quarter: 11 of 37 (30%)
GIULIANI--Very imbalanced
Senior Staff: 1 of 10 (Communications Director)
Top 20 identified paid staff: 4 women, 15 men, 1 unknown gender
All paid over $9K/3rd quarter: 36 of 122 (29.5%) [four unknown gender]
River Curtis-Stanley, Saba Kenedy-Washington, Daniella Kamis-Brown, Sandra P. Thompson, Kirstin Michel, Steven Greenberg, Jeanie Molloff, Paul Abroms, and Bryan Bissell also contributed reporting to this piece.
Loading comments…
Want to reply to a comment? Hint: Click "Reply" at the bottom of the comment; after being approved your comment will appear directly underneath the comment you replied to
Judy, er, Judith recognizes that a man who marries his mistress creates a job vacancy!!! She's not about to let him take any applications for the position!
Likely Judi (oops I mean Judith) is afraid to have Rudy around too many women. She's likely worrying that he may sneak some hussy into the White House while she's sleeping upstairs - just like he did with HER!
Let's face it - his track record isn't too good!!
Hell, rudi's wife won't let him have any women in his campaign. But just think, if she wants to stay his wife, can you blame her.
Perhaps the post "Presidential Campaign Staffs Dominated By Men: Giuliani The Worst Offender" isn't aimed at a mass audience. OK, nothing wrong with Huffington Post targeting particular political sub-cultures. As long as we realize that this type of article is so very out of touch with the masses of Americans.
The great, substantial, consensus majority of citizens and voters don't care about the sex of their politicians or public servants. We care about their beliefs and their competence, not their genitalia.
To the extent that Democrats get associated with this view, the view that would judge a campaign based on the sex of the staff... that's so clueless, that it explains a lot about how George Bush could get elected.
-- Stuart's "Random Thoughts" blog
I am a woman, and it irks me to constantly have someone start something over male and female agendas. Equal rights does not constantly have to be flung in our faces and comparisons made over everything. I don't care how many women are working on the campaigns of those running for president. I care about what the candidate stands for and the platform which they are presenting.
I am capable of making a decision for myself without being concerned as to the balance of which sex is working to get the message out. If I don't like what I'm hearing, then I won't vote for that candidate, so why all the fuss over gender? I don't give a crap! May the best candidate win.
It's just sad that we don't get to hear from some of the most viable candidates, such as Biden, Tancredo, Ron Paul, and Kuchinnick, because the media is forcing Obama, Hillary, Guilliani, and Romney down our throats. I would be putting my efforts towards giving the other candidates well deserved airtime to present their platforms and give us a real choice for the future rather than those who have the most money and can buy their presidency, of which is happeneing as we speak.
Lets start being honest here, and quit with the gender bias--we have more important things to be concerned with--our country is corrupt and going down the tubes at remarkable speed, and you want to whine about the quota of women working on campaigns??? Oh, PLEASE.
I am not commenting on whether or not this is a
significant topic
Apparently the gender of some of the staff could
not be determined. The proper way to handle this
would have been to state ranges of gender employment.
What would the count have been if all
the unidentified staffers were men and what would
the count have been if all those staffers were women?
Comparing these ranges among the candidates
would have been fairer.
Please. We all know Rudy only considers women when he wants to cheat on his wife du jour.
This latest wife has him on a tight leash- so why would he want to pay good money for a female staffer if he can't screw her?
This comes as no shock- the guy's a phony prick who doesn't even bother to pretend he considers women equals.
Bravo!!! Great example of good Right wing christian values-----hehehehe
so is Hillary the worst offender when it comes to hiring men? What is this gender balance , and sexual preference balance , and racial balance as staffing issues. If you are a neocon you hire the best neocons, if you are lib yu hire the best libs , if yu are hillary you hire????
first of all hillary is not the cure but, part of the big problem. the lack of real men ,those with a backbone to stand up and face the people. i know turning their back on their party lines will mean a political knife in the back but, the people would be interested to see some one who wants to change the messed up political mess we have its not a male/female thing so don't go there. The system is broken,out of control, most people don't vote because one candidate is usually the lesser of two evils we need to change that. hire all men or hire all women the end result is still the same.
first of all what does this have to do with the price of watermelons? not relavent? well who cares the systems broken and now its because there is not enough women is candidates staffs? is there not some way to enlighten the people that the issue is the broken political machine and how to change it to again work for the people. don't cloud the issues with nonsense diversions get back to issues...who cares they only hire the ones they will return the favor to once elected our government is wasteful,antiquated, and full of crooks where do we start ?? with who don't hire enough women? or men? wake up get with the program. before we lose what little freedoms we still have.
NY Times, Daily Show, Colbert Report et al...
mostly white men who criticize others for having mostly white men......
ah, lefties are so so cute and ridiculous.
What does that tell you ladies. I know what my wife and daughter said when they left for their offices this morning. Both of them vowed not to come home until they both turned two female voters away from the Mayor.
Well this tell us much of what pattern to could be up when either of these candiates become president, right now it seem useless but there always a pattern in politics
i'm confused as to why a staff predominately male is termed to be an offense also. Is that implying anyone with more than 1/2 the staff as male is committing a crime now?
I would argue based on the numbers, hillary is the worst offender by not having enough males on her staff.
What difference does it make whether it's male or female? I would go for competence any day. In my experience as a woman, I found that woman in high positions have a problem handling it. In other words there seems to be an arrogance that emerges from being in a post they are not used to. Work your way up is my motto. The same goes for Dragon lady Clinton. She needs to start at the botttom perhaps in the mail room before she takes on the presidency.
Giuliani's is the worst?
Well, duh.
It can be difficult to find pro-war neoconservatives who aren't men, with the possible exception - on a number of counts - of Ann Coulter.
Let's see: Democrats lost with Susan and Donna, the point being that incompetence trumps gender, always and everyday. So who cares what gender these political advisers are?
You must be logged in to comment. Log in or connect with
