Quotas

Quota Laws for Women in Politics: Implications for Feminist Practice

Citation:

Krook, Mona Lena. 2008. “Quota Laws for Women in Politics: Implications for Feminist Practice.” Social Politics: International Studies in Gender, State and Society 15 (3): 345–68.

Author: Mona Lena Krook

Abstract:

More than fifty countries have adopted quota laws to regulate the selection or election of women to political office. This suggests that states have begun to identify quotas as a new state-led strategy for incorporating women into public life and, by extension, for promoting feminist aims to improve women's overall social, economic, and political status. This article explores the reasons why quotas have been so readily adopted in diverse countries around the world, as well as possible implications for women as political actors and for women as a group, to gauge the broader meaning of quotas for feminism in practice.

Topics: Feminisms, Gender, Women, Governance, Quotas, Political Participation

Year: 2008

Women in Parliaments: Descriptive and Substantive Representation

Citation:

Wängnerud, Lena. 2009. "Women in Parliaments: Descriptive and Substantive Representation."Annual Review of Political Science 12: 51-69.

Author: Lena Wängnerud

Abstract:

This essay reviews two research programs. The first focuses on variations in the number of women elected to national parliaments in the world (descriptive representation), and the second focuses on effects of women's presence in parliament (substantive representation). The theory of the politics of presence (Phillips 1995) provides reasons for expecting a link between descriptive and substantive representation. The safest position would be to say that results are “mixed” when it comes to empirical support for the theory of the politics of presence. However, when a large number of studies covering a wide set of indicators on the importance of gender in the parliamentary process are piled together, the picture that emerges shows that female politicians contribute to strengthening the position of women's interest.

Topics: Gender, Women, Gender Balance, Governance, Quotas, Political Participation

Year: 2009

Women, Quotas and Politics

Citation:

Dahlerup, Drude. 2006. Women, Quotas and Politics. London: Routledge.

Author: Drude Dahlerup

Abstract:

Given the slow speed at which the number of women in politics is growing, different policy measures are being introduced to reach gender balance in political institutions. Quotas present one such mechanism to increase, and safeguard, women’s presence in parliaments and are now being introduced all over the world. What are the arguments for and against the use of quotas? What types of quota have led to substantial increase

in women’s political representation in practice? Which quotas work best in different electoral systems and how can they be effectively enforced? This chapter examines the world of electoral quotas and the ways in which quotas can lead, and have led, to historic leaps in women’s political representation.

Topics: Gender, Women, Gender Balance, Gendered Power Relations, Gender Equality/Inequality, Governance, Quotas, Political Participation, Rights, Women's Rights

Year: 2006

Explaining Women's Legislative Representation in Sub-Saharan Africa

Citation:

Yoon, Mi Yung. 2004. “Explaining Women’s Legislative Representation in Sub-Saharan Africa.” Legislative Studies Quarterly 29 (3): 447–68. doi:10.3162/036298004X201258.

Author: Mi Yung Yoon

Abstract:

This study examines the relative impacts of social, economic, cultural, and political determinants on women's legislative representation in sub-Saharan Africa by using an ordinary least squares multiple regression model. Under study are sub-Saharan African countries that held democratic legislative elections between January 1990 and June 30, 2001. Only the latest election in each country is included for analysis. My study finds that patriarchal culture, proportional representation systems, and gender quotas are statistically significant. This study, by focusing on sub-Saharan Africa, fills a gap in the extant literature, which has focused on women's legislative representation in advanced industrialized democracies.

Topics: Democracy / Democratization, Gender, Women, Gendered Power Relations, Patriarchy, Governance, Quotas, Elections, Political Participation Regions: Africa, Central Africa, East Africa, Southern Africa, West Africa

Year: 2004

Coalition Building, Election Rules, and Party Politics: South African Women's Path to Parliament

Citation:

Britton, Hannah E. 2002. “Coalition Building, Election Rules, and Party Politics: South African Women’s Path to Parliament.” Africa Today 49 (4): 33–67.

Author: Hannah E. Britton

Abstract:

This paper argues that pre-transition mobilization by South African women fostered post transition success in constitutional mandates, party politics, and office holding. Informed by examples of failed postliberation gender movements in Zimbabwe, Mozambique, and Angola, South African women's groups worked collectively and individually to advance gender equality. Women mobilized around their gender identity to form a powerful multiparty women's coalition, which became a vehicle through which women pushed for inclusion in the Constitutional Assembly. Using this external power-base, women's branches of major political parties compelled their parties' leaders to implement affirmative-action measures for candidate recruitment and selection. These measures, particularly the gender quota of the African National Congress, have pressured all political parties to increase the number of women on their party-lists in subsequent elections.

Topics: Gender, Women, Gendered Power Relations, Gender Equality/Inequality, Governance, Constitutions, Quotas, Elections, Post-Conflict Governance, Political Participation, Post-Conflict Regions: Africa, Southern Africa Countries: South Africa

Year: 2002

Increasing Women’s Political Representation: New Trends in Gender Quotas

Citation:

Dahlerup, Drude. 2005. “Increasing Women’s Political Representation: New Trends in Gender Quotas.” In Women in Parliament: Beyond Numbers, edited by Julie Ballington and Azza Karam, 141-153. Stockholm, Sweden: International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance (IDEA).

Author: Drude Dahlerup

Abstract:

Given the slow speed at which the number of women in politics is growing, different policy measures are being introduced to reach gender balance in political institutions. Quotas present one such mechanism to increase, and safeguard, women’s presence in parliaments and are now being introduced all over the world. What are the arguments for and against the use of quotas? What types of quota have led to substantial increase in women’s political representation in practice? Which quotas work best in different electoral systems and how can they be effectively enforced? This chapter examines the world of electoral quotas and the ways in which quotas can lead, and have led, to historic leaps in women’s political representation.

Keywords: women in politics, political representation, gender quotas, electoral systems

Topics: Gender, Women, Gender Balance, Governance, Quotas, Political Participation

Year: 2005

Constitutional Engineering: What Opportunities for the Enhancement of Gender Rights?

Citation:

Waylen, Georgina. 2006. “Constitutional Engineering: What Opportunities for the Enhancement of Gender Rights?” Third World Quarterly 27 (7): 1209–21.

Author: Georgina Waylen

Abstract:

The majority of feminist scholars have neglected the impact of constitutional design to date. But it has recently come to the fore, as institutional engineering has been a key part of the efforts to ‘build democracy after conflict’ (or impose it from the outside), most notably in Iraq and Afghanistan. This paper will examine some contrasting experiences of constitutional design (with evidence drawn primarily from some transitions to democracy) and draw out some wider lessons for feminists exploring effective strategies to enhance gender rights. It will also widen the debate from the institutional concerns that have predominated to date, namely quotas as a mechanism to enhance women's descriptive representation and, to a lesser extent, national women's machineries as a mechanism to enhance women's substantive representation. It will focus more broadly on the opportunities that constitutional design can provide to embed women's rights more securely and create an enabling framework that can subsequently be used toenhance all forms of women's rights, not just civil and political ones.

Topics: Feminisms, Gender, Women, Governance, Constitutions, Quotas, Post-Conflict Governance, Peacebuilding, Political Participation, Post-Conflict, Post-Conflict Reconstruction, Rights, Women's Rights Regions: MENA, Asia, Middle East, South Asia Countries: Afghanistan, Iraq

Year: 2006

Fighting Both Struggles in Palestine

Citation:

Maas, Kirsten. 1998. “Fighting Both Struggles in Palestine.” Lola Press 1 (8): 44.

Author: Kirsten Maas

Abstract:

Palestinian women were active participants in the struggle for the liberation of the homeland especially during the Intifada. But their contribution started as early as the beginning of the century. In 1921, a group of upper class, urban women - most of them connected to male notables who led the nationalist movement - founded the Palestine Women's Union, concerned mostly with charitable work. Following the mass exodus of Palestinians from what became Israel in 1948, women activists focused on social and charitable work amongst the refugees. The founding of the Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) in 1964 ushered in a new era for women's activism, but there was no dramatic shift in consciousness of gender issues among women in occupied Palestine until well into the 1980s. Whatever feminist voices might have been raised during the revolutionary struggle in Jordan and Lebanon, and despite the leftist's ideological commitment to the women question", the dominant thesis was that women's liberation would follow national liberation. The General Union of Palestinian Women (GUPW) founded in 1965, was also unwilling to challenge the prevailing ideology of nationalism before feminism. Their leaders related more to their own political faction than to each other. In the 1980s however, a new generation of women activists began to raise feminist issues, including the reform of family law, gender relations within the national movement and the need for better primary health care for women.

 

Signs that the fate of Palestinian women would be disappointing were visible right from the beginning of the peace negotiations. Whereas the PLO's declaration of independence on 15 November 1988 had clearly stated that `Palestine is a state based on social justice, equality with no discrimination in general rights on the basis of ethnicity, religion, colour or between men and women", the implementation of women's rights seemed to have been postponed by the PLO. When only four women were appointed to the more than three hundred slots on the Technical Committees formed after the 1992 Madrid conference - the beginning of the peace negotiations -- Palestinian women formed a Women's Technical Committee to demand the appointment of more women and gender awareness to govern the work of all committees. Women mobilized again when the first draft of the constitution for the interim period was issued in December 1993 with no full guarantee of gender equality. In January 1994, members of the women's committees, the General Union of Palestinian Women and human rights groups went a step further: an independent "Women's Charter" group was formed to formulate a women's bill of rights, which was presented to the public on 3 August 1994 as "The Principles of Women's Legal Status". Based on the 1988 Palestinian Declaration of Independence, the charter calls for governance based on social justice and equality and the strengthening of the national and social struggle for Palestinian women to obtain equality, political, civil, economic, social and cultural rights. The charter derives much of its authority from various UN conventions, including the UN Convention to end Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW). Women continue to be marginalized in the political presentation, specially within the Palestinian Authority. Out of a 22-member cabinet, only one member is a woman. Women constitute only 5.8% of Palestinian Legislative Council and out of the approximately 800 director generals in the various Palestinian Authority ministries there are five women. This has motivated Palestinian women activists to demand a quota of 30% in the forthcoming elections.

 

Topics: Civil Society, Gender, Women, Gendered Power Relations, Gender Equality/Inequality, Governance, Constitutions, Quotas, Nationalism, Peace Processes, Political Participation, Rights, Women's Rights Regions: MENA, Asia, Middle East Countries: Palestine / Occupied Palestinian Territories

Year: 1998

Dazzling the World: A Study of India's Constitutional Amendment Mandating Reservations for Women on Rural Panchayats

Citation:

Harmon, Louise, and Eileen Kaufman. 2004. "Dazzling the World: A Study of India's Constitutional Amendment Mandating Reservations for Women on Rural Panchayats." Berkeley Women's Law Journal 19 (1): 32-105.

Authors: Louise Harmon, Eileen Kaufman

Keywords: democracy, local government, constitutional design, political institutions

Topics: Gender, Women, Governance, Quotas, Elections, Political Participation Regions: Asia, South Asia Countries: India

Year: 2004

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