Feminist-in-Chief? Examining President Obama's Executive Orders on Women's Rights Issues

This article focuses on President Obama’s use of executive orders in various areas of women’s rights issues including the empowerment of women, gender-based violence, reproductive rights, and employment. As scholars of the American presidency have noted, executive orders can be used either as strategic tools to short-circuit legislative gridlock or to underscore and complement presidential policy measures pending in Congress. Executive orders can also serve to promote projects of special interest groups. Finally, knowing that their directives can be powerfully symbolic, presidents can be particularly effective in the use of executive action to underscore the gulf between the Democratic Party and the GOP on women’s issues.

Examining the content and context of President Obama’s executive orders on women’s rights can help us to ascertain whether he has been the Feminist-in-Chief during his time in office.