The Magazine

Political Women

The complications of gender in today's America.

Dec 14, 2009, Vol. 15, No. 13 • By SABRINA L. SCHAEFFER
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You've Come a Long Way, Maybe

Sarah, Michelle, Hillary, and the Shaping of the

New American Woman

by Leslie Sanchez

Palgrave Macmillan,

224 pp., $25

The hit television program Mad Men provides a remarkable (if exaggerated) portrayal of the sexism that once dominated the workplace, and defined much of mainstream society. The show is centered around an advertising agency in Manhattan in the early 1960s, where women--I mean, girls--work as secretaries until they find husbands, are left out of any meaningful conversation, and are treated largely as sexual objects.

Mad Men, of course, uses TV license; but there's no doubt that women have made tremendous strides, from business to medicine to media, shattered glass ceilings, and achieved levels of success no one working at Sterling Cooper--except, perhaps, Peggy Olson--would have imagined. Yet in politics, women have not quite found their footing. We have women representatives, senators, governors, and two women who figured prominently in the 2008 presidential race. But on balance, women are significantly underrepresented in American politics.

Or, at least, that's what Leslie Sanchez maintains in You've Come A Long Way, Maybe--a catchy title commending the accomplishments of women leaders while recognizing the challenges that still confront women interested "in the arena." A communications consultant and political strategist, Sanchez herself has experienced no shortage of professional success; but her careful analyses of Hillary Clinton, Sarah Palin, and Michelle Obama remind readers that, while women have come a long way since the dawn of the modern feminist movement, women -seeking public office share a daunting task.

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