Andrew Cuomo

Is the Albany Power 100 list sexist?

Blame society, not the journalists who report on it, for the unequal distribution of power in the Albany Power 100.

Secretary to the Governor Melissa DeRosa discussing the highlights of the fiscal year 2019 budget, alongside Gov. Andrew Cuomo.

Secretary to the Governor Melissa DeRosa discussing the highlights of the fiscal year 2019 budget, alongside Gov. Andrew Cuomo. Mike Groll/Office of the Governor

Editor’s Note: In response to past criticism that our annual Albany Power 100 list underrepresents women, we asked feminist journalist Lindsay Beyerstein to analyze this year’s list. We gave her advance access to the list and gave her complete freedom to reach her own conclusions.

What are we to make of the fact only 29 people on City & State New York’s Albany Power 100 list are women? Only one woman initially cracked the top 10 – Melissa DeRosa at No. 7 – until state Attorney General Eric Schneiderman resigned for allegedly hitting multiple girlfriends, bringing his acting replacement, Barbara Underwood, into the rankings. Only six women made it into the top 20 and only 14 are in the top 50. Does that mean the list is biased against women?

No, because the list is an exercise in journalism rather than activism. The goal of the list is to document the most powerful figures in state politics. This list is dominated by politicians, political staffers, labor leaders and lobbyists, with the odd university chancellor, judge, developer or philanthropist thrown in for good measure. While there’s a certain amount of subjectivity inherent in any list of superlatives, the Albany Power 100 is an effort to measure political reality.

The point is not to feel better about a bad situation.

That doesn’t mean one can’t quibble with the specific choices, or argue that more attention to gender diversity – or at least a broader understanding of political power – would lead to more women appearing on the list, or being ranked higher. Because lists are made to be debated, I have a couple suggestions: New Yorker reporter Jane Mayer merited inclusion, after her devastating exposé with Ronan Farrow of physical abuse and abuse of power forced Schneiderman to resign in under four hours – especially since she is a leading investigative political reporter at the most prestigious magazine in New York. (Her work on major New York-based Republican donors such as the Mercers and David Koch also dramatically shifted political conversation.) Another strong contender would be New York City Public Advocate Letitia James, the city’s second-highest-ranking public official and a politician with enough juice to be discussed as a leading candidate to replace Schneiderman, until she took herself out of the running to serve the remainder of his term, reportedly to improve her odds of winning a full term at the polls.

But, quibbling aside, the makeup of the list reflects an ugly reality: Political and institutional power in New York is still disproportionately held by men. Only one person on the list holds a job that’s officially off-limits to women (Cardinal Timothy Dolan, No. 91). Yet women are far from equally represented in the upper echelons of power in the Empire State.

When measuring power in Albany, there’s only so much room for subjectivity. A lot of people are powerful because of their institutional roles and many of these institutions are dominated by men.

New York boasts so many firsts in the struggle for women’s equality that it’s easy to get complacent.

A closer look at the list demonstrates the constraints on revising the list for parity: Gov. Andrew Cuomo is No. 1, immediately followed by President Donald Trump, Assembly Speaker Carl Heastie, U.S. Senate Minority Leader Charles Schumer and state Senate Majority Leader John Flanagan. None of these jobs has ever been held by a woman. The office of state Comptroller (Thomas DiNapoli, No. 6) has also never been held by a woman.

New York is a union town, and few would dispute that the leader of the 400,000-member 1199SEIU (George Gresham, No. 14), and the leader of the mighty New York Hotel and Motel Trades Council (Peter Ward, No. 15), deserve their lofty spots on the power brokers’ list. 1199SEIU hasn’t had a female president since the 1980s and the Hotel Trades Council has never had one. They both outrank the mayor of New York City (Bill de Blasio, No. 20), which has never had a female mayor. No woman has ever been Bronx borough president (Rubén Díaz Jr., No. 41), or executive director of the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey (Rick Cotton, No. 49). One could go on.

New York boasts so many firsts in the struggle for women’s equality, from the declaration at Seneca Falls to the presidential bids of Shirley Chisholm and Hillary Clinton, that it’s easy to get complacent. Only 11 out of 51 members of the New York City Council are women. New York’s congressional delegation has just nine women out of 29 members.

The state power structure is heavily dominated by men and any list that didn’t reflect that would be doing a profound disservice to its readers.

The gender imbalance in New York politics is typical of the whole country. The United States ranks 104th out of more than 190 countries for women in office. Only 20 percent of the members of Congress are women. Nationwide, just 25 percent of state legislators are women – which is up from 8 percent in 1975 – but that share has stalled in the low-to-mid 20s for two decades. Clearly structural changes are needed to even the odds.

Each individual rank is a judgement call. On the margins, different writers might have chosen a few more women. But the fact is that the state power structure is heavily dominated by men and any list that didn’t reflect that would be doing a profound disservice to its readers. The goal here is documentation, not validation. The point is not to feel better about a bad situation.

The Albany Power 100 isn’t an endorsement. The object of the exercise isn’t to celebrate the status quo or congratulate the people who are on the list. The goal is to illuminate the power structure.

As readers, if we don’t like what we see, it’s up to us to change it.

X
This website uses cookies to enhance user experience and to analyze performance and traffic on our website. We also share information about your use of our site with our social media, advertising and analytics partners. Learn More / Do Not Sell My Personal Information
Accept Cookies
X
Cookie Preferences Cookie List

Do Not Sell My Personal Information

When you visit our website, we store cookies on your browser to collect information. The information collected might relate to you, your preferences or your device, and is mostly used to make the site work as you expect it to and to provide a more personalized web experience. However, you can choose not to allow certain types of cookies, which may impact your experience of the site and the services we are able to offer. Click on the different category headings to find out more and change our default settings according to your preference. You cannot opt-out of our First Party Strictly Necessary Cookies as they are deployed in order to ensure the proper functioning of our website (such as prompting the cookie banner and remembering your settings, to log into your account, to redirect you when you log out, etc.). For more information about the First and Third Party Cookies used please follow this link.

Allow All Cookies

Manage Consent Preferences

Strictly Necessary Cookies - Always Active

We do not allow you to opt-out of our certain cookies, as they are necessary to ensure the proper functioning of our website (such as prompting our cookie banner and remembering your privacy choices) and/or to monitor site performance. These cookies are not used in a way that constitutes a “sale” of your data under the CCPA. You can set your browser to block or alert you about these cookies, but some parts of the site will not work as intended if you do so. You can usually find these settings in the Options or Preferences menu of your browser. Visit www.allaboutcookies.org to learn more.

Sale of Personal Data, Targeting & Social Media Cookies

Under the California Consumer Privacy Act, you have the right to opt-out of the sale of your personal information to third parties. These cookies collect information for analytics and to personalize your experience with targeted ads. You may exercise your right to opt out of the sale of personal information by using this toggle switch. If you opt out we will not be able to offer you personalised ads and will not hand over your personal information to any third parties. Additionally, you may contact our legal department for further clarification about your rights as a California consumer by using this Exercise My Rights link

If you have enabled privacy controls on your browser (such as a plugin), we have to take that as a valid request to opt-out. Therefore we would not be able to track your activity through the web. This may affect our ability to personalize ads according to your preferences.

Targeting cookies may be set through our site by our advertising partners. They may be used by those companies to build a profile of your interests and show you relevant adverts on other sites. They do not store directly personal information, but are based on uniquely identifying your browser and internet device. If you do not allow these cookies, you will experience less targeted advertising.

Social media cookies are set by a range of social media services that we have added to the site to enable you to share our content with your friends and networks. They are capable of tracking your browser across other sites and building up a profile of your interests. This may impact the content and messages you see on other websites you visit. If you do not allow these cookies you may not be able to use or see these sharing tools.

If you want to opt out of all of our lead reports and lists, please submit a privacy request at our Do Not Sell page.

Save Settings
Cookie Preferences Cookie List

Cookie List

A cookie is a small piece of data (text file) that a website – when visited by a user – asks your browser to store on your device in order to remember information about you, such as your language preference or login information. Those cookies are set by us and called first-party cookies. We also use third-party cookies – which are cookies from a domain different than the domain of the website you are visiting – for our advertising and marketing efforts. More specifically, we use cookies and other tracking technologies for the following purposes:

Strictly Necessary Cookies

We do not allow you to opt-out of our certain cookies, as they are necessary to ensure the proper functioning of our website (such as prompting our cookie banner and remembering your privacy choices) and/or to monitor site performance. These cookies are not used in a way that constitutes a “sale” of your data under the CCPA. You can set your browser to block or alert you about these cookies, but some parts of the site will not work as intended if you do so. You can usually find these settings in the Options or Preferences menu of your browser. Visit www.allaboutcookies.org to learn more.

Functional Cookies

We do not allow you to opt-out of our certain cookies, as they are necessary to ensure the proper functioning of our website (such as prompting our cookie banner and remembering your privacy choices) and/or to monitor site performance. These cookies are not used in a way that constitutes a “sale” of your data under the CCPA. You can set your browser to block or alert you about these cookies, but some parts of the site will not work as intended if you do so. You can usually find these settings in the Options or Preferences menu of your browser. Visit www.allaboutcookies.org to learn more.

Performance Cookies

We do not allow you to opt-out of our certain cookies, as they are necessary to ensure the proper functioning of our website (such as prompting our cookie banner and remembering your privacy choices) and/or to monitor site performance. These cookies are not used in a way that constitutes a “sale” of your data under the CCPA. You can set your browser to block or alert you about these cookies, but some parts of the site will not work as intended if you do so. You can usually find these settings in the Options or Preferences menu of your browser. Visit www.allaboutcookies.org to learn more.

Sale of Personal Data

We also use cookies to personalize your experience on our websites, including by determining the most relevant content and advertisements to show you, and to monitor site traffic and performance, so that we may improve our websites and your experience. You may opt out of our use of such cookies (and the associated “sale” of your Personal Information) by using this toggle switch. You will still see some advertising, regardless of your selection. Because we do not track you across different devices, browsers and GEMG properties, your selection will take effect only on this browser, this device and this website.

Social Media Cookies

We also use cookies to personalize your experience on our websites, including by determining the most relevant content and advertisements to show you, and to monitor site traffic and performance, so that we may improve our websites and your experience. You may opt out of our use of such cookies (and the associated “sale” of your Personal Information) by using this toggle switch. You will still see some advertising, regardless of your selection. Because we do not track you across different devices, browsers and GEMG properties, your selection will take effect only on this browser, this device and this website.

Targeting Cookies

We also use cookies to personalize your experience on our websites, including by determining the most relevant content and advertisements to show you, and to monitor site traffic and performance, so that we may improve our websites and your experience. You may opt out of our use of such cookies (and the associated “sale” of your Personal Information) by using this toggle switch. You will still see some advertising, regardless of your selection. Because we do not track you across different devices, browsers and GEMG properties, your selection will take effect only on this browser, this device and this website.