Martha Johnson – författare

This is an open access title available under the terms of a CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 International license. It is free to read at [Oxford Scholarship Online and offered as a free PDF download from OUP and selected open access locations.Women and Power in Africa: Aspiring, Campaigning, and Governing examines women's experiences in African politics as aspirants to public office, as candidates in election campaigns, and as elected representatives. Part I evaluates women's efforts to become party candidates in four African countries: Benin, Ghana, Malawi, and Zambia. The chapters draw on a variety of methods, including extensive interviews with women candidates, to describe and assess the barriers confronted when women seek to enter politics. The chapters help explain why women remain underrepresented as candidates for office, particularly in countries without gender-based quotas, by emphasizing the impact of financial constraints, fears of violence, and resistance among party leaders. Part II turns to women's experiences as candidates during elections in Kenya and Ghana. One chapter provides an in-depth account of a woman's presidential bid in Kenya, demonstrating how gendered ethnicity undermined her candidacy, and another chapter presents a novel evaluation of the media's coverage of women candidates in Ghana. Part III turns to women as legislators in Namibia, Uganda, and Burkina Faso, asking whether women engage in substantive representation on gendered policy issues once in office. The chapters challenge the assumption that a critical mass of women is necessary or sufficient to achieve substantive representation. Taken together, the book's chapters problematize existing hypotheses regarding women in political power, drawing on understudied countries and variety of empirical methods. By following political pathways from entry to governance, the book uncovers how gendered experiences early in the political process shape what is possible for women once they attain political power.Oxford Studies in African Politics and International Relations is a series for scholars and students working on African politics and International Relations and related disciplines. Volumes concentrate on contemporary developments in African political science, political economy, and International Relations, such as electoral politics, democratization, decentralization, the political impact of natural resources, the dynamics and consequences of conflict, and the nature of the continent's engagement with the East and West. Comparative and mixed methods work is particularly encouraged. Case studies are welcomed but should demonstrate the broader theoretical and empirical implications of the study and its wider relevance to contemporary debates. The series focuses on sub-Saharan Africa, although proposals that explain how the region engages with North Africa and other parts of the world are of interest.Series Editors: Nic Cheeseman, Professor of Democracy and International Development, University of Birmingham; and Ricardo Soares de Oliveira, Professor of the International Politics of Africa, University of Oxford.

How are leaders facing a crisis supposed to handle and overcome an unknowable set of issues? This book demonstrates how effective leaders under pressure work from an understanding of the situation at hand and of their impact on others, and explains how leaders can best apply their internal strengths.Most leaders are steeped in risk management, crisis response tactics, readiness for disaster, continuity-of-operations planning, and logistical and agility capabilities. These preparations are critical but not complete. The reality is that even experienced leaders themselves need guidance when it comes to managing a crisis. This standout book fills that need, drawing on interviews with successful leaders; research findings on trauma, neuroscience, and crisis management; and the authors' own extensive career experiences. The chapters suggest and probe ideas from various angles rather than promoting simplistic formulas or nostrums that are unlikely to apply to all circumstances and present new angles on self-awareness and management under pressure for the practitioner.The book leads off with a description of organizational disaster and crisis leadership—topics of considerable concern as disasters are becoming the "new normal." The authors then explore three critical but very different types of responses by leaders at such a time: recognition and response, care of self and others, and storytelling. A detailed case study of a leader in the midst of Hurricane Katrina—the most expensive natural disaster in U.S. history—provides readers with a real-world practicum for the theories and ideas suggested.