Living in Monterrey, Mexico during the lower congressional chamber and local elections, I have been noticing a lot about the differences in the political process between the U.S. and Mexico. One of the first things I noticed was the prominence of women candidates. About half of the people running are women. This is a far higher rate than in my very conservative home state of Utah. I found out there are so many women because Mexican election law requires each party to fill 40% of its candidate lists with women. The current congress is made up of 24% women in the lower chamber and 21% in the upper chamber. This is significantly higher than the rates in the United States.
 
People might be surprised to hear this given Mexico’s reputation of machismo. While it’s true that sexism is more wide-spread here and generally stronger than in the U.S.; the most notable thing about it is that it seems to have little influence on the daily lives of many women and their legitimacy in business and government leadership roles. Most people I know have a woman boss or boss’s boss and there doesn’t seem to be any tension or resentment due to that fact. There are women doctors, engineers, and business administrators to name a few. The leader of one of the main parties, the PRI, is a woman. This apparent, though not complete, equal opportunity does not hold for lower ranking jobs. These are still explicitly divided up by gender with companies looking for a “señorita” to fill a secretarial position and “varones” to fill other types of positions. The stark differences in hiring practices show the beneficial effects of education for women in their own lives and for the perceptions of women in the more educated portions of society.
 
While I don’t think that quotas would be an appropriate change for the US congress; I think the Mexican systems shows the importance of fielding a critical mass of women candidates and women leaders to change societal perceptions of women and gender relations. Whether this is brought about by government edict or groups like WomenCount or the White House Project, the effects are the same. People will, albeit slowly, come to accept and appreciate women in positions of leadership. Even if having a few women at the top doesn’t break the glass ceiling; it clearly illustrates that the ceiling is there. This increased awareness, along with visible role models makes a huge difference in the perceptions of young women and men here and in the U.S.. Even if most women candidates here lose, their visibility helps diminish the machismo in all our lives.

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