User:Ducksarethebestbird/Identity politics

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=== The portion of this article discussing gender is remarkably short and doesn't do enough to bring identity politics into other discussions. My edits would include discussions of substantive and descriptive representation in politics. This would broaden the article and bring it into contemporary political discourse. ===

Hispanic/Latino identity politics[edit]
See also: Hispanic and Latino Americans in politics

According to Leonie Huddy, Lilliana Mason, and S. Nechama Horwitz, the majority of Latinos in the United States identity with the Democratic Party. Latinos' Democratic proclivities can be explained by: ideological policy preferences and an expressive identity based on the defense of Latino identity and status, with a strong support for the latter explanation hinged on an analysis of the 2012 Latino Immigrant National Election Study and American National Election Study focused on Latino immigrants and citizens respectively. When perceiving pervasive discrimination against Latinos and animosity from the Republican party, a strong partisanship preference further intensified, and in return, increased Latino political campaign engagement.

'''The policy decisions regarding national immigration policy throughout U.S. history have functioned to exert control over the flow of immigrants, which has been recognized as an important factor to the nation building of the U.S. For example, as a result of the Bracero Program, in 1957, legal entries from Mexico totalled 485,000 persons, 436,000 of which arrived on temporary work visas. Figure 1 demonstrates that the total population of undocumented residents has increased significantly over the past few decades.[Insert example of immigration statistics from another latin american country The social and cultural consequences of this continuing flow of immigration from Latin America led to concerted efforts to increase the political visibility of Hispanic/Latino population. [Invention of the term "Hispanic" and Latin America]'''

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Gender
Gender identity politics is an approach that views politics, both in practice and as an academic discipline, as having a gendered nature and that gender is an identity that influences how people think. Politics has become increasingly gender political as formal structures and informal 'rules of the game' have become gendered. How institutions affect men and women differently are starting to be analysed in more depth as gender will affect institutional innovation.

'''A key element of studying electoral behavior in all democracies is political partisanship. In 1996, Eric Plutzer and John F. Zipp examined the election of 1992 election, also commonly referred to as "Year of the Woman", where a then-record- breaking 14 women ran for governor or U.S. senator, 4 of whom were successfully elected into office. Plutzer and Zipp found that, in 8 of 13 statewide elections analyzed, the sex of the voter was significantly related to voting for female candidates among partisans of both parties as well as Independents. This gender effect was further amplified for Democratic female candidates who were rated as most feminist. These results demonstrate that gender identity has and can function as a cue for voting behavior.'''

Women's Identity Politics in the United States[edit]
Scholars of social movements and democratic theorists disagree on whether identity politics weaken women's social movements and undermine their influence on public policy or have reverse effects. S. Laurel Weldon argues that when marginalized groups organize around an intersectional social location, knowledge about the social group is generated, feelings of affiliation between group members are strengthened, and the movement's agenda becomes more representative. Specifically for the United States, Weldon suggests that organizing women by race strengthens these movements and improves government responsiveness to both violence against women of color and women in general.

'''Issues have revealed that gender identity politics, instead of transcending differences, may have an inadvertent effect of ignoring these differences altogether. For example, in the context of violence against women, many women's experiences are differently shaped by other aspects of their identity, such as race and class. '''

edit: Addition of a subsection to Gender section

Representation in U.S. politics
'''Political representation can be broken down into multiple categories. Descriptive representation is a form of representation where officeholders are of similar backgrounds to the people they represent. Substantive representation centers on representatives focusing on the issues of a particular group, without the representatives necessarily being of a similar background to the people they represent.'''

References