This is an election poster created by Mapai in 1961. It was published in the run-up to the elections for the fifth Knesset (Israeli parliament) in 1961. In the fifth Knesset there were only 12 female members of parliament, 10 percent of all members.
The poster takes the form of a conversation between two women about the role of politics in their lives. The woman on the right is wearing a green shirt and black trousers and is surrounded by pieces of paper on which there are different Hebrew letters, signifying ballot cards. The woman opposite her, who is holding a piece of paper with the words “young people’s groups/Mapai” on it, is dressed smartly in a black shirt and pleated skirt and is informing her about the nature of politics.
In the Israeli elections, the voters choose one ballot card from a large collection and place it in the ballot box. Each card has a different letter, representing each of the political parties. The different ballot cards surrounding the woman on the right suggest the many different political parties that are confusing her. This confusion is reflected in her first question, when she asks the other woman to explain “what all these political parties want from me.”
The woman on the left is not confused, as she has already decided who she is voting for. She also seems to hold some sort of official position in Mapai, the Israeli Workers’ party, signified by the paper she is holding. She tells the other woman that women’s opinions and votes are just as important as men’s. When the women on the right says that she is not interested in politics, the women on the left shows her that she nonetheless has some important opinions on political topics, and that she should feel empowered to make a decision and to join a young people’s political group to meet like-minded individuals.
The poster presents politics as a male occupation in which women have little involvement. Indeed, despite trying to convince women that they have an equal voice in elections, the poster reinforces this attitude in the words and phrases used in the conversation. The statement that men and women have an equal say in the future of the country does little to change the overall outdated position on the role of women in politics reflected by the poster.
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Fifth Knesset Elections (1961) - The elections for the fifth Knesset (Israeli parliament) took place in 1961. These were the last elections in which David Ben-Gurion led the socialist Mapai party, having headed the party since the establishment of the State of Israel. Despite winning the elections once again, it was clear that Mapai’s hegemony was diminishing and that the Menachem Begin’s right-wing Herut party and the centrist Liberal party were gaining political power.
Women's Vote in Israel - Since the first elections for the institutions of the Yishuv (the Jewish population of pre-State Israel), Israeli women had fought for the right to vote. The first moshava (agricultural town) that gave women voting rights was Rishon LeZion in 1917. Women participated in their first national elections in Israel in 1926. When the State of Israel was established, the Declaration of Independence called for: “complete equality of social and political rights to all its inhabitants irrespective of religion, race or sex.” Accordingly, women have had to the right to vote and to be elected since the very first Knesset elections.
