Abstract
Electoral gender quotas, which aim to increase either the proportion of women candidates or political representatives, are currently used in over a hundred countries around the world. In most cases quota measures have been adopted over the past two decades. This chapter shows that the 1995 Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action fundamentally changed the international discourse on the diagnosis of women’s underrepresentation in politics and thus the solutions to it. As opposed to waiting for women to incrementally “catch up” with men, quotas represent a fast-track approach to increasing women’s representation in politics. Significantly, the use of electoral gender quotas means that the Global South has now overtaken the Global North as world leaders in women’s parliamentary representation. This is a rapid turnaround on the situation just 20 years ago where the Scandinavian countries and the Netherlands were at the top of the world rankings for women’s representation.
Despite there being resistance to their adoption and full implementation in most contexts, this chapter argues that electoral gender quotas have significantly advanced women’s access to parliamentary politics at a global level. The use of proportional representation (PR) continues to progress women’s representation to a much greater extent than plurality/majoritarian systems, and PR systems are generally more facilitating of quota implementation. Voluntary party quotas can be as effective as legal quotas if the right institutional and ideological factors are present. When properly implemented, quotas obstruct highly male-dominated recruitment patterns by encouraging or requiring parties to select increased numbers of women candidates or representatives.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Buckley F, Galligan Y, McGing C (2016) Women and the election: assessing the impact of gender quotas. In: Gallagher M, Marsh M (eds) How Ireland voted 2016. Palgrave Macmillan, New York, pp 185–205
Celis K, Childs S (2012) The substantive representation of women: what to do with conservative claims? Pol Stud 60:213–225
Childs S, Krook ML (2006) Should feminists give up on critical mass? A contingent yes. Polit Gend 2(4):522–530
Dahlerup D (2007) Electoral gender quotas: Between equality of opportunity and equality of result. Representations 43(2):73–92
Dahlerup D (2018) Has democracy failed women? Polity, Cambridge
Dahlerup D, Antić Gaber M (2017) Legitimacy and effectiveness of gender quotas in politics in Central and Eastern Europe. Teorija in Praksa 54(2):307–316
Dahlerup D, Freidenvall L (2005) Quotas as a ‘fast track’ to equal representation for women. Int Fem J Polit 7(1):26–48
Dahlerup D, Leyenaar M (2013) Breaking male dominance in politics. In: Dahlerup D, Leyenaar M (eds) Breaking male dominance is old democracies. Oxford University Press, Oxford, pp 221–237
Davidson-Schmich LK (2006) Implementation of political party gender quota: evidence from the German Länder 1990–2000. Party Polit 12(2):211–232
Farrell D (2011) Electoral systems: a comparative introduction, 2nd edn. Palgrave Macmillan, Basingstoke
Franceschet S, Piscopo J (2012) Gender and political backgrounds in Argentina. In: Franceschet S, Krook ML, Piscopo JM (eds) The impact of gender quotas. Oxford University Press, Oxford, pp 27–42
Freidenvall L (2003) Women’s political representation and gender quotas: the Swedish case. Working paper series 2003:2. Research program on gender quotas. Department of Political Science, Stockholm University, Stockholm. http://www.niyf.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/05/zipping.pdf
Hazan RY, Rahat G (2010) Democracy within parties: candidate selection methods and their political consequences. Oxford University Press, Oxford
Inter-Parliamentary Union (n.d.) Women in national parliaments. Inter-Parliamentary Union website. http://archive.ipu.org/wmn-e/classif-arc.htm
Kanter RM (1977) Men and women of the corporation. Basic Books, New York
Kenny M (2013) Gender and political recruitment: theorizing institutional change. Palgrave Macmillan, New York
Krook ML (2006) Reforming representation: the diffusion of candidate gender quotas worldwide. Polit Gend 2(3):303–327
Krook ML (2015) Gender and elections: temporary special measures beyond quotas. Conflict prevention and peace forum (CPPF) working papers on women in politics, no. 4. Social Science Research Council, New York
Krook ML (2016) Contesting gender quotas: dynamics of resistance. Polit Groups Identities 4(2):268–283
Krook ML, Lovenduski J, Squires J (2009) Gender quotas and models of political citizenship. Br J Polit Sci 39(4):781–803
Lovenduski J (2005) Feminizing politics. Polity, Cambridge
Mackay F (2001) Love and politics. Continuum, London
Mansbridge J (1999) Should blacks represent blacks and women represent women? A contingent yes. J Polit 61(3):628–657
Matland R (2004) The Norwegian experience of gender quotas. In: Ballington J, Binda F (eds) The implementation of quotas: European experiences. Stockholm, International IDEA, pp 64–71
McGing C (2013) The single transferable vote and women’s representation in Ireland. Irish Pol Stud 28(3):322–340
Murray R (2014) Quotas for men? Reframing gender quotas as a means of improving representation for all. Am Polit Sci Rev 108(3):520–532
Norris P (2004) Electoral engineering: voting rules and political behaviour. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge
Norris P, Lovenduski J (1995) Political recruitment: gender, race and class in the British parliament. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge
Nugent M, Krook ML (2016) All-women shortlists: myths and realities. Parliam Aff 69:115–135
Phillips A (1991) Engendering democracy. Pennsylvania State University Press, University Park
Phillips A (1995) The politics of presence. Clarendon Press, Oxford
Reynolds A (1999) Women in the legislatures and executives of the world: Knocking at the highest class ceiling. World Polit 51(4):547–572
Schwindt-Bayer LA (2009) Making quotas work: the effect of gender quota laws on the election of women. Legis Stud Q 34(1):5–28
Shepard-Robinson L, Lovenduski J (2002) Women and candidate selection in British political parties. Fawcett, London
Tremblay M (2008) Introduction. In: Tremblay M (ed) Women and legislative representation: electoral systems, political parties, and sex quotas. Palgrave Macmillan, New York, pp 1–22
UN (1985) The Nairobi Forward-looking Strategies for the Advancement of Women [adopted by the World Conference to review and appraise the achievements of the United Nations Decade for Women: Equality, Development and Peace, held in Nairobi, Kenya, 15–26 July 1985]. http://www.un.org/womenwatch/confer/nfls/Nairobi1985report.txt
Wangnerud L (2009) Women in parliaments: Descriptive and substantive representation. Annu Rev Polit Sci 12:51–59
Wolbrecht C, Campbell DE (2007) Leading by example: female members of parliament as political role models. Am J Polit Sci 51(4):921–939
Zeitlin D (2014) Women in parliament in the Pacific region. Aust J Polit Sci 49(2):252–266
Law and Cases
FWCW (1995) Beijing declaration and platform for action. Fourth world conference on women, United Nations. UN Doc A/Conf.177/20. http://www.un.org/documents/ga/conf177/aconf177-20en.htm
UNGA (1979) Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW). UN Doc A/RES/34/180, UN General Assembly. http://undocs.org/A/RES/34/180
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2019 Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd.
About this entry
Cite this entry
McGing, C. (2019). Electoral Quotas and Women’s Rights. In: Reilly, N. (eds) International Human Rights of Women. International Human Rights. Springer, Singapore. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-10-8905-3_12
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-10-8905-3_12
Published:
Publisher Name: Springer, Singapore
Print ISBN: 978-981-10-8904-6
Online ISBN: 978-981-10-8905-3
eBook Packages: Law and CriminologyReference Module Humanities and Social SciencesReference Module Business, Economics and Social Sciences