ABSTRACT
This chapter discusses the prospects for equitable politics by considering a series of continuing challenges that confront political women. It investigates stereotypes and biases in evaluation that persistently work to the advantage of elite white men. The chapter examines pervasive pressures to assimilate to norms derived from elite men's experience—norms that are too narrow to encompass embodied differences. It explores political frames that mask raced-gendered power and economic practices that heighten inequalities. The chapter considers resistance within existing institutions to policies designed to foster equality and the mobilization of forces that aspire to further entrench racial and gender subordination. It evaluates various obstacles women confront in their continuing campaign for political inclusion, for the right to be fully and equitably engaged in all domains of existence—from local to global and from geospatial to sociospatial. Political futures are notoriously difficult to predict.
