{"id":12585,"date":"2016-01-04T09:12:07","date_gmt":"2016-01-04T14:12:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/college.unc.edu\/?p=12585"},"modified":"2024-07-02T16:27:13","modified_gmt":"2024-07-02T16:27:13","slug":"the-starting-point","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/collegearchive.unc.edu\/?p=12585","title":{"rendered":"The Starting Point"},"content":{"rendered":"
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\"Andrew<\/a>
Andrew Reynolds and Logan Casey, along with other advocates for the global transgender community, presented their findings on trans* people in electoral politics at the British Parliament in November.
(Photo courtesy of Andrew Reynolds)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

I<\/span>t\u2019s the first week of December, and much of America is watching Ted Cruz and Donald Trump hurl insults at each other. But a political science professor at UNC<\/span>-Chapel Hill is keeping close tabs on some lesser-known political candidates in other parts of the world. In Australia, the first openly gay member of Parliament <\/a>was just elected. Meanwhile, Venezuela just elected the first transgender woman <\/a>to their National Assembly. Andrew Reynolds, director of the UNC<\/span> LGBTQ<\/span> Representation and Rights Initiative<\/a> and an associate professor of political science in the College of Arts and Sciences, updates his website to reflect these developments. He maintains a running list of all LGBTQ<\/span> elected officials, all around the world, and he updates it constantly.<\/p>\n

\u201cJust about every week, someone is elected, or someone comes out,\u201d Reynolds\u00a0says.<\/p>\n

While the list contains hundreds of openly gay, lesbian, and bisexual people, it includes only a handful of transgender people. The grand total of openly trans* people who have ever been elected to public office is\u00a052.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen you hear that number, it may sound like a lot,\u201d Reynolds says. \u201cBut it\u2019s a drop in the bucket compared to the ocean of hundreds of thousands of people who run in electoral races around the world every\u00a0year.\u201d<\/p>\n

The UNC<\/span> LGBTQ<\/span> Representation and Rights Initiative published a report in November called \u201cStanding Out: Transgender and Gender Variant Candidates and Elected Officials Around the World<\/a>.\u201d And when Reynolds tweeted about it, the impact permeated globally. \u201cIt almost crashed our website,\u201d he says, smiling. The site was visited thousands of times, and hundreds of people downloaded the\u00a0report.<\/p>\n

Real\u00a0representation<\/strong><\/p>\n

Reynolds recruited Logan Casey, a scholar and advocate on issues facing trans* people, to take on an unprecedented project with him: compile a comprehensive report on all the transgender people who have been elected to office \u2014 anywhere in the world,\u00a0ever.<\/p>\n

\u201cStudying transgender people in electoral politics is something that has just never been done,\u201d Reynolds says. \u201cThere are so few\u00a0examples.\u201d<\/p>\n

Both Reynolds and Casey point out that one way to measure the progress of minority groups is their inclusion in formal institutions, like government. \u201cWe\u2019ve noted the moments when the first black person was elected to Congress, or the first woman,\u201d Casey says. \u201cAnd we\u2019re still focused on that in our presidential race here in the U.S.<\/span> But this project was all about trans* people serving their communities around the\u00a0world.\u201d<\/p>\n

Before beginning the project, Reynolds and Casey approached dozens of leading transgender advocates and groups from across the country and the world to ask: \u201cHas anyone done this?\u201d Specifically, they were trying to find out if anyone had ever counted the number of transgender people who have run for office. According to their sources, nobody had \u2014 but they all encouraged Reynolds and Casey to move forward with the\u00a0project.<\/p>\n

Will all the trans* people please stand\u00a0up? <\/strong><\/p>\n

To begin their search, Reynolds and Casey asked trans* advocates and organizations to provide the names of people who had been elected to public office as openly transgender. They reached out to each name they received to confirm his or her transgender identity was public knowledge. Each person became a new resource, providing Reynolds and Casey with the names of other trans* people serving in public\u00a0office.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou just start with a pool of people and then you fill in the gaps,\u201d Reynolds says. \u201cThere are a couple of websites and blogs out there but nothing\u00a0systematic.\u201d<\/p>\n

Until now. After combing through every country on the planet and over 40 years of history<\/a>, \u00a0they found that 126 transgender individuals from 30 countries have run in 209 races and been elected 72 times. The first time a community elected an openly trans* person happened in 1986 \u2014 Rachael Webb served on the London City Council for eight years. The most recent trans* person to be elected to public office is Tamara Adri\u00e1n, Venezuela\u2019s first self-disclosed trans* member of\u00a0Parliament.<\/p>\n

Despite their exhaustive search, Casey acknowledges that a couple people may have slipped through the cracks. \u201cWe know that we didn\u2019t find every single person in the world,\u201d Casey says. \u201cWe know that we\u2019re going to miss people because it\u2019s the first time we\u2019ve ever done this and we have limited\u00a0resources.\u201d<\/p>\n

Since the report has been published, more trans* people have come forward. Casey and Reynolds plan to publish a report with updated numbers in\u00a0January.<\/p>\n

London is\u00a0listening <\/strong><\/p>\n

The impact of the report goes far beyond retweets and downloads. Casey and Reynolds traveled to London at the beginning of November to present their findings to the British\u00a0Parliament.<\/p>\n

They discussed their numbers and the success rate of trans* people getting elected\u2014about one in three. The main obstacle is getting to the point of running for office. \u201cIt\u2019s an almost overwhelmingly high bar to even run for office as a trans* person \u2014 just to deal with the questions and the prejudice,\u201d Reynolds says. Casey points out that for most members of the trans* community, life is filled with more pressing concerns than trying to manage a political campaign. \u201cTrans* people are busy trying not to get murdered, and to secure healthcare, stable jobs, and housing. So the biggest hurdle right now is\u00a0survival.\u201d<\/p>\n

Upon hearing the findings from the report, the government officials were incredibly receptive, according to Casey. \u201cEveryone we spoke to in the British government asked: \u2018What do we need to do to make things\u00a0better?\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

LGB<\/span> versus\u00a0T <\/strong><\/p>\n

Reynolds draws a parallel between where transgender people are in politics today to where gay people were in politics 40 years ago. But he is careful not to make a direct comparison. \u201cThe gay experience, while far from identical, is a parallel experience and thus useful history for scholars and transgender activists alike,\u201d he says.<\/p>\n

When major triumphs occur in the LGBT<\/span> community, like nation-wide marriage equality, Reynolds says people often assume that transgender people are included in that victory.\u00a0 But they are often fighting different battles. \u201cThere are all these issues about your name, your legal identity, your health care, that are very, very different when you\u2019re a trans* person,\u201d he says. \u201cThe levels of suicide, bullying, depression, and homelessness amongst transgender youth, especially, is huge. It\u2019s bad in the gay and lesbian community as well, but in the transgender community, it\u2019s off the\u00a0charts.\u201d<\/p>\n

In the United States, LGBT<\/span> representation in politics is shifting. In 2013, there were 120 LGB<\/span> representatives serving in state legislators across the country. Now there are 97. \u201cWe\u2019ve lost almost a fifth of them because people step down and they\u2019re not being replaced.\u201d Now that gay marriage is legal nationwide, Reynolds says progressive donors are \u201cmoving on\u201d to other causes.<\/p>\n

Going\u00a0Forward <\/strong><\/p>\n

Descriptive representation is a no-brainer, according to Reynolds. \u201cYou\u2019re just less likely to be prejudiced if you know people who are gay or transgender,\u201d he says. \u201cSo the impact of their presence in legislative bodies \u2014 your local school board, your national parliament \u2014 is even more\u00a0powerful.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe know that, and that\u2019s my institute. We can measure that impact. It\u2019s a really powerful way that social change\u00a0happens.\u201d<\/p>\n

As a trans* person himself, Casey feels as though he views all trans* issues through a critical lens. \u201cIf you pose the question: \u2018What is the most urgent issue facing the transgender community?\u2019 the answer is not, \u2018Getting elected to\u00a0office.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

But in its own way, this report is already positively impacting trans* lives \u2014 and not just by educating policy makers. At the end of the presentation at the London School of Economics, there was time for the audience to ask questions. A young man stood up and said, \u201cI\u2019m a trans* person and I\u2019ve never thought about running for office before. But now that I\u2019ve seen this report \u2014 maybe I\u00a0will.\u201d<\/p>\n

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trans*<\/h3>\n<\/div>\n
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Transgender people identify and describe themselves in a variety of ways. Many global activists have started using the term \u201ctrans*\u201d with an asterisk, denoting a placeholder for the entire range of possible gender identities that fall under the broad definition\u00a0of\u00a0trans*.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

Andrew Reynolds is the director of the LGBTQ<\/span> Representation and Rights Initiative at UNC<\/span>-Chapel Hill and an associate professor in the Department of Political\u00a0Science.<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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Logan Casey is a doctoral candidate in the Department of Political Science at the University of\u00a0Michigan.\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n

Story by Mary Lide Parker, <\/em>Endeavors magazine<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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The UNC LGBTQ Representation and Rights Initiative has published the first worldwide comprehensive report on transgender people serving in elected office. 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