My upcoming book, an edited volume called “Political Black Girl Magic: The Elections and Governance of Black Female Mayors” examines the background of 24 Black women elected to lead cities over 50,000 since 2000 to learn who these pioneering women are and how they came to power.
Then came 2017, when five African American women held that office simultaneously in Atlanta, Baton Rouge, Baltimore, Toledo and Washington, D.C. Huffington Post dubbed it the “Year of the Black Woman Mayor.”
In 2019, Chicago’s Lori Lightfoot, a former prosecutor, defeated another Black woman in the Democratic primary to become the city’s first Black – and first openly gay – female mayor.
And unlike many of the country’s first Black male mayors, who were primarily elected in poor cities, Black female mayors lead a socioeconomically and demographically diverse array of communities, including super-wealthy enclaves like San Francisco.
In so many of the cities these women lead – from Atlanta and Ferguson to Washington, D.C. and Chicago – Black residents have struggled to achieve political and economic power despite their large population.
