The Palgrave Handbook of Women’s Political Rights

The Palgrave Handbook of Women’s Political Rights Edited by Susan Franceschet Mona Lena Krook · Netina Tan

Gender and Politics Series Editors Johanna Kantola University of Tampere Tampere, Finland Sarah Childs Birkbeck, University of London London, UK

The Gender and Politics series celebrated its 7th anniversary at the 5th European Conference on Politics and Gender (ECPG) in June 2017 in Lausanne, Switzerland having published more than 35 volumes to date. ­ The original idea for the book series was envisioned by the series editors Johanna Kantola and Judith Squires at the first ECPG in Belfast in 2009, and the series was officially launched at the Conference in Budapest in 2011. In 2014, Sarah Childs became the co-editor of the series, together with Johanna Kantola. Gender and Politics showcases the very best international writing. It publishes world class monographs and edited collections from scholars - junior and well established - working in politics, international relations and public policy, with specific reference to questions of gender. The titles that have come out over the past years make key contributions to debates on intersectionality and diversity, gender equality, social movements, Europeanization and institutionalism, governance and norms, policies, and political institutions. Set in European, US and Latin American contexts, these books provide rich new empirical findings and push forward boundaries of feminist and politics conceptual and theoretical research. The editors welcome the highest quality international research on these topics and beyond, and look for proposals on feminist political theory; on recent political transformations such as the economic crisis or the rise of the populist right; as well as proposals on continuing feminist dilemmas around participation and representation, specific gendered policy fields, and policy making mechanisms. The series can also include books published as a Palgrave pivot. More information about this series at http://www.palgrave.com/gp/series/14998

Susan Franceschet · Mona Lena Krook Netina Tan Editors

The Palgrave Handbook of Women’s Political Rights

Editors Susan Franceschet University of Calgary Calgary, AB, Canada

Netina Tan McMaster University Hamilton, ON, Canada

Mona Lena Krook Rutgers University New Brunswick, NJ, USA

Gender and Politics ISBN 978-1-137-59073-2 ISBN 978-1-137-59074-9  (eBook) https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-137-59074-9 Library of Congress Control Number: 2018943275 © The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s) 2019 The author(s) has/have asserted their right(s) to be identified as the author(s) of this work in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. This work is subject to copyright. All rights are solely and exclusively licensed by the Publisher, whether the whole or part of the material is concerned, specifically the rights of translation, reprinting, reuse of illustrations, recitation, broadcasting, reproduction on microfilms or in any other physical way, and transmission or information storage and retrieval, electronic adaptation, computer software, or by similar or dissimilar methodology now known or hereafter developed. The use of general descriptive names, registered names, trademarks, service marks, etc. in this publication does not imply, even in the absence of a specific statement, that such names are exempt from the relevant protective laws and regulations and therefore free for general use. The publisher, the authors and the editors are safe to assume that the advice and information in this book are believed to be true and accurate at the date of publication. Neither the publisher nor the authors or the editors give a warranty, express or implied, with respect to the material contained herein or for any errors or omissions that may have been made. The publisher remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations. Cover credit: GeorgePeters This Palgrave Macmillan imprint is published by the registered company Springer Nature Limited The registered company address is: The Campus, 4 Crinan Street, London, N1 9XW, United Kingdom

For all women’s political rights pioneers—past, present, and future.

Preface

2018 and 2019 mark the centennials of women’s right to vote in 20 c­ ountries around the globe, with further celebrations to follow in the coming years. New Zealand, the first country to grant women’s suffrage, is commemorating 125 years of women’s right to vote. Women’s share of parliamentary representation has never been higher, with the world average currently standing at 23.6%, according to the Inter-Parliamentary Union. Twelve countries have surpassed more than 40% women in parliament and nearly 50 have achieved 30% or more. This Handbook seeks to take stock of these developments to offer a definitive account of the global state of women’s political rights. The book understands women’s political rights to include the right to participate in politics through voting (suffrage) and the right to stand for political office (eligibility), offering an important interdisciplinary contribution to scholarship on gender and politics. Much of the research on women’s suffrage campaigns has been carried out by historians, while political scientists have taken up questions of women’s electoral behavior, gender gaps in voting, and the struggle to improve women’s access to political office. The book is also global in scope, covering developments across all the world’s major regions. Part I, Theories and Concepts, comprises five chapters that set the stage for the case-focused chapters in Parts II and III. Chapters 1 and 3 map debates and events surrounding the introduction of women’s rights to vote and run for political office, respectively, focusing on global patterns. Chapter 1 surveys suffrage movements around the world, analyzing the four waves of suffragism across the globe. Chapter 3 outlines the major debates as well as conceptual and theoretical questions about women’s representation in office. Chapters 2 and 4 outline and discuss the various ways scholars have measured of the impact of these rights, focusing on what women’s voting and election patterns have looked like over time, as well as the various ways that scholarly research has analyzed what these activities have meant for politics and society more vii

viii  Preface

broadly. Chapter 5 surveys emerging areas of concern among academics and practitioners, regarding new challenges to women’s exercise of their political rights. In Part II, Suffrage and Political Participation, the volume presents 21 case studies from six regions of the world. Each chapter focuses on a single country to map how women gained the right to vote, including the kinds of arguments utilized by the main advocates and opponents of women’s right to vote, as well as who the main actors were in the suffrage debates. Authors also address the impact of women as voters, defined in various ways. These include voter turnout by sex, gender gaps in voting, and changes in political parties and party competition in response to female voters. The chapters also offer insights into the historical and ongoing challenges women confront in exercising their right to vote, including threats to women’s political rights in societies where electoral violence is common. Part III, Eligibility and Political Representation, examines developments in 23 countries across six geographical regions. Each chapter maps the struggles that women have waged in order to gain the right to run for political office and to improve their political representation. The authors identify and account for uneven patterns in women’s parliamentary representation and electoral performance at local and national levels over time. In addition to identifying ongoing challenges and stereotypes undermining women’s participation, authors discuss formal and informal strategies to improve the share of women elected, especially the introduction of electoral gender quotas. Many chapters also explore the descriptive, substantive, and symbolic impacts of electing more women, focusing on the profiles of elected women, the proposal and passage of women-friendly bills, public opinion toward women as leaders, and initiatives to enhance representation based on race, ethnicity, age, and sexual orientation. Calgary, Canada New Brunswick, USA Hamilton, Canada

Susan Franceschet Mona Lena Krook Netina Tan

Contents

Part I  Theories and Concepts 1

Global Patterns and Debates in the Granting of Women’s Suffrage 3 Ann Towns

2

Gender and Electoral Behavior 21 Miki Caul Kittilson

3

The Political Representation of Women over Time 33 Melanie M. Hughes and Pamela Paxton

4

The Impact of Women in Parliament 53 Diana Z. O’Brien and Jennifer M. Piscopo

5

New Horizons in Women’s Political Rights 73 Mona Lena Krook

Part II  Suffrage and Political Participation 6

Chile: Women’s Suffrage and Political Participation, 1935–2015 85 Ricardo Gamboa and Miguel Angel López

7

Colombia: Civil Conflict, Violence, and Women’s Political Participation 101 Juliana Restrepo Sanín ix

x  Contents

8

Mexico: The Long Road to Women’s Suffrage 115 Gabriela Cano

9

New Zealand: A Country of Firsts in Women’s Political Rights 129 Jennifer Curtin

10 Finland: Suffrage, Nation, and Political Mobilization Irma Sulkunen

143

11 Switzerland: Direct Democracy and Women’s Political Participation 155 Anouk Lloren 12 Canada: Uneven Paths to Suffrage and Women’s Electoral Participation 169 Nancy Janovicek and Melanee Thomas 13 Afghanistan: Uphill Challenges for Women’s Political Rights Andrea Fleschenberg

185

14 Kuwait: Why Did Women’s Suffrage Take So Long? 201 Meriem Aissa 15 Morocco: Ongoing Struggle for More Representation Katja Žvan Elliott

213

16 Turkey: From Symbols to Actors in the Struggle for Women’s Political Rights 227 Marella Bodur Ün 17 Kenya: Women’s Suffrage and Political Participation as Voters Mi Yung Yoon and Christol Okeke

243

18 Nigeria: Women’s Suffrage, Change, and Continuities in Political Participation 257 Chiedo Nwankwor 19 Cameroon: Early Mobilization and Limited Impact of Women’s Suffrage 275 Melinda J. Adams 20 Zimbabwe: Women’s Mass Movement and Violence 289 Rudo B. Gaidzanwa

Contents

  xi

21 China: Women’s Rights Advocacy 301 Kimberley Ens Manning 22 Indonesia: Local Advocacy for Suffrage 317 Kurniawati Hastuti Dewi 23 Malaysia: Middle-Equality Trap 331 Bridget Welsh 24 Sri Lanka: Struggle for Franchise 349 Malathi de Alwis and Chulani Kodikara 25 Czech Republic: Nationalism, Suffrage and Political Participation 363 Dana Musilová 26 Russia: The Great War and Women’s Political Rights 375 Rochelle Goldberg Ruthchild Part III  Eligibility and Political Representation 27 Bolivia: Parity, Empowerment, and Institutional Change Stéphanie Rousseau

393

28 Cuba: Women’s Complicated Political Participation and Representation 405 Lana Wylie and Sarah Shoker 29 Uruguay: Slow Progress in Women’s Political Representation Niki Johnson

421

30 United States: Gendered Institutions, Processes, and Outcomes 437 Kelly Dittmar 31 Sweden: An Incremental Process 455 Lenita Freidenvall 32 France: The Republic Tested by Parity 467 Réjane Sénac 33 Australia: The Slow Road to Parliament 483 Joy McCann and Marian Sawer

xii  Contents

34 Jordan: Quotas and Change in Women’s Political Representation 503 Sarah Sunn Bush 35 Tunisia: Changing Patterns of Women’s Representation Lindsay J. Benstead

517

36 Israel: A Century of Political Involvement 531 Reut Itzkovitch-Malka and Chen Friedberg 37 Mauritius: Still a Long Journey Ahead 547 Ramola Ramtohul 38 Rwanda: Women’s Political Representation and Its Consequences 563 Jennie E. Burnet 39 Uganda: Achievements and Challenges for Women in Elected Office 577 Aili Mari Tripp 40 Niger: Patterns of Women’s Political Presence Since Independence 591 Alice J. Kang 41 Ghana: Stalled Patterns of Women’s Parliamentary Representation 607 Gretchen Bauer 42 South Korea: Women’s Political Representation 627 Young-Im Lee 43 Taiwan: Asia’s Exception 641 Chang-Ling Huang 44 Myanmar: Women’s Political Life 657 Paul Minoletti 45 India: A Contradictory Record 673 Francesca R. Jensenius

Contents

  xiii

46 Poland: Regime Transformation and Women’s Political Representation 689 Małgorzata Fuszara 47 Slovenia: From Socialist Legacies to Legislative Gender Quotas 699 Milica Antić Gaber 48 Mongolia: Transformation of Women’s Representation Pavel Maškarinec

713

49 Armenia: Persistent Gender Stereotypes 729 Kristin Cavoukian and Nona Shahnazaryan Index 745

Contributors

Melinda J. Adams  James Madison University, Harrisonburg, VA, USA Meriem Aissa  Rutgers University, New Jersey, USA Milica Antić Gaber  University of Ljubljana, Ljubljana, Slovenia Gretchen Bauer Political Science and International Relations, University of Delaware, Newark, DE, USA Lindsay J. Benstead  Portland State University, Portland, OR, USA Marella Bodur Ün Department of Political Science and International Relations, Çukurova University, Adana, Turkey Jennie E. Burnet  Georgia State University, Atlanta, GA, USA Sarah Sunn Bush  Yale University, New Haven, CT, USA Gabriela Cano  El Colegio de México, México, Mexico Kristin Cavoukian University of Toronto Mississauga, Mississauga, ON, Canada Jennifer Curtin  University of Auckland, Auckland, New Zealand Malathi de Alwis  University of Colombo, Colombo, Sri Lanka Kurniawati Hastuti Dewi  Research Center for Politics, Indonesian Institute of Sciences (LIPI), DKI Jakarta, Indonesia xv

xvi  Contributors

Kelly Dittmar  Rutgers University, Camden, NJ, USA; Center for American Women and Politics, Rutgers University, New Brunswick, NJ, USA Andrea Fleschenberg  Cologne, Germany Lenita Freidenvall  Stockholm University, Stockholm, Sweden Chen Friedberg Department of Middle Eastern Studies and Political Science, Ariel University, Ariel, Israel; Israel Democracy Institute, Jerusalem, Israel Małgorzata Fuszara  University of Warsaw, Warsaw, Poland Rudo B. Gaidzanwa  University of Zimbabwe, Harare, Zimbabwe Ricardo Gamboa Institute of International Studies, University of Chile, Santiago, Chile Chang-Ling Huang Department of Political Science, National Taiwan University, Taipei, Taiwan Melanie M. Hughes  University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, PA, USA Reut Itzkovitch-Malka Department of Sociology, Political Science, and Communication, Open University of Israel, Ra’anana, Israel Nancy Janovicek  University of Calgary, Calgary, Canada Francesca R. Jensenius University of Oslo, Oslo, Norway; Institute of International Affairs, Oslo, Norway

Norwegian

Niki Johnson  Universidad de la República, Montevideo, Uruguay Alice J. Kang Associate Professor of Political Science and Ethnic Studies, University of Nebraska-Lincoln, Lincoln, USA Miki Caul Kittilson School of Politics and Global Studies, Arizona State University, Tempe, AZ, USA Chulani Kodikara  University of Edinburgh, Edinburgh, UK Mona Lena Krook  Rutgers University, New Brunswick, NJ, USA

Contributors

  xvii

Young-Im Lee California State University-Sacramento, Sacramento, CA, USA Anouk Lloren  Swiss National Science Foundation, Bern, Switzerland Miguel Angel López  Institute of International Studies, University of Chile, Santiago, Chile Kimberley Ens Manning  Concordia University, Montreal, Canada Pavel Maškarinec Jan Evangelista Purkyně University, Ústí nad Labem, Czech Republic Joy McCann School of History, Australian National University, Canberra, ACT, Australia Paul Minoletti  Yangon, Myanmar Dana Musilová University of Hradec Králové, Hradec Králové, Czech Republic Chiedo Nwankwor School of Advanced International Studies, Johns Hopkins University, Washington, DC, USA Diana Z. O’Brien  Texas A&M University, College Station, TX, USA Pamela Paxton  University of Texas at Austin, Austin, TX, USA Jennifer M. Piscopo  Occidental College, Los Angeles, CA, USA Ramola Ramtohul  University of Mauritius, Moka, Mauritius Juliana Restrepo Sanín Josef Korbel School of International Studies, Denver, CO, USA; One Earth Future, Broomfield, CO, USA Stéphanie Rousseau  Pontificia Universidad Catolica del Peru, Lima, Peru Rochelle Goldberg Ruthchild Davis Center for Russian and Eurasian Studies, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA, USA Marian Sawer School of Politics and International Relations, Australian National University, Canberra, ACT, Australia Réjane Sénac  Sciences Po, CEVIPOF, CNRS, Paris, France

xviii  Contributors

Nona Shahnazaryan  National Academy of Sciences, Yerevan, Armenia Sarah Shoker  McMaster University, Hamilton, Canada Irma Sulkunen  University of Tampere, Tampere, Finland Melanee Thomas  University of Calgary, Calgary, Canada Ann Towns  University of Gothenburg, Gothenburg, Sweden Aili Mari Tripp  University of Wisconsin-Madison, Madison, WI, USA Bridget Welsh Political Science and International Affairs, John Cabot University, Rome, Italy Lana Wylie  McMaster University, Hamilton, Canada Mi Yung Yoon  Hanover College, Hanover, IN, USA Katja Žvan Elliott  School of Humanities and Social Sciences, Al Akhawayn University, Ifrane, Morocco

List of Figures

Fig. 3.1 Fig. 3.2 Fig. 3.3 Fig. 6.1 Fig. 11.1 Fig. 23.1 Fig. 30.1 Fig. 30.2 Fig. 33.1 Fig. 33.2 Fig. 33.3 Fig. 36.1 Fig. 36.2 Fig. 36.3 Fig. 36.4 Fig. 36.5 Fig. 36.6 Fig. 43.1 Fig. 45.1 Fig. 48.1

Women’s political representation, 1945–2015 34 Sample trajectories of women’s political representation, 1945–201039 Women’s average political representation by geographic region 43 Integration of women in the electorate, 1935–2009, presidential elections91 Female and male turnout in national elections 1971–2015 160 Women candidates by party, 2013 general election 338 Proportion of women in Congress and state legislatures, 1917–2017439 Proportion of women of color in Congress and state legislatures, 1965–2017440 Representation of women in the House of Representatives, 1977–2016486 Women in national parliament: Australia’s world ranking 1997–2018486 Women senators and members in the Commonwealth Parliament in election years, 1943–2013 487 The number of female members of Knesset (on the date the Knesset was installed) 534 Female MKs by political division (right-center-left) 536 Private members’ bills by thematic area and gender 540 Laws enacted by thematic area and gender 541 Legislators’ issue priorities by gender—PMBs 542 Legislators’ issue priorities by gender—Laws enacted 543 Percentage of female representatives in local councils in Taiwan 646 Percentage of female candidates and elected Members of Parliament in India’s federal parliamentary elections 1952–2014678 Women’s representation in the Mongolian parliament, 1973–2016715

xix

List of Tables

Table 1.1 Table 3.1 Table 6.1 Table 6.2 Table 6.3 Table 6.4 Table 6.5 Table 9.1 Table 11.1 Table 12.1 Table 13.1 Table 14.1 Table 18.1 Table 18.2 Table 20.1 Table 23.1 Table 23.2 Table 23.3 Table 23.4 Table 29.1 Table 29.2

Women’s suffrage adoption in national politics, on the same terms as men, 1893–2018 5 Thresholds of women’s parliamentary representation for 190 countries, 2015 47 Gender gap in presidential elections 1952–1970 93 Gender gap in presidential elections 1989–2009 94 Candidates for Senate, Chamber of Deputies, and Municipal Councils96 Distribution of candidates by gender: Chamber of Deputies 1989−201396 Distribution of candidates by gender: Councilors 1992−201297 Turnout rates by sex, New Zealand, 1893–1919a136 Policy proposals with the largest gender gap in voting 163 First year (some) women eligible to vote in Canada, by province173 Percentage of women voters and candidates in post-2001 elections189 Logistic regression of voting in elections, with robust standard errors208 Time line of suffrage and women’s suffrage in Nigeria 259 Women’s representation in elective positions in Nigeria (1979–2015)268 Representation at the parliament and Senate 291 Women’s representation in Malaysia’s general elections 337 Voting by gender 341 Political engagement by gender 341 Non-traditional political participation by gender 342 Women seat-holders at the beginning of each legislative term, 1985–2015423 Women seat-holders in parliament at the beginning of each legislative term by party, 1985–2015 423

xxi

xxii  List of Tables Table 29.3 Table 29.4 Table 29.5 Table 32.1 Table 32.2 Table 33.1 Table 34.1 Table 35.1 Table 35.2 Table 35.3 Table 37.1 Table 39.1 Table 39.2 Table 39.3 Table 39.4 Table 39.5 Table 39.6 Table 39.7 Table 39.8 Table 39.9 Table 39.10 Table 40.1 Table 41.1 Table 42.1 Table 42.2 Table 42.3 Table 42.4 Table 43.1 Table 43.2 Table 43.3

Women’s representation in departmental assemblies (percentage) at the beginning of each legislative period, 1985–2015 424 Impact of quota on percentage of female candidates and women elected by electoral district 430 Bill introduction by sex of signatories 431 Implementing provisions for parity rules by election and voting system 475 Proportion of men in political assemblies and executive councils, before and after gender parity laws 476 Timeline of women’s political rights in Australia’s national, state and territory elections 485 Women in the Jordanian parliament 506 Women’s descriptive representation in the legislature 519 Female parliamentarians in the 217-seat Constituent Assembly (2011–2014) 523 Family status laws and reforms 524 Elected members by type of election and sex, 1983–2014550 Women in Uganda’s parliaments (1962–2016) 579 Ugandan parliamentarians: highest degree attained 582 Marital status of parliamentarians 583 Support for women as political leaders, 2005–2018 586 Support for women as political leaders, 2018 587 Trust in the president 2002–2018 by gender 587 Support for president by gender, geography, and education 587 Trust in institutions 2016/2018 588 Voting by gender 589 Political participation 589 Women’s political representation in the National Assembly of Niger 592 Women members of parliament in Ghana, 1956–2016 elections609 Gender gaps in legislators’ backgrounds 632 Number of women-friendly bills by legislative session 635 The number of women-friendly bills proposed to the National Assembly, 2000–2016 636 Party affiliation, seat type, gender, and women-friendly bill initiation 637 Women’s reserved seats in Taiwan’s national elections 644 Reserved seats and gender quotas in Taiwan after the mid-1990s649 Female parliamentary members with local political experience651

List of Tables

Table 44.1 Table 46.1 Table 47.1 Table 47.2

  xxiii

Percentage of parties’ MPs that are women following 2015 elections (National and State/Region parliaments combined)663 Percentage of women in the Sejm in Poland after 1989 692 Elected women in Slovenia at all levels 708 Attitudes to the statement: Men are better political leaders709

PART I

Theories and Concepts

CHAPTER 1

Global Patterns and Debates in the Granting of Women’s Suffrage Ann Towns

In 1912, German women’s rights activist Käthe Schirmacher proclaimed that “woman’s suffrage is the most radical demand made by organized women and is hence advocated in all countries by the ‘radical’ woman’s rights advocates” (Schirmacher 1912). Claiming suffrage to be radical was no exaggeration at a time when only four countries—New Zealand (1893), Australia (1902), Finland (1906), and Norway (1907)—had granted women the right to vote. This was about to change. In the coming century, virtually every state introduced women’s suffrage, making the measure global in scope and hardly extreme. In fact, to most, the radicalism today is found in the extremely rare denial of women’s suffrage on the same terms as men’s. In Saudi Arabia, for instance, women are only allowed to vote in local elections, and that right was exercised for the first time only in 2015. The first aim of this chapter is to show how women’s suffrage spread internationally, both in terms of global adoption patterns and in terms of the transnational suffrage activism which preceded adoption. As we will see below, suffrage activism and suffrage adoption were clustered along some major lines of international hierarchy. Transnational suffragism developed in at least four overlapping waves with distinctive membership, geographical scope, and suffrage arguments rooted in international social hierarchies between so-called civilized states and others. The first emerged in what was then referred to as the “society of civilized states,” from the turn of the twentieth century until the 1920s. Transnational suffrage mobilization in the A. Towns (*)  University of Gothenburg, Gothenburg, Sweden e-mail: [email protected] © The Author(s) 2019 S. Franceschet et al. (eds.), The Palgrave Handbook of Women’s Political Rights, Gender and Politics, https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-137-59074-9_1

3

4 

A. TOWNS

socialist East constitutes a second, closely overlapping wave, from approximately 1907 until the 1920s. The third wave developed in the Pan-American context, from the 1920s until the 1940s. Although much less research and evidence is provided, a fourth wave of transnational suffragism appears to have developed in the Afro-Asian post-colonial context in the 1950s. Suffrage adoption closely followed these waves of activism. The second aim of this chapter is to analyze some of the arguments made in favor and against women’s suffrage, focusing particularly on claims about the relation between suffrage and so-called civilization. Women’s suffrage initially became expected behavior of so-called civilized states, around the end of World War I (WWI). Suffrage became indicative of having reached a more advanced level of civilization and thus helped to set these states apart from presumably inferior societies. Since far from all societies were regarded as civilized (nor desired to be), it was not clear what this new standard of civilization suggested for them, however. It was a formidable task of non-European activists to justify why their states should also pass suffrage laws. After all, as the Europeans claimed, this was behavior proper for “civilized” states rather than the “less advanced” or non-civilized. Creative reinterpretation of the initial arguments was needed to explain why it was appropriate for states not part of the core of Western civilization to approve the vote for women. Activist organizations and networks were the primary associational arena promoting women’s suffrage internationally, rather than international organizations or state actors. Transnational suffrage advocacy supplies a good empirical entry-point to study the debates on women’s suffrage around the globe. The rest of this chapter is therefore organized around demonstrating the existence of no less than four waves of transnational suffragism and analyzing their arguments. Before delving into these waves of transnational activism and the understandings of suffrage, however, the chapter begins by looking at the global route of suffrage law adoption. The chapter ends with an assessment of prior attempts to account for the global emergence of women’s suffrage.

Suffrage Adoption Trajectory Women first won the vote in new states on the outskirts of the core of international society—New Zealand (1893), Australia (1902), Finland (1906), and Norway (1907)—rather than in, say, France and Great Britain (see Table 1.1). By 1919, another twenty European states had passed suffrage legislation. It would nevertheless take many decades for a few European states, like Switzerland (1971) and Lichtenstein (1984), to allow women voting rights. In short, women’s suffrage initially moved from the margins to the center of European and neo-European international society. One striking and overlooked aspect is that the ensuing adoption path was clustered, as is evident in Table 1.1. The timing of adoption seems to cluster

1  GLOBAL PATTERNS AND DEBATES IN THE GRANTING OF WOMEN’S SUFFRAGE 

5

Table 1.1  Women’s suffrage adoption in national politics, on the same terms as men, 1893–2018 Year

European civilization

New Zealand Australia Finland Norway Denmark Iceland 1917 Canada 1918 Austria Germany Hungary Ireland United Kingdom

Socialism

PanAmericanism

(Post)-colonialism

Other/Unclear

1893 1902 1906 1913 1915

1919 Belgium Luxemburg Netherlands Sweden 1920 Czechoslovakia United States 1921 1924

1927 1929 Romania 1930 South Africa (‘whites’) 1931 Portugal Spain 1932 1934 1935 1937 1938 1939 1941 1942 1944 Bulgaria France 1945 Croatia Slovenia Italy

Russian Federation Estonia Georgia Latvia Lithuania Poland Belarus Ukraine

Albania Armenia Azerbaijan Kazakhstan Mongolia Tajikistan Turkmenistan

Saint Lucia (UK)

Ecuador

Chile Brazil Uruguay Cuba

Thailand (Siam) Turkey Myanmar (UK) Philippines

Uzbekistan

Bolivia El Salvador Panama Dominican Republic Jamaica (UK) Indonesia Senegal (FR) Togo (FR)

Japan

(continued)

6 

A. TOWNS

Table 1.1  (continued) Year

European civilization

Socialism

PanAmericanism

(Post)-colonialism

Other/Unclear

1946 Romania Yugoslavia

DPR of Korea

Guatemala Venezuela

Liberia Trinidad and Tobago (UK)

1947

China

Argentina Mexico

Viet Nam Djibouti (FR) Cameroon (FR) Pakistan Singapore (UK) Niger (FR) Seychelles (UK) Suriname (NL)

1948 Israel

1949 Bosnia and Herzegovina 1950

Costa Rica

Syria India

1951

Nepal

1952

Ivory Coast (1952) Bhutan Ghana (UK) Eritrea Ethiopia Cambodia Benin (FR) Gabon (FR) Comoros (FR) Egypt Mali (FR) Mauritius (UK) Somalia (UK/ IT) Malaysia Nigeria (South—UK) Burkina Faso (FR) Chad (FR) Guinea Madagascar Tunisia Tanzania (UK) Tonga (UK) Gambia (UK)

1953 Greece 1954 1955

Colombia Honduras Nicaragua Peru

1956

1957 1958

1959 San Marino

1960 Cyprus

Laos

Republic of Korea

Haiti Barbados (UK) Antigua and Barbuda (UK) Dominica (UK) Grenada (UK) Saint Kitts and Nevis (UK) Lebanon Guyana (UK) Belize (UK)

(continued)

1  GLOBAL PATTERNS AND DEBATES IN THE GRANTING OF WOMEN’S SUFFRAGE 

7

Table 1.1  (continued) Year

European civilization

Socialism

1961

1962 Monaco

1963

1964 1965 1967 1968 1970 Andorra 1971 Switzerland 1972 1973

1989 1998 2003 2005 2006

(Post)-colonialism

Other/Unclear

El Salvador Paraguay

Malawi (UK) Burundi Rwanda Mauritania Sierra Leone Algeria Uganda Zambia (UK) Kenya Fiji (UK) Kenya Congo (FR) Morocco Sudan Botswana Lesotho

Bahamas (UK)

Afghanistan Iran

Libya

Swaziland Yemen Bangladesh Bahrain (reintroduced 2002) Jordan

1974 1975

1977 1978 1979 1980 1984 Lichtenstein 1986

PanAmericanism

Angola Cape Verde Mozambique Moldova Iraq Central African Republic Namibia Quatar Oman Kuwait United Arab Emirates

Table assembled from data provided in IPU (2000), Arat (2000), Edwards (2000), Al Kitbi (2008)

around four intersecting transnational contexts in international society: European civilization, socialism, Pan-Americanism, and Afro-Asian post-colonialism. After suffrage had successfully won ground in a handful of “civilized” states, an overlapping though more concise second cluster of adoption took

8 

A. TOWNS

place in the emerging socialist states of Eastern Europe and Central Asia. These states recognized women’s suffrage primarily between 1918 and 1924, simultaneously with many states of Western Europe. The so-called New World of the Americas passed suffrage laws in a third cluster, mainly between the late 1930s and mid-1950s. The fourth cluster consists of the post-colonial states of Africa and Asia, where suffrage was extended to women primarily when national independence was won, between 1945 and 1975. The clustered timing of adoption corresponds roughly with the timing of four waves of transnational suffrage activism.

Four Waves of Suffragism and Debates Suffragism in the Society of Civilized States Nineteenth-century Europe was characterized by tremendously intense struggles over the nature of sexual difference and the implications of that difference for women in terms of participation in political life. Then, the prevailing idea was that civilized states should keep women out of politics. However, this idea was always contested and had to be justified and bolstered in an ongoing manner. The demand for voting rights began already in the 1840s, not long after women were expressly barred from state affairs. The first domestic suffrage organizations were also formed at this time, more or less simultaneously across Europe and some of its former colonies. The first push to connect some of this domestic activism across borders was made at the turn of the twentieth century. The well-known International Woman Suffrage Alliance (IWSA) was founded in Berlin in 1904. Although there were a number of transnational women’s organizations that worked for suffrage, such as the International Council of Women, few were as important as the IWSA. The phenomenon of transnational suffragism and the IWSA emerged in an era of new imperialism, with colonial conquests accelerating at a rapid pace. European powers competed aggressively for territorial conquests, freshly joined by a USA with international aspirations. International Society of the early twentieth century was thus deeply divided and, from the vantage point of Europe, consisted of two rough classes of people and societies: the civilized and the uncivilized. Doctrines of racial and cultural superiority abounded, legitimating the superiority of the so-called civilized and their domination of the uncivilized. Colonialism and the relations of inequality it entailed fundamentally shaped transnational suffrage activism. This was activism primarily by and for the “civilized” parts of the world. The nationality of the IWSA officers, the congress locations, and the official languages of the association—English and French—were exclusively European until the 1930s. The member affiliations (organized as country sections) suggests a slightly larger circle, including

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Australia, White South Africa, Argentina, and Uruguay as the most European of the young Americas, as well as Russia and China, considered to be at the outskirts of civilization. Tellingly, once most of Europe and the Anglo states had enfranchised women in the early 1920s, the IWSA moved to work on other issues (Rupp 1997). This decision was made even though there were by then suffrage movements in Asia and Latin America that had still not attained their objective. The core of the organization and its activities matched the core of the society of civilized states. The expectation of the day was that civilized states keep women out of formal state affairs. Those in favor of the status quo could contend that “the propaganda of woman suffrage is part and parcel of the worldwide movement for the overthrow of the present order of civilized society” (Illinois Association Opposed to the Extension of Suffrage to Women 1900, p. 2). The suffragists naturally had to meet such arguments. In their attempts to show the benefits of women as voters for the civilized state, the suffragists forged a specific subject position—“Civilized Women”—which differentiated them from men (civilized and uncivilized) as well as from less or non-civilized women. In relation with the non-European, they were now civilized women, free beings, able to awaken less civilized women to demand their rights. As such, the suffragists had ample voice in the mainstream media. Writing in a US magazine in 1912, the founder and first president of the IWSA, Carrie Chapman Catt, accredited the incipient women’s mobilizing in Egypt to British colonial tutelage: “Great Britain has created a new Egypt,” she announced. “It has awakened a sleeping race and held before it the dazzling achievements of Western progress” (as quoted in Burton 1994, p. 191). On the other hand, the suffragists also articulated women as the more civilized of the sexes within Europe. Military service had served as a potent argument of working-class men in their contention for the vote, an argument which did little to bring women suffrage as they were barred from the military. The suffragists instead pointed to the allegedly destructive and selfish capacity of men and the male state, which resulted in the menace of war. The portrayal of men as a threat to civilization had been made for some time. Particularly around times of war, interpretations of other cultures were used metaphorically to give meaning to the savagery and barbarism of male power and masculine politics. At the onset of the 1871 Franco-Prussian War, British suffragists roared that “the franchise is needed as a protection for women from the uncontrolled dominion of the savage passions of men.” The female forces of civilization were needed to overpower the “savage instinct in men” and save Europe from the destruction of war (as cited in Rendall 1994, pp. 143–144). In most cases, the extension of women’s suffrage was not simply a matter of argumentative savvy and ability to mobilize great numbers of s­uffrage supporters. Women’s suffrage may never have materialized in the “old culture-states” of Europe had it not been for the crisis generated by the ­ world wars. The World War I signified a breakdown of the relations between

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civilized states of enormous magnitude. A wave of European states enfranchised women in the years immediately preceding or following the war: Denmark and Iceland in 1915; Canada in 1917; Germany, Austria, Hungary, the UK, and Ireland in 1918; Belgium, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, and Sweden in 1919; and Czechoslovakia and the USA in 1920. Women’s suffrage now became viewed as a standard of civilization, a reversal of the prior expectation that civilized states keep women out of formal politics. But far from all societies were classified as “civilized” in the early twentieth century. Nor did all care to be part of civilized society and adhere to its standards of behavior. What did the close link between suffrage and civilization imply for women in these other societies? What were the implications of tying the female vote so intimately to civilization? Subsequent suffrage movements all had to grapple with the claim that suffrage was a trait of European civilization. As we will see below, they handled the claim in very different ways.

Suffragism and Socialist Transnationalism In the first years of the twentieth century, the importance of women’s suffrage as an explicit goal also won ground among socialist organizations. A second and distinctive wave of suffragism developed within socialist transnationalism between then and the early 1920s. This wave was distinctive in two regards. First, socialist women organized separately from the suffragists and the core of their organization was located more toward the east of Europe. Second, these women had a different diagnosis of the problem that suffrage was meant to rectify. What others termed Western civilization was to them “bourgeois capitalism” and the source of female subordination. The claim that women’s suffrage was a standard of civilization, an indicator of civilized progress, thus posed a challenge for socialist women. In the late 1890s, women were organized as a separate collective within the socialist transnational infrastructure. Among others, Clara Zetkin of the German Social Democratic Party worked relentlessly for a formalized Women’s International. This work came into fruition at the 1907 Congress of the Second Socialist International in Stuttgart, and a permanent International Women’s Bureau was created. A key resolution was passed requiring all socialist parties to fight for universal male and female suffrage. Commanding all socialist parties across Europe and beyond to place universal suffrage on their platform was no small accomplishment. As was the case with the IWSA, the geographical scope of this circle of women was to remain limited until the 1920s. During its first decade of existence, the Women’s International was almost entirely made up of nationals of Europe and North America. The working language was one—German— rather than the two (English and French) of the IWSA. The choice of working language is telling about the core of the organization. In the Women’s

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International, German and Russian women were most active, rather than the Anglo-Europeans of the IWSA. The socialist activists understood themselves to be distinctive from the civilized suffragists and worked for a different and superior world. Any cooperation with “bourgeois” transnational suffragism was thus expressly prohibited. As Aleksandra Kollontai of the Russian Bolsheviks explained, “different aims and understandings of how political rights are to be used create an unbridgeable gulf between bourgeois and proletarian women” (Kollontai 1909, p. 72). This gulf included distinctive understandings not only about the ideal society but also about the nature of womanhood and women’s relation to the state. Although the civilized and socialist activists endorsed the same standard—political rights for women—the rationales and goals of this standard diverged dramatically. Among socialists, the present situation of women was viewed as a clear indicator of the miseries of “civilized society.” Capitalism and Christianity, seen as the key components of Western civilization, were presented as the two prime causes of the contemporary oppression of women. Capitalism used “the backward character of old-style housekeeping… to keep women intellectually and politically backward by blocking them from participating in society,” Communist International instructions to communist parties around the world informed in 1920 (Zetkin 1920, pp. 911–912). Christian morality and the reactionary influence of the clergy on women did not help matters. Women, as most heavily under the influence of the Catholic Church and enduring the most difficult effects of capitalism, became a symbol and the very embodiment of the backwardness of the civilized world. The conceptualization of women as particularly backward and victimized posed a difficult dilemma. On the one hand, women were victims of bourgeois capitalism in dire need of liberation. However, their backwardness was also a concrete impediment to the victory of socialism. To many, women’s alleged reactionary disposition made them unsuitable political actors since they were expected to advance clerical and reactionary political forces. Until the turn of the century, this was reason to exclude women from participating in political life. Clara Zetkin, German socialist and founder of the International Socialist Women’s Congress, came to argue that women should have “Universal Suffrage, not as a reward for political maturity, but as an effective means of educating and organizing the masses… it is our duty through intensive work of enlightenment and organization so to raise the standard of political intelligence and maturity in our proletarian women that it will soon be impossible for the reaction to count on the women’s vote” (Zetkin 1906, p. 18). It was precisely because women were so backward that special agitation for women’s suffrage became a necessity. The socialist suffrage efforts came to fruition after WWI as a host of new states emerged from the war under socialist rule. The geographical scope of the Women’s International was expanded in the 1920s, moving beyond the European and North American membership. However, just as the women’s

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international was beginning to reach outward from Europe and the USA, it dwindled. The last international conference was held in 1926. From the mid-1920s on, European women were no longer important as a force in the extension of suffrage. However, by then the baton had been passed on.

Pan-American Suffragism It is rarely recognized that the suffrage laws passed in Latin American between the 1930s and 1940s were preceded by transnational struggle to demand the vote. But a third and distinctive suffrage wave did develop in the Americas between the 1920s and 1940s, clustering not only the transnational mobilization but also the timing of the grand suffrage debates and the adoption of suffrage. Most importantly, the rationales of why suffrage was an appropriate behavior identified Latin American states as distinctive from others, as a “new” part of Western civilization that was still not as advanced as the old world of Europe. By the turn of the twentieth century, voices were already raised in favor of enfranchising women in the Americas. For instance, the Argentine socialist party had endorsed universal suffrage for both sexes in 1900, much earlier than most European counterparts (Lavrin 1995, pp. 259–260). The takeoff in mobilization for suffrage across the continent came in the early 1920s, as Latin American women networked, traveled, and selectively imported ideas and strategies from Europe and the USA. Ideas about the unity of the Americas served as an enabling and delimiting transnational framework for these suffrage struggles. The suffragists organized as “American” women, and as such they could meet across national borders. The formal Pan-American institutional infrastructure was made into the primary arena to advocate for women’s suffrage (Cáceres 1946; Miller 1986, 1991; Pernet 2000). Suffrage activists could soon turn to the Inter-American Commission of Women (IACW) which was created “to take up the consideration of the civil and political equality of women in the continent” at the meeting in Havana in 1928 (Scott 1931, p. 408). The IACW had an official mandate, making suffrage part of the formal diplomacy of interstate relations of the Americas and indeed the world for the very first time. At the VII meeting in Montevideo in 1933, the world’s first international resolution to recommend suffrage—Resolution XIX, Civil and Political Rights of Women—was adopted unanimously. In most cases, the great onslaught of suffrage campaigning and the grand parliamentary debates came in the early 1930s, showing a clear hemispheric trend. Though not for lack of mobilization, these debates resulted in the approval of national female suffrage in only three cases: Uruguay in 1932, Brazil in 1932, and Cuba in 1934. If the geographical scope and timing suggest a Pan-American wave of suffrage advocacy and debate, the understandings of what suffrage was and did

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also points to “the Americas” as a distinctive region. By 1930, veteran Brazilian politician José Fransisco Assis Brasil, a previous opponent of women’s suffrage, proclaimed that suffrage was a “victorious idea of the civilization to which we belong” (Hahner 1990, p. 159). This was a position that the suffragists of the Americas had advocated for well over a decade. They located the historical origins of the advancement of women, including suffrage, almost exclusively in the “civilized” world and primarily Europe. However, young America was prevalently characterized as “less advanced” on the scale of social evolution. And suffrage became seen as characteristic of “more advanced” societies that had already experienced changes that had not yet reached the Americas. Many of those who agitated on behalf of women from the 1910s to the 1930s embraced suffrage in principle. However, like suffrage opponents, even women’s rights activists expressed deep skepticism about the propriety of granting women the vote in a “less advanced” cultural and social environment. The particular cultural circumstances of the Americas became interpreted to mean that these countries were “not ready” for women’s vote, something considered appropriate only for fully civilized states. Even if Europe was upheld as the pinnacle of civilization, it was furthermore the Anglo tradition that was widely signified as empowering for women. Latin American women suffered from a cultural deficiency which was partially blamed on “her cultural tradition, with all the impediments of Colonial Spain which place the woman in a socially inferior level, devoid of impulse and initiative of her own” (Portal 1933, p. 10, my translation). Spanish heritage, including Catholicism and legal systems based on the Napoleonic Code, was thought to give rise to a “Latin tendency” that inhibited the “rapid granting of justice to women” which had taken place in areas with English Common Law (IACW 1965, p. iii). Lack of education and literacy was central: with lower levels of formal schooling than men, it was argued, women of the Americas had less culture and consciousness. They were also excessively influenced by the clergy and the Catholic Church, thus incapable of voting independently and rationally. “Woman’s absolute and unconditional civil and political equality signifies an exceedingly radical change for the Latin American society, since its women are perhaps not properly prepared,” the National Women’s Council of Peru proclaimed in a statement against suffrage in 1938 (El Comercio 1938, my translation). With the vote, women would allegedly threaten the advancement of their societies and thus, in extension, they posed a threat to their own well-being. In Ecuador (1929) and Spain (1931), the conservative political establishments saw women as loyal Catholics, congenitally conservative, whose votes could be mobilized accordingly. These examples were not lost on the suffrage debaters in rest of the Americas. The Mexican Institutional Revolutionary Party saw support for women’s suffrage as a sure electoral defeat and held out against such reform until 1953. Women were allegedly prone to traditional

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ideas and prejudice, thus still inept for politics for those on the left in states such as Chile, Mexico, and Peru while being seen as attractive candidates to a limited few on the right. In this context, suffragists came to argue that granting some women the vote would help the states of the Americas progress within civilization— the vote of women “of culture” would advance the states of the Americas, whereas granting suffrage to the allegedly “uncivilized” segments in society would inhibit progress. To attain the vote, suffragists in countries with substantial indigenous populations such as Bolivia, Colombia, Guatemala, and Peru struggled to distinguish themselves from illiterate “Indians without culture.” They argued that certain women were already cultured enough to shoulder voting responsibilities: “It is not only unacceptable but deeply embarrassing that [the proposal for the new electoral law] suggests granting the vote to an 18-year-old child and to the illiterate while denying it to the woman,” the organization Feminismo Peruano reiterated in article after article. As the franchise was extended to women, literacy remained a commonplace requirement for voting rights in many parts of the Americas, excluding large segments of the populations from suffrage. By the end of World War II, a series of regimes across the Americas were toppled by mass upheavals, once again generating the prospect of electoral reform. National suffrage coalitions such as the Federación Chilena de Instituciones Femeninas and the Peruvian Comité Nacional Pro-Derechos Civiles y Políticos de la Mujer were created, campaigning vigorously for the introduction and passage of suffrage bills in the constituent congresses. At the Ninth International Conference of American States at Bogotá in 1948, the world’s first treaty on women’s political rights was approved: the Inter-American Convention on the Granting of Political Rights of Women. A number of the ensuing new constitutions granted (some) women suffrage: Guatemala (1945), Panama (1941), Argentina (1947), Venezuela (1947), Chile (1949), and Costa Rica (1949). The ruling left establishments of Mexico (Alemán of PRI) and Peru (Bustamante of the Frente Democrático Nacional) still would not risk granting the vote to presumably conservative women. In Peru and Paraguay, it was the right-wing dictatorships of Manuel Odría and Alfredo Stroessner that would finally find women beneficial as voters.

Suffragism, Liberation Struggles, and Afro-Asian Solidarity In the colonized areas of Asia and Africa, women’s suffrage first emerged as a concern within the vast dominions of the colonial empires of France and Great Britain and the less extensive colonies of Portugal, Belgium, the Netherlands, and the USA. In many cases, female suffrage was granted in the context of limited self-government within the auspices of the imperial state. The British Empire seems to have been more reticent to supporting female suffrage within its colonies and protectorates than the French, particularly in

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regard to the African colonies. Whereas France quickly enfranchised women in five African colonies upon granting French women suffrage in 1944, the British allowed women to vote in the West Indies and Singapore in the 1940s and 1950 but waited until the mid-1950s until extending the vote to women of the first African state (Ghana). In many other cases, women achieved suffrage only with liberation from colonialism. For instance, in Gabon (1956), Mauritania (1961), Algeria (1961), and the Congo (1963) women gained the right to vote with independence from France. Likewise, in Jamaica (1944), Malaysia (1957), Uganda (1962), and Bahrain (1971/1973), suffrage came with liberation from British rule. Portugal is notable for not extending the franchise to women within the colonies, all of whom were enfranchised upon independence in 1975 (Angola, Cape Verde, Mozambique, Sao Tome and Principe, and Guinea Bissau). In a number of cases, such as Cambodia, Morocco, the Central African Republic, Egypt, Sudan, Jordan, Yemen, and Iraq, suffrage was not extended to women until several years after independence. Although research on women’s suffrage struggles in post-colonial states is still limited, studies that do exist makes clear that the granting of suffrage rarely took on an automatic logic. Despite the large number of states that had accepted women’s suffrage by the mid-1940s, it was not a given for these states to do so. The extension of the vote to women within colonial rule was preceded by widespread suffrage activism from the 1930s to 1960s— among women of the Bahamas, Nigeria, and India, to name three examples— prompting general concern about suffrage in the colonies among the ­British (Burton 1994; Grewal 1996; Johnson-Odim and Mba 1997). Similar ­mobilization for suffrage within colonial rule took place in the Dutch East Indies (Blackburn 1999). Among the states that enfranchised women upon their creation, furthermore, the women of the national liberation movements had often organized for and demanded political equality before liberation (Johnson-Odim and Mba 1997; Blackburn 1999; Tripp 2000). In Sudan and Egypt, where suffrage was not extended to women until eight or nine years after independence, suffrage mobilization was similarly a crucial antecedent to the vote (Botman 1999; Ahmed al Amin and Abdel Magied 2001). There were also important organized transnational dimensions to these suffrage demands, generated within the emergent Asian-African liberation from colonialism. The first Asian-African Conference on Women was held in Colombo in 1958, and the first Afro-Asian Women’s Conference in Cairo in 1961, both direct offspring of the Non-Aligned and Afro-Asian Solidarity Movements. Their stated aim was to coordinate and formalize the interaction among women of former colonies, with women’s suffrage on the agenda (Proceedings of the First Asian-African Conference of Women, Colombo, Ceylon, February 15–24, 1958; Proceedings of the First Afro-Asian Women’s Conference, Cairo, January 14–23, 1961).

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The insistence by European women and statesmen that suffrage and the advancement of women was a European invention, intrinsic to “civilization,” did not facilitate the efforts of Asian and African suffragists. In a context of enmity with the colonial West, such an insistence instead prodded forward arguments for the rejection of political equality. Opposing suffrage as a European invention became a manner of rejecting the West and guarding non-Western “tradition.” Afro-Asian suffragists responded not only by referring to examples of women’s political emancipation in Turkey, India, China, and the Philippines, but also by crafting arguments about the political power of women in pre-colonial societies (Blackburn 1999, p. 214). They drew on intellectuals such as Turkish Kemalist ideologue, Ziya Gökalp, who had proclaimed that “Old Turks were both democratic and feminist” (Arat 2000, p. 109). Likewise, when introducing the suffrage bill to parliament, Turkish president İsmet Inönü claimed that “the Turkish nation prospered and pervaded the whole world with its power and civilization only when its women had occupied their just and prestigious place along with men and worked together with men in the complicated and difficult tasks of their country” (Arat 2000, p. 111). Despite what the Europeans may claim, female political agency was not a European invention, they insisted: far from it.

Conclusion In a now classic statement, Tilly claims of the extension of political rights that “nothing could be more detrimental to an understanding of this whole process than the old liberal conception of European history as the gradual creation and extension of political rights” (Tilly 1975, p. 37). This chapter seconds that statement in its analysis of the worldwide emergence of women’s suffrage. Although suffragism first emerged in Europe, the subsequent development of suffrage laws around the world is not testimony to the progressive expansion of a liberal, European international society of more similar states. Indeed, this chapter challenges several central claims made in prior attempts to address this development (Ramirez et al. 1997; Ramirez and McEneaney 1997; Keck and Sikkink 1998; Finnemore and Sikkink 1999; Berkovitch 1999). Prior analyses of the worldwide emergence of women’s suffrage all share the assumption that this is a case of liberal or Western ideals spreading from Europe to the rest of the world. The accounts also share the view that once a critical mass of European countries and Anglo-European settler states had instituted suffrage as a result of activism, an imitative logic took hold among remaining states, those of Latin America, Asia, and Africa. In these later cases, the causal power is thought to rest with a new international suffrage norm. The states of the Americas, Asia, and Africa mimicked a standard which the Europeans had set up, creating an outcome of similarity among states worldwide.

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This account takes us some of the ways in understanding the global emergence of women’s suffrage. Transnational suffrage mobilization did start among European nationals and women of Anglo-European settler countries. A number of these states were the first to grant women political rights. And suffrage did become an international standard of appropriate behavior for states. The rationales for why women should be allowed to vote furthermore became part of the shared language of international society. Notions of suffrage as progress, linking the political status of women to the advancement of the state, circulated across the world. In these ways, suffrage is a story of state similarity emerging out of the European core of international society. International social hierarchies were built into the new norm from the get-go, however. The initial transnational activism developed in the society of civilized states and not in the world at large. This fact is not well explained simply with reference to the strength of liberal ideals about political equality in Europe as opposed to elsewhere. Not only can liberalism accommodate the exclusion of women from politics, but also many non-European societies had already recognized female political authority and could have been included in the struggle. The scope and content of the first wave of transnational suffragism are better accounted for as a response to a prior international norm, the standard that civilized states (in contrast to allegedly inferior societies) keep women out of politics. By reinterpreting this prior norm, “civilized” suffragists helped change the standard governing their states. Civilized states were now to grant women suffrage. Since suffrage was presumably indicative of having reached an advanced stage of European civilization, it was far from clear whether this was an expectation for other societies as well. If they were to enfranchise women, on what grounds? It would take imaginative re-interpretations of this norm to make the case that other states, states whose representatives indeed may have loathed such “civilization,” should adopt suffrage legislation. Large-scale activism developed to legitimate women’s suffrage also in societies not part of “advanced European civilization.” In this chapter, we saw the mass nature of the mobilizations for female political empowerment in the Socialist East, the Americas, and the newly emerging states of Africa and Asia. Prior accounts have overlooked these waves of transnational suffragism. Had they not, they would likely agree that this level of mobilization outside of the core of civilized society is not well captured as a process of “mimicry.” Nor did activists outside the core simply mimic the rationales for women’s suffrage provided for civilized states. They did argue that the political status of women was a means for general national advancement in a hierarchical world. And the suffrage proponents all had to come to grips with and transform the challenging European proclamations of suffrage as exclusively a sign of “civilization.” However, they did so in different ways. Rather than the spread of Western ideas and institutions, these developments suggest an international society whose Eurocentric hierarchy was contested.

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References Ahmed Al Amin, Nafisa, and Ahmed Abdel Magied. 2001. A History of Sudanese Women Organizations and the Strive for Liberation and Empowerment. Ahfad Journal 18 (1): 2–24. Al Kitbi, Ebtisam. 2008. Women’s Political Status in the GCC States. Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. Accessed 28 July 2016. Arat, Yesim. 2000. From Emancipation to Liberation: The Changing Role of Women in Turkey’s Public Realm. Journal of International Affairs 54 (1): 107–123. Berkovitch, Nitza. 1999. From Motherhood to Citizenship: Women’s Rights and International Organizations. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press. Blackburn, Susan. 1999. Winning the Vote for Women in Indonesia. Australian Feminist Studies 14 (29): 207–218. Botman, Selma. 1999. Engendering Citizenship in Egypt. New York: Columbia University Press. Burton, Antoinette. 1994. Burdens of History: British Feminists, Indian Women and Imperial Culture, 1865–1915. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press. Cáceres, Zoila Aurora. 1946. Labor de Armonía Interamericana en los Estados Unidos de Norte América 1940–1945. Lima: n.p. Edwards, Louise. 2000. Women’s Suffrage in China: Challenging Scholarly Conventions. Pacific Historical Review 69 (4): 617–638. El Comercio. 1938. Consejo Nacional de Mujeres del Perú, July 17. Finnemore, Martha, and Kathryn Sikkink. 1999. International Norm Dynamics and Political Change. In Exploration and Contestation in the Study of World Politics, ed. Peter Katzenstein, Robert Keohane, and Stephen Krasner, 247–278. Cambridge: MIT Press. Grewal, Inderpal. 1996. Home and Harem. Nation, Gender, Empire, and the Cultures of Travel. Durham: Duke University Press. Hahner, June. 1990. Emancipating the Female Sex: The Struggle for Women’s Rights in Brazil, 1850–1940. Durham: Duke University Press. Illinois Association Opposed to the Extension of Suffrage to Women. 1900. Address to the Voters of the Middle West. Chicago: n.p. Inter-American Commission of Women (IACW). 1965. Historical Review on the Recognition of the Political Rights of American Women. Washington, DC: Panamerican Union. Inter-Parliamentary Union (IPU). 2000. Participation of Women in Political Life: An Assessment of Developments in National Parliaments, Political Parties, Governments and the Inter-Parliamentary Union, Five Years After the Fourth World Conference on Women. Geneva: IPU. Johnson-Odim, Cheryl, and Nina Mba. 1997. For Women and the Nation: Funmilayo Ransome-Kuti of Nigeria. Urbana: University of Illinois Press. Keck, Margaret, and Kathryn Sikkink. 1998. Activists Beyond Borders: Advocacy Networks in International Politics. Ithaca: Cornell University Press. Kollontai, Alexandra. 1909. The Struggle for Political Rights. In The Social Basis of the Woman Question, Reproduced in Alix Holt ed. 1977. Selected Writings of Alexandra Kollontai, 58–74. London: Allison & Busby. Lavrin, Asunción. 1995. Women, Feminism, and Social Change in Argentina, Chile and Uruguay, 1890–1940. Lincoln: Nebraska University Press.

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Miller, Francesca. 1986. The International Relations of Women of the Americas 1890–1928. The Americas XLIII (2): 171–182. Miller, Francesca. 1991. Latin American Women and the Search for Social Justice. London: University Press of New England. Pernet, Corinne. 2000. Chilean Feminists, the International Women’s Movement, and Suffrage, 1915–1950. Pacific Historical Review 69 (4): 663–688. Portal, Magda. 1933. El Aprismo y la Mujer. Lima: Editorial Cooperativa Aprist “Atahualpa”. Ramirez, Fransisco, and Elizabeth McEneaney. 1997. From Women’s Suffrage to Reproduction Rights? Cross-National Considerations. International Journal of Comparative Sociology 38 (1–2): 6–35. Ramirez, Francisco, Yasemin Soysal, and Suzanne Shanahan. 1997. The Changing Logic of Political Citizenship: Cross-National Acquisition of Women’s Suffrage Rights, 1890–1990. American Sociological Review 62 (5): 736–747. Rendall, Jane. 1994. Citizenship, Culture and Civilization: The Languages of British Suffragists, 1866–1874. In Suffrage and Beyond, ed. Caroline Daley and Melanie Nola, 126–150. International Feminist Perspectives: New York University Press. Rupp, Leila. 1997. Worlds of Women: The Making of an International Women’s Movement. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press. Schirmacher, Käthe. 1912. The Modern Woman’s Rights Movement: A Historical Survey. New York: The Macmillan Company. Scott, James. 1931. The International Conferences of American States, 1889–1928: A Collection of the Conventions, Recommendations, Resolutions, Reports, and Motions Adopted by the First Six International Conferences of American States, and Documents Relating to the Organization of the Conferences. New York: Oxford University Press. Tripp, Aili Mari. 2000. Women and Politics in Uganda. Madison: University of Wisconsin Press. Zetkin, Clara. 1906. “Woman Suffrage”, Speech Delivered at Mannheim Socialist Women’s Conference. London: Twentieth Century Press. Zetkin, Clara (ed.). 1920. Theses for the Communist Women’s Movement. Resolution adopted by the Comintern Executive Committee in 1920, in John Riddell (ed.) 1991, vol. I, 977–998.

CHAPTER 2

Gender and Electoral Behavior Miki Caul Kittilson

Research on gender and electoral behavior demonstrates that the ways that ordinary citizens connect to the democratic process are gendered. Women and men tend to participate at different rates and show greater support for different political parties. These gender differences not only stem from men and women’s different positions in the socioeconomic landscape, but also derive from the way that gender is woven into election campaigns, political processes, and policy outcomes. Casting a ballot is important to democracy, and it represents a choice among political alternatives. Women have largely caught up to men in voter turnout. However, remaining gender differences in the electoral activities that connect citizens to shaping these alternatives and the salient issues of the day mean that women have less input into the choices put before them. This chapter examines the general contours of men and women’s electoral participation and voting preferences in the post-World War II era. Group differences are often dubbed a gender gap. A growing body of research in comparative political behavior finds common gender gaps in voter participation and vote preferences around the world. Providing an overview of patterns worldwide, the focus is on cross-national and cross-temporal variations. However, it is important to note that beneath these general trends lies meaningful variation at the national level, as well as among different kinds of women. Globally, women hold the right to vote in most nations. Yet early research was largely limited to the USA and Western Europe as most election study surveys were conducted in these countries. More recent literature examines Eastern and Central Europe, Latin America, and Africa. Overall, gender M. C. Kittilson (*)  School of Politics and Global Studies, Arizona State University, Tempe, AZ, USA e-mail: [email protected] © The Author(s) 2019 S. Franceschet et al. (eds.), The Palgrave Handbook of Women’s Political Rights, Gender and Politics, https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-137-59074-9_2

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differences in voter participation have narrowed in recent decades for most democracies, such that today women are as likely as men to cast a ballot on election day. Women are still less likely to participate in the sorts of activities that contribute to structuring vote choices, however. At the same time, gaps in vote choice have reversed direction for many countries: Whereas women tended to vote more conservatively than men, they now vote more progressively. Variation across countries suggests that context matters for the way gender structures voting patterns. Several explanations have been offered to explain these differences, both at the individual level and country level.

Gender and Electoral Participation After enfranchisement, women traditionally voted less frequently than men in most democracies around the world. Pioneering comparative research by Verba et al. (1978) established that men voted at higher rates than women in all seven countries in their comparative study. At that time in the development of scholarship on political behavior, gender differences were not a primary focus for explanation. Instead, a dichotomous variable to denote whether a respondent was male or female was considered a control in a multifaceted set of explanatory variables. Scholarship on gender and electoral participation has strengthened considerably in recent decades, enhancing our understanding of how different kinds of people connect to the democratic process. In recent decades, several studies report similar rates of voter participation for men and women. By the 1980s, women were voting at equal rates to men across several European democracies (Christy 1987; Conway 2001). Similarly, for US presidential elections, women have cast their ballot at similar rates to men since 1980 (Beckwith 1986; CAWP 2000). Likewise, British elections have seen little gender gap in turnout since 1979 (Norris 1999). Much of our cross-national election survey data comes from the Comparative Study of Electoral Systems (CSES). There have been several waves of the survey, and the number of countries in the dataset has grown over time. In contemporary elections, for 11 of 16 countries in the Comparative Electoral Systems dataset (2011–2013), men voted at higher rates than women, but the gap was not large in most instances (Kittilson 2015). For example, in Germany men registered higher voting participation by 8 percentage points. In the USA, in contrast, the gender gap favored women by 3 percentage points—a gap that holds across racial and ethnic groups. This finding of minimal gender differences for voting participation in recent elections is supported across 18 Latin American democracies in recent elections (Espinal and Zhao 2015). Although men and women turn out to cast a ballot at similar rates in most contemporary elections, women still participate less in other forms of electoral activity. Across nearly all 31 democracies in the CSES dataset, men

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report higher rates of political persuasion, campaign work, and contracting elected officials (Kittilson and Schwindt-Bayer 2012). For 18 democracies, Coffe and Bolzendahl (2010) find that men are more likely to have contacted an elected official, joined a political party, or attended a political meeting. This gender gap in favor of men’s electoral activity holds even after controlling for socioeconomic characteristics. Similarly, across Latin American nations men report more frequent participation on campaigns and in protests than women (Desposato and Norrander 2009; Espinal and Zhao 2015). In the USA, women are less likely to make a campaign contribution or join political organizations (Burns et al. 2001). One of the most important predictors of electoral participation is political interest. Political interest not only exerts powerful influence on who votes, but also is an antecedent to participation in more demanding forms of participation. The seminal research of Campbell et al. (1960) showed that political interest and other dimensions of psychological engagement are integral to participating in midterm and local elections. Since the 1970s, several studies have shown women report less political interest than their male counterparts (Verba et al. 1978; Jennings and Niemi 1981; Burns et al. 2001). In contemporary elections, across 31 democracies, women report less political interest and the difference is statistically significant in most instances (Kittilson and Schwindt-Bayer 2012; Schwindt-Bayer 2011). Women also report less frequent political discussion. Of course, people with more interest in the political process are also more likely to report discussing politics with friends and family. This gender gap holds for most democracies in the CSES dataset (Kittilson and Schwindt-Bayer 2012). Similarly, Desposato and Norrander (2009) find that across Latin America women report talking about politics with friends less than men. After controlling for partisanship and socioeconomic status, significant gender differences in engagement remain in the American electorate (Delli Carpini and Keeter 1997; Burns et al. 2001). Explanations for gender differences in electoral participation can be grouped into several broad categories, including aggregate-level socioeconomic development, broad societal attitudes, individual-level resources, socialization, and political context. While they can be distinguished analytically, these different explanations certainly work together and interact in important ways. Gender differences in electoral participation may rest on men and women’s differential positions in the social and economic landscape. Since the 1950s, many societies have witnessed a sea change in the structure of the economy and in the traditional division of labor between men and women. Inglehart and Norris (2003) draw on a wealth of cross-national survey data to link economic development and religious traditions to broad patterns of attitudes and values regarding gender equality. They find that more economically developed and secular countries tend to have more egalitarian gender attitudes.

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In countries where more people share commitment to gender equality, gender gaps in participation are smaller (Inglehart and Norris 2003). Shrinking gender gaps in voter participation in recent decades are often attributed to attenuating gender gaps in educational attainment and paid workforce participation. These aggregate-level educational and workforce explanations are also important at the individual level. Women have historically held fewer of the resources that are linked to turnout, relative to men. In recent decades, women’s levels of education, income, and occupational prestige have grown considerably. Verba et al. (1995) show that these factors translate into the cognitive and civic skills that make participation in politics more likely. Further, as more women work outside the home, they also gain entry into the traditional politically mobilizing networks from which they were historically excluded, such as trade unions and professional associations. Andersen’s (1975) pioneering research on gender and electoral activity examined voter participation and working for a party, attending a meeting, being a member of a political organization, and contributing money to campaigns. Her findings showed that it is the “group of employed women which has made the biggest gain in participation between 1952 and 1972” (p. 442). The persistent gaps in psychological engagement with electoral politics, such as political interest, continue to puzzle researchers (Burns et al. 2001). Unlike voter turnout, resource-based explanations offer less leverage in explaining persistent differences. Socialization of traditional gender roles may discourage political interest and political discussion among women. Following the logic of socioeconomic theories, as women’s education and paid labor force participation rates have risen, gender differences in engagement should attenuate as well. The weak explanatory power of individual-level attributes to explain gender gaps in political interest, efficacy, and discussion has led scholars to examine the political context. Nancy Burns (2007) theorizes that political context, including the salience of particular issues or policies, can make gender more or less relevant. Further, policy changes or political events can mobilize women around political issues. The importance of these contextual influences lies in shifting the burden of gender equality from women themselves, in terms of gaining civic skills or resources, to the gendered cues of the existing political landscape. Political institutions are never neutral, but rather advantage some groups over others. In this way, some institutions and structures will depress women’s political engagement, while other contexts will encourage it. One of the most frequently studied contextual factors is the presence of women in political office. Women’s election to office may alter men and women’s attitudes and perceptions of the appropriate role of women in the political process. Women’s presence in politics is theorized to influence masslevel attitudes and behaviors (Franceschet et al. 2012). Pioneering studies

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examined the relationship between elected office and mass-level participation in the USA. Both Atkeson and Carillo (2007) and Burns et al. (2001) found that women living in states with women elected to political offices are significantly more likely to be interested in and efficacious about politics than their male counterparts. This relationship holds at the district level as well (Sapiro and Conover 1997). However, Dolan (2006) notes that after controlling for party congruence, she finds little support for this relationship. This discrepancy may be attributed to the visibility of the office that women hold. Campbell and Wolbrecht (2006) find that women’s candidacies for highly visible offices, covered more prominently in the news media, are more likely to empower women politically. Further, where the campaigns are competitive and female candidates are visible, women as candidates may also heighten women’s political efficacy and discussion. The link between women’s presence in elected office and mass-level attenuation in gender gaps in electoral participation and interest has also been established more broadly across democracies. For Latin America, Desposato and Norrander (2009) find that where women have a greater share of seats in parliament, the gender gap in political participation is smaller. Across Europe, differences in intentions to participate among adolescents show fewer gender differences in countries where there are more women in parliament (Wolbrecht and Campbell 2007). The authors theorize that a role model effect is at work: Female candidates show young women that the political process is open to them. In contrast, other cross-national studies find less evidence to support the effects of women’s election to office to increased political involvement (Karp and Banducci 2008; Kittilson and Schwindt-Bayer 2012). Given that the visibility of office matters for influencing electoral behavior, Liu and Banaszak (2017) extend this argument to the executive branch. Women in cabinet positions may be more well known among the electorate and wield more policymaking power. Examining gender equality on cabinets across 20 democracies in the 2014 World Values Survey, they find a significant impact of women in cabinets on electoral participation. In recent decades, more than 60 countries have adopted national quotas or reserved seats for women and many more political parties in these countries and others have crafted their own statutes to increase female candidacies (Krook 2009; Quota Project 2017). Might then gender quotas act as symbols of inclusion in politics and alter the gender gap in political interest or activity? Evidence to support this proposition is mixed. On the one hand, Hinojosa et al. (2017) find that gender quotas in Uruguay led to a significant increase in women’s political interest and participation across a host of electoral activities. Surveying Uruguayans before and after the implementation of quotas in Uruguay, they find strong evidence that increases in women’s descriptive representation resulting from the implementation of a gender quota positively

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affect symbolic representation. While there is little change among men, substantial (and statistically significant) changes occur for women. Alternatively, gender quota policies may highlight negative stereotypes about women and could depress men and/or women’s mass-level participation (Clayton 2015). Supporting this expectation, Kittilson and SchwindtBayer (2012) find that the passage of the quota law itself seems to have limited effects on women’s political engagement across the democracies included in the CSES data set. Zetterberg (2009) also finds no relationship in his study of Latin American nations. Recent research moves beyond the contextual influence of women in elected office to examine the ways electoral institutions more broadly may impact gender differences in political participation and engagement with politics. More inclusive proportional electoral systems are associated with smaller gender differences in political engagement across 31 democracies (Kittilson and Schwindt-Bayer 2012). The effects of proportionality in the vote to seat translation heighten women’s participation by incentivizing parties to pursue group-based mobilization efforts in elections.

Gender, Partisanship, and Vote Choice Group preferences for political parties and candidates are integral in the democratic process because they shape policy outcomes. Most democracies demonstrate dynamic gender gaps in vote choice and party attachments. Some of the earliest comparative voting behavior studies found that women were more politically conservative than men in ideology, partisan attachment, and vote choice (Lipset 1960; Duverger 1955). This early gap is often referred to as the “traditional” gender gap. By the 1980s, several cross-national studies noted a gender dealignment, with few gender differences in voting preferences and party attachments. In recent decades, in many democracies women have moved to support leftist parties more than men. Among the 60 countries in their study, Inglehart and Norris (2000) find that half showed a “modern gender gap” in the mid1990s, with women leaning toward the left wing. In more recent elections, across Western Europe, women have continued to vote for more leftist parties in nearly all countries (Giger 2009; Abendschon and Steinmetz 2014). Across Western European countries, further, women are significantly less likely to vote for radical right parties than their male counterparts (Immerzeel et al. 2015; Spierings and Zaslove 2015). This relationship holds even after controlling for several socioeconomic and political factors. Importantly, however, these gender gaps do not hold for postcommunist countries (Abendschon and Steinmetz 2014). Trends in American elections are similar to the cross-national patterns. In recent elections, women are more supportive of the Democratic Party than the Republican Party. There is some fluctuation from election to election, but

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the gender gap shows women favoring the Democrats for the most part since 1980 (Carroll 1988). The shifting gender gap in US elections is not solely driven by women’s changing voter preferences, however, but has been driven in large part by men’s movement toward the Republican Party (Kaufmann and Petrocik 1999; Box-Steffensmeier et al. 2004). Beneath this broad cross-national and cross-temporal pattern, individual countries differ in the size and direction of the gender gap in voting preferences. Even within countries, gender differences fluctuate from one election to the next. It is also essential to highlight differences among women. Rosie Campbell (2006) points out the dangers in treating women and men as monolithic blocks of voters. Differences among men and among women also shape attachments to parties. Age, education, income, race, ethnicity, religion, sexuality, marital, and parental status are some factors that intersect with gender in complex ways. For example, younger women are more likely to support the more Labour Party in Britain and to prioritize health care and education than their older female counterparts (Campbell 2006). Differences among women are also evident in US elections. Despite some ebb and flow, both white women and white men have shifted toward the Republicans, although the movement among men has been stronger. Among Latinos women are more likely to support the Democratic Party than are men (Bejarano 2014). Among African-Americans, support for the Democratic Party is strong among both men and women. The very same social and economic inequalities that tend to depress women’s political engagement in activities beyond voting also set the scene for differences in party preferences. Several explanations have been advances to explain the leftward shift of women cross-nationally. One theory focuses on secularization. Traditionally, right-wing and center parties were more closely linked with religious voters. The standard explanation for the “traditional gender gap” was that women’s higher levels of religiosity led them to favor conservative parties. The relationship between women’s declining religiosity and their shift toward more leftist parties is most evident across Western Europe, where religion has historically structured party systems (Emmenegger and Manow 2014). Concomitantly, women’s entrance into the paid workforce across industrialized democracies in the post-World War II era also influences women’s leftward shift in party preferences and vote choice. Increased levels of female workforce participation are linked to women’s increasing propensity to vote for leftist parties across Western Europe (Giger 2009). However, this relationship does not seem to hold for postcommunist parties where women entered the workforce at very high rates but have not shifted toward leftist parties. Women’s participation in the labor force may influence their vote preferences through several potential mechanisms. Women’s rising labor force

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participation erodes traditional divisions of labor and gender roles. As women move from the private to public sphere, their social and political networks change. Because women were historically less likely to participate in the paid workforce and professional associations and unions, women were less likely to be mobilized by leftist parties. Women in paid employment also become more autonomous through economic independence. At the same time, women in the workforce are often marginalized in undervalued and underpaid sectors, rendering them more economically vulnerable (Iverson and Rosenbluth 2006). Further, as the welfare state has grown so has women’s disproportionate employment in the public sector. Spending cuts usually reduce the size of public sector employment. In this way, some of women’s support for leftist parties may come through women’s support for public sector jobs. Heightened levels of women in the workforce are not the sole source of gender differences in voter preferences. Rising rates of divorce rates increase women’s need for welfare state benefits. Increasing economic vulnerability leads women to be less supportive of the more conservative parties advocating spending cuts. Because women are disproportionately affected by social spending cuts, relative to their male counterparts, women are less likely to support the party pushing for the cuts (Cheney et al. 1998). Inglehart and Norris (2000) theorize that long-term structural trends in education and the workforce common to postindustrial democracies lead to cultural transformations. Namely, the breakdown of the traditional division of gendered labor encourages more gender egalitarian attitudes. They find that postmaterialist attitudes and support for the women’s movement are tied to women’s greater support of leftist parties. Further, they find that generational differences (not life cycle) account for the shift from the traditional to modern gender gap, as the “modern gender gap was strongest among the younger age groups while the traditional gender gap was evident among the elderly” (p. 459). Thus, the modern gender gap is expected to grow with generational replacement.

Conclusions Women have made impressive gains in electoral participation in the postWorld War II era. Existing studies of gender and electoral engagement find the most equality in voter participation, but note larger gaps in other forms of electoral activity, including interest in and discussion of elections and politics, working on campaigns, and joining political organizations. As women’s participation levels have increased, their overall preferences for political parties have also shifted. For most democracies, women’s vote choices have moved from leaning toward conservative parties toward favoring leftist parties. Established explanations tend to focus on large-scale structural and concomitant attitudinal shifts to explain the dynamics of the gender gap over time.

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While social and economic explanations are powerful, future research might also add some political and group mobilization explanations. Levels of participation may be linked to aggregate-level voter preferences. The same forces that encourage women’s electoral participation, such as rising levels of education and workforce participation, also underpin shifts in voter preferences from right to left. Strengthening women’s voice through their participation in the democratic process is important because political activity is expected to shape the policy agenda, policy alternatives, and policy outcomes. At certain points in history, some issues may disproportionately affect women as a group, relative to men. For example, today workplace discrimination, equal wages, parental leave, childcare provision, and violence against women may be more relevant to some women. Historically, there were few formal policies to address these issues, but in recent decades, some democracies have adopted new laws. Yet policies are not only outcomes of the democratic process, but may also exert influence over levels of electoral participation. New policies can act as symbols to carry important messages to the electorate. Gender equality and women’s rights policies signify that issues that have traditionally been considered private have become national policy choices. Specifically, in countries where policies addressing gender equality are adopted, more women may be drawn into the democratic process (Kittilson 2010). Similar to the way policy alternatives can mobilize men and women in the electorate, so too can electoral campaigns. Future research should also address how they ways gender is made more or less relevant in election campaigns may affect both vote choice and participation. Given that women and men’s electoral participation and voting preferences vary by country, these country-level differences may be partially explained by the ways gender is constructed in election campaigns, as well as in the ways political parties make their appeals to the electorate. Some of the most recent research asks how different groups of women vary in their propensity to vote. Of course, women are not a monolithic group and gender intersects in important ways with race, ethnicity, sexuality, and socioeconomic status. Future cross-national research should follow the example of pioneering research on US elections to more carefully consider the intersection of gender with race, ethnicity, sexuality, and class. These interactions may be important for strengthening our understanding of electoral participation and political preferences. Gender is not only monolithic, but also no simply synonymous with women. Past research has tended to focus on women’s attributes. Scholarship in this area must also account for men’s shifting political orientations to fully explain gender gaps in electoral behavior. Some researches in the USA have focused on changes in men’s party preferences, and more research is needed. Because we are interested in fully understanding how gender shapes electoral behavior, we must give a more careful look at changes in men’s electoral behavior over time and across contexts.

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References Abendschon, Simone, and Stephanie Steinmetz. 2014. The Gender Gap in Voting Revisited: Women’s Party Preferences in a European Context. Social Politics 21 (2): 315–344. Andersen, Kristi. 1975. Working Women and Political Participation, 1952–1972. American Journal of Political Science 19 (3): 439–453. Atkeson, Lonna Rae, and Nancy Carrillo. 2007. More Is Better: The Influence of Collective Female Descriptive Representation on External Efficacy. Politics & Gender 3 (1): 79–101. Beckwith, Karen. 1986. American Women and Political Participation. Westport, CT: Greenwood Press. Bejarano, Christina E. 2014. Latino Gender and Generation Gaps in Political Ideology. Politics & Gender 10 (1): 62–88. Box-Steffensmeier, Janet M., Suzanna De Boef, and Tse-Min Lin. 2004. The Dynamics of the Partisan Gender Gap. American Political Science Review 98 (3): 515–528. Burns, Nancy. 2007. Gender in the Aggregate, Gender in the Individual, Gender and Political Action. Politics & Gender 3 (1): 104–124. Burns, Nancy, Kay Lehman Schlozman, and Sidney Verba. 2001. The Private Roots of Public Action: Gender, Equality, and Political Participation. Cambridge: Harvard University Press. Campbell, Rosie. 2006. Gender and the Vote in Britain. Colchester: ECPR Press Monographs. Campbell, David E., and Christina Wolbrecht. 2006. See Jane Run: Women Politicians as Role Models for Adolescents. Journal of Politics 68 (2): 233–247. Campbell, Angus, Philip Converse, Warren Miller, and Donal Stokes. 1960. The American Voter. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Carroll, Susan. 1988. Women’s Autonomy and the Gender Gap. In Politics of the Gender Gap, ed. Carol Mueller. Beverly Hills, CA: Sage Publications. CAWP. 2000. Sex Differences in Voting Turnout. www.cawp.org. Cheney, Carol Kennedy, R. Michael Alvarez, and Jonathan Nagler. 1998. Explaining the Gender Gap in U.S. Presidential Elections. Political Research Quarterly 51 (2): 311–339. Christy, Carol A. 1987. Sex Differences in Political Participation: Processes of Change in Fourteen Nations. New York: Praeger. Clayton, Amanda. 2015. Women’s Political Engagement Under Quota-Mandated Female Representation: Evidence from a Randomized Policy Experiment. Comparative Political Studies 48 (3): 333–369. Coffé, Hilde, and Catherine Bolzendahl. 2010. Same Game, Different Rules? Gender Differences in Political Participation. Sex Roles 62 (5–6): 318–333. Conway, M. Margaret. 2001. Women and Political Participation. Political Science and Politics 34 (2): 231–233. Carpini, Delli, X. Michael, and Scott Keeter. 1997. What Americans Know About Politics and Why It Matters. New Haven: Yale University Press.

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Desposato, Scott, and Barbara Norrander. 2009. The Gender Gap in Latin America: Contextual and Individual Influences on Gender and Political Participation. British Journal of Political Science 39 (1): 141–162. Dolan, Kathleen. 2006. Symbolic Mobilization? The Impact of Candidate Sex in American Elections. American Politics Research 34 (6): 687–704. Duverger, Maurice. 1955. The Political Role of Women. UNESCO. Emmenegger, Patrick, and Philip Manow. 2014. Religion and the Gender Vote Gap: Women’s Changed Political Preferences from the 1970s to 2010. Politics & Society 42 (2): 166–193. Espinal, Rosario, and Shanyang Zhao. 2015. Gender Gaps in Civic and Political Participation in Latin America. Latin American Politics and Society 57 (1): 123–138. Franceschet, Susan, Mona Lena Krook, and Jennifer M. Piscopo (eds.). 2012. The Impact of Gender Quotas. New York: Oxford University Press. Giger, Nathalie. 2009. Toward a Modern Gender Gap in Europe? A Comparative Analysis of Voting Behavior in 12 Countries. Social Science Journal 46: 474–492. Hinojosa, Magda, Kim Fridkin, and Miki Kittilson. 2017. The Impact of Descriptive Representation on Persistent Gender Gaps. Politics, Groups and Identities 5 (3): 435–453. Immerzeel, Tim, Hilde Coffe, and Tanja van der Lippe. 2015. Explaining the Gender Gap in Radical Right Voting: A Cross-National Investigation in 12 Western European Countries. Comparative European Politics 12 (2): 263–286. Inglehart, Ronald, and Pippa Norris. 2000. The Developmental Theory of the Gender Gap: Women’s and Men’s Voting Behavior in Global Perspective. International Political Science Review 21 (4): 441–463. Inglehart, Ronald, and Pippa Norris. 2003. Rising Tide: Gender Equality and Cultural Change Around the World. New York: Cambridge University Press. Iversen, Torben, and Frances Rosenbluth. 2006. The Political Economy of Gender: Explaining Cross-National Variation in the Gender Division of Labor and Gender Voting Gap. American Journal of Political Science 50 (1): 1–19. Jennings, M. Kent, and Richard Niemi. 1981. Generations and Politics: A Panel Study of Young Adults. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press. Kaufmann, Karen M., and John R. Petrocik. 1999. The Changing Politics of American Men: Understanding the Sources of the Gender Gap. American Journal of Political Science 43 (3): 864. Karp, Jeffrey A., and Susan A. Banducci. 2008. When Politics Is Not Just a Man’s Game: Women’s Representation and Political Engagement. Electoral Studies 27 (1): 105–115. Kittilson, Miki Caul. 2010. Comparing Gender, Institutions and Political Behavior: Toward an Integrated Theoretical Framework. Perspectives on Politics 8 (1): 217–222. Kittilson, Miki Caul. 2015. Gender and Political Behavior. In Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Politics. Oxford University Press. Kittilson, Miki Caul, and Leslie Schwindt-Bayer. 2012. The Gendered Effects of Electoral Institutions: Political Engagement and Participation. New York: Oxford University Press. Krook, Mona Lena. 2009. Quotas for Women in Politics: Gender and Candidate Selection Reform Worldwide. New York: Oxford University Press. Lipset, Seymour Martin. 1960. Political Man. New York: Doubleday.

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Liu, Shan-Jan Sarah, and Lee Ann Banaszak. 2017. Do Government Positions Held by Women Matter? A Cross-National Examination of Female Ministers’ Impacts on Women’s Political Participation. Politics & Gender 13 (1): 132–162. Norris, Pippa. 1999. Women’s Power at the Ballot Box: Voter Turnout from 1945 to 2000, A Global Report on Political Participation. Stockholm: International IDEA. Quota Project. 2017. Gender Quotas Database. IDEA. https://www.idea.int/datatools/data/gender-quotas. Accessed 20 Aug 2017. Sapiro, Virginia, and Pamela Conover. 1997. The Variable Gender Basis of Electoral Politics: Gender and Context in the 1992 US Election. British Journal of Political Science 27 (4): 497–523. Schwindt-Bayer, Leslie A. 2011. Gender Quotas and Women’s Political Participation in Latin America. Working Paper, Americas Barometer Small Grants and Data Award Recipients. Spierings, Niels, and Andrej Zaslove. 2015. Gendering the Vote for Populist Radical-Right Parties. Patterns of Prejudice 49 (1): 135–162. Verba, Sidney, Kay Lehman Schlozman, and Henry E. Brady. 1995. Voice and Equality: Civic Voluntarism in American Politics. Cambridge: Harvard University Press. Verba, Sidney, Norman Nie, and Jae-on Kim. 1978. Participation and Political Equality. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Wolbrecht, Christina, and David E. Campbell. 2007. Leading by Example: Female Members of Parliament as Political Role Models. American Journal of Political Science 51 (4): 921–939. Zetterberg, Pär. 2008. The Downside of Gender Quotas? Institutional Constraints on Women in Mexican State Legislatures. Parliamentary Affairs 61 (3): 442–460. Zetterberg, Pär. 2009. Do Gender Quotas Foster Women’s Political Engagement? Lessons from Latin America. Political Research Quarterly 62 (4): 715–730.

CHAPTER 3

The Political Representation of Women over Time Melanie M. Hughes and Pamela Paxton

Over the past 100 years, the world has witnessed a remarkable transformation in women’s representation in politics. In 1900, no woman had ever been elected or appointed to a national legislature. That changed in 1907 when Finland became the first country to elect women to parliament. In 1946, the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR) was the first country to reach 10% women in its national legislature. Today, women make up over 50% of the national legislature in two countries (64% in Rwanda and 53% in Bolivia). Further, 80% of countries have at least 10% women in their national legislatures, and women are 23% of parliaments on average worldwide (IPU 2016). Figure 3.1 illustrates the overall trend in women’s representation from 1945 to 2015. The upward trajectory is clear, from less than 3% women in parliaments on average in 1945 to over 20% today. Although women remain underrepresented in politics in most countries of the world, the growth in women’s political representation is one of the most important trends of the past 100 years. Still, it is important to recognize that women remain underrepresented in most national legislatures. Women make up half of the population of every country in the world, but 20% of countries today have fewer The authors contributed equally to this chapter. We gratefully acknowledge the support of the National Science Foundation (SES-0549973). M. M. Hughes (*)  University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, PA, USA e-mail: [email protected] P. Paxton  University of Texas at Austin, Austin, TX, USA © The Author(s) 2019 S. Franceschet et al. (eds.), The Palgrave Handbook of Women’s Political Rights, Gender and Politics, https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-137-59074-9_3

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Fig. 3.1  Women’s political representation, 1945–2015

than 10% women representing that half. Fourteen countries have less than 5% women in their national legislature, and 5 countries have no women at all. Despite remarkable gains in some countries, therefore, women have overall made less progress in the political arena than in education or in the labor force. What this brief introduction to the history of women’s representation also indicates is significant variation across countries. In some countries, such as Sweden, South Africa, and Rwanda, women have made remarkable progress in their political representation. In other countries, the struggle for equal representation proceeds slowly. Within and between countries, some populations, religions, and governments remain openly hostile to the notion of women in politics. Below, we discuss global patterns of representation over time and briefly describe some of the most common explanations for variation in women’s representation. But first, we turn to a discussion of why it is important to elect women.

Why It Is Important to Elect Women Does it matter if all political decision makers are men? In principle, the answer could be no. But in practice, the answer is often yes. In principle, most laws are gender neutral, and elected representatives pay attention to all of their constituents equally. In practice, however, feminist political theorists have argued that the appearance of neutrality toward gender or equality between men and women in government actually hides substantial gender inequality. Theorists such as Carole Pateman (1988, 1989), Anne Phillips (1991, 1995), and Iris Young (1990) have shown that abstract terms used

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in political theory, such as individual or citizen, actually signify White men. Even more forceful arguments say that the state was structured from its inception to benefit men, both in Western (Lerner 1986; MacKinnon 1989) and non-Western countries (Charrad 2001). Generally, two different types of arguments are used to justify women’s political representation. First, justice arguments suggest that women should be represented in politics, full stop. Because women constitute about half of the population in every country, women should also be half of elected and appointed leaders. Even if men and women in politics author bills, vote, lobby, and distribute resources in exactly the same way as men, women have a right to equal representation. A second set of arguments focus on the utility, or usefulness, of having women represented in politics. According to this line of thinking, women’s presence is expected to change politics or society in some way. Whether it is improving the quality of deliberation, transforming the kinds of laws that are passed, or signaling to young women that politics is not solely a “man’s game,” utility arguments emphasize the difference women’s representation makes. Looking more closely at justice and utility arguments that justify women’s political representation, it is clear that arguments vary depending upon what is meant by “representation”—formal, descriptive, substantive, or symbolic representation. Women’s Formal Representation Historically, the first arguments for women’s representation called for women’s formal representation—women’s legal right to participate in politics alongside men. Formal representation requires the removal of legal barriers to women voting and standing for public office. To put it simply, women and men must be offered the same opportunities to participate in politics. Arguments for women’s formal representation are typically framed in terms of justice. The language of rights and equality permeates the call to change laws and remove obstacles to women’s participation. However, allowing women to participate in politics legally does not guarantee that women will vote, run, or rise to political leadership. Today, all countries in the world have granted women the right to vote and stand for election, if men have those rights. But as noted earlier, many countries have less than 20% women in their national legislatures. Equal opportunity does not automatically result in women’s representation in sizeable numbers. Women’s Descriptive Representation During the 1980s and 1990s, faced with the slow rate of change in the number of women entering politics, feminist political theorists began to articulate a different conception of equal representation that focused on women’s presence (Mansbridge 1999; Phillips 1991, 1995; Sapiro 1982;

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Williams 1998; Young 1990). They called for descriptive representation— that elected bodies should share key characteristics with the citizens who elect them. If women are half of the population, they should also hold half of the seats in legislative and executive bodies. Over the same period, women activists around the world began making similar claims, calling for women’s inclusion in political decision making. Certainly, some contend that women have the right to be present in democratic institutions and the right to be represented in equal numbers as men. Yet, arguments for descriptive representation also go beyond justice arguments. Descriptive representation is expected to matter precisely because women and other marginalized groups are thought to be uniquely suited to represent themselves in political institutions (Williams 1998). As a consequence of their shared position in society, in the economy, and in the family, and their shared history of oppression, members of subordinated groups are expected to better represent the interests of group members (Mansbridge 1999; Phillips 1995; Williams 1998). Consider language from the 1995 Beijing Platform for Action, which states this directly: “Women’s equal participation in decision making is not only a demand for simple justice or democracy but can also be seen as a necessary condition for women’s interests to be taken into account” (United Nations 1995, paragraph 181). It is important to understand that this way of thinking was a radical departure from previous conceptions of representative democracy. Indeed, for two centuries of democratic life in the USA, wealthy White men were often seen as capable of representing all of their constituents, including the poor, people of color, and women, just as well as they could represent the interests of wealthy White men. But, feminist political theorists challenged this view. As Anne Phillips (1991, p. 65) articulates, “while we may all be capable of that imaginative leap that takes us beyond our own situation, history indicates that we do this very partially, if at all.” Women have different interests than do men, and those interests cannot be represented exclusively by men; therefore, women must be present themselves in the political arena. Women’s Substantive Representation A third form of women’s representation—substantive representation—takes some of the emphasis off of women’s presence and puts it on advocacy on behalf of women. Substantive representation requires that politicians speak for women’s interests and act to support women’s issues. Advocates of substantive representation point out that standing for is not the same as acting for (Pitkin 1967). Increasing the numbers of women in politics is a necessary but not a sufficient condition for women’s interests to be served. Women politicians must willing to and able to represent those interests. Arguments about the need to address women’s substantive interests often focus on the difference women make. For instance, research shows

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that women have demonstrably different policy priorities than men (Chattopadhyay and Duflo 2004; Gerrity et al. 2007; Schwindt-Bayer 2006; Swers 1998). In some cases, these differences in preferences translate to differences in laws. For example, men are less likely than women to initiate and pass laws that serve women’s and children’s interests (Berkman and O’Connor 1993; Bratton and Haynie 1999; Taylor-Robinson and Heath 2003; Childs and Withey 2004; Schwindt-Bayer 2010; Htun et al. 2013). Arguments for women’s substantive representation often point to such evidence, articulating the need for women’s interests to be served. Women’s Symbolic Representation A final set of arguments involves symbolic representation—the “feeling of being fairly or effectively represented” (Schwindt-Bayer and Mishler 2005, p. 407; Pitkin 1967). When there are more women visible in politics, it acts as a signal to women citizens that they are represented and that politics may be receptive to them. “Just as the exclusion of women from politics at an elite level sends the implicit message that politics is a ‘man’s game’…the inclusion of women in politics at an elite level sends messages to women that politics is a woman’s game too” (Barnes and Burchard 2013, p. 770). Regardless of whether women’s presence matters for policy, their inclusion matters in other important ways. Arguments for women’s representation that focus on the symbolic realm generally articulate two different kinds of claims. One justification is that women political leaders act as role models for young girls and women. Women’s political leadership may increase girls’ career aspirations and educational attainment, women’s civic engagement, and women’s and self-esteem (Barnes and Burchard 2013; Beaman et al. 2012; Campbell and Wolbrecht 2006; Fridkin and Kenney 2014; High-Pippert and Comer 1998; Johnson 2003; Reingold and Harrell 2010; Wolbrecht and Campbell 2007). Role models effects can be political—women inspiring other women to participate in politics—or can be more general—improving the lives of women and girls in other ways. A second set of arguments suggest that including women in visible positions of power may have transformative effects beyond girls and women. Women’s political representation might send messages to men and boys that women are capable of leading. As Jane Mansbridge argues (1999, p. 649), if groups are excluded from politics, this creates the perception that persons in these groups are “not fit to rule” (Mansbridge 1999, p. 649). Other symbolic arguments sometimes generalize the benefits of women’s representation to all of society. For example, having a diverse set of leaders may transform the ways that people feel about the democracies in which they live, and how constituents interact with their representatives.

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The Quality of Representation Itself A final utility argument is that women’s representation may improve the quality of political decision making. When women are brought into the fold, it doubles the pool of talent from which leaders can be drawn. When women are boxed out of politics, valuable human resources are wasted (Norderval 1985, p. 84). Women’s representation should also increase the diversity of ideas, values, priorities, and political styles that are represented. And, diversity should also make political decision making more flexible and capable of change. Having only the ideas and perspectives of men represented in a country’s polity could make a country less flexible to changes in its internal or international environment.

Global Patterns in the Election of Women to Parliaments Next, we consider how women’s descriptive representation has changed over time. As Fig. 3.1 indicates, women’s representation in national legislatures increased dramatically over the course of the twentieth century. Women moved from no representation in any parliament in 1900 to an average of 12% across the world’s parliaments in 2000. Between 2000 and 2010, the average number of women in parliaments nearly doubled, reaching 19%. Today, women are 23% of parliaments on average worldwide. But growth in women’s representation over the course of the twentieth century varies widely among countries. In some countries, women have become commonplace as members of parliament (MPs), reaching 20, 30%, and even 50% of legislatures. In many other countries, however, descriptive representation for women has proceeded slowly, and women remain barely visible in legislatures. Some countries demonstrate that women can lose representation even after they have gained it. Trajectories of growth, or the pace of increases in women’s representation, also vary substantially from country to country. In some countries, women appear in parliaments in substantial numbers by the 1970s, whereas in others, it would take until the 1990s to gain anything beyond token levels of representation. Women remain minimally represented, demonstrating little change, in other countries. To provide an overview of the historical growth and decline in women’s descriptive representation across countries, this section provides an overview of several typical paths. We adapt Paxton and Hughes (2016)’s country parliamentary histories into four basic paths: (1) No Change, (2) Incremental Gains, (3) Fast-Track Growth, and (4) Plateau. Here, we summarize each historical path, running from 1945 to 2010, and provide example countries. No Change The first historical trajectory is one of stability. Countries with nearly identical levels of women’s representation from 1945 to 2010 follow a “No Change”

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historical trajectory. Apart from the world’s few remaining Communist countries with around 20% women over the entire 65 year period (e.g., China and Vietnam), most of the countries in this group never elected a significant number of women to their parliament. A good example of this trajectory is Georgia, which elected 7.1% women to its first parliament in 1991 and continued to hover within a few percentage points of that number for the next 20 years. Panel A of Fig. 3.2 presents an example of a low No Change trajectory— Lebanon—and an example of a high No Change trajectory—China. Other countries have stayed at less than 5% women for decades. Many of these countries are in the Middle East and North Africa, including Kuwait, Lebanon, and Yemen. The concentration of countries that historically never incorporated women into politics in a few regions of the world suggests that there is something in these regions that acts as a barrier to women’s political representation. Research suggests that one of these barriers is culture (Kenworthy and Malami 1999; Paxton 1997; Paxton and Kunovich 2003; Paxton and Hughes 2016). Negative cultural beliefs toward women are based in either religious traditions or cultural attitudes suggesting that women should not participate in the political realm. Incremental Gains A second historical trajectory is one of “Incremental Gains.” The key feature of this trajectory is that, regardless the level of representation women were able to obtain, the process was slow, steady, and incremental in any given year.

Fig. 3.2  Sample trajectories of women’s political representation, 1945–2010

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A diverse array of countries falls into this category, including countries from the West, Latin America, and Africa. Incremental growth can lead to very high or still fairly low levels of representation for women. The Incremental Gains category includes some of the countries with the highest levels of women’s parliamentary representation in the world in 2010: Sweden, the Netherlands, Finland, Norway, and Denmark. All of these countries have more than 35% women in their parliaments. Further, among this group of countries, the timing of women’s gains in political power started earlier than in other countries, often beginning their incline in the late 1970s and early 1980s. Finland and Sweden, for example, followed this trajectory, both crossing the 30% women in parliament threshold by 1985. Other countries in this broad category began their incline a little bit later and did not achieve quite as high levels of representation. For example, Austria did not make significant gains until the early 1990s. What accounts for countries on a high Incremental Gains trajectory? First, many countries that made it the furthest through Incremental Gains are Scandinavian countries, and this reaffirms the importance of regional differences, and culture, in women’s representation (Bystydzienski 1995; Rule 1987). But more is going on than simply a culture of equality. Countries in this category, too, often had a proportional representation (PR) system. Proportional representation electoral systems are considered more beneficial for women’s representation than majoritarian electoral systems (Kenworthy and Malami 1999; Matland 2005; Norris 1985, Paxton 1997; Paxton et al. 2010; Rule 1987). Of course, Incremental Gains can also be quite minimal. Some countries have experienced some change in women’s representation over time, but the increases are marginal. An example is Brazil, which today has 10% women in its national legislature. Ireland and the USA are other examples. Today, both have achieved slightly higher numbers than in the past—Ireland has 16% women and the USA has 19%—but progress remains slow. Panel B of Fig. 3.2 tracks the USA over time as a good example of the low Incremental Gains trajectory and Sweden as an example of the high Incremental Gains trajectory. Fast-Track Growth In strong contrast to the Incremental Gains trajectory is the “Fast-Track Growth” trajectory. Countries following this trajectory experience extremely large gains in women’s representation in short periods of time—often a single election cycle. Even though countries following this trajectory vary substantially in the timing and extent of their jump in women’s representation, they all experience rapid increases. Rwanda’s representation, for example, jumped from 25.7 to 48.8% in 2003, a gain of 23.1% in a single year. It is no coincidence that countries on a Fast-Track Growth trajectory often experienced their jump in representation from the mid-1990s through the present. During that period, countries around the world began to implement

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gender quotas in which individual parties or country constitutions or electoral laws mandate a certain percentage of women candidates or parliamentarians (Hughes et al. 2017). The vast majority of countries on the Fast-Track Growth trajectory introduced gender quotas into law just before large gains were made. For example, between 1994 and 1995, after the major political party in South Africa, the African National Congress (ANC), adopted a 30% quota for women, women’s share of parliamentary seats rose from 1.2 to 25.0%—a 23.8% gain. Similar is the Iraq case, whose 2004 interim constitution introduced a quota requiring that one-quarter of parliamentary seats be filled by women. The 25% quota in Iraq led to a 24 point increase in women’s parliamentary representation. Panel C of Fig. 3.2 illustrates the FastTrack Growth category using the example of South Africa. Noticeably, Rwanda, South Africa, and Iraq are all countries that adopted quotas as they were transitioning out of armed independence struggles. Many of the fast-track countries experienced recent civil wars, or other major armed struggles. As countries transition from war to peace, governments draft new constitutions, change their electoral systems, and adopt gender quotas, all of which may increase women’s political representation (Anderson and Swiss 2014; Fallon et al. 2012; Hughes 2009; Hughes and Tripp 2015; Tripp 2016). Wars also transform societies in other important ways. Women’s participation as soldiers and their activism to bring peace can mobilize women and profoundly change gender relations (Hughes 2009; Hughes and Tripp 2015; Tripp 2016). Overall, wars can bring terrible consequences to the security, health, and well-being of populations, but they can also set women on the fast track to political gains. Plateaus There is no guarantee that trajectories of women’s representation are always increasing. Certainly, women can lose power over time. The “Plateau” trajectory documents exactly this scenario: countries that experienced a jump in women’s parliamentary representation, followed by a period of general stability, and then a sharp decline. Examples include Hungary and Poland. Indeed, Poland is the exemplar trajectory in panel D of Fig. 3.2. Indeed, most Plateau countries were formerly Communist countries, including Albania, Cambodia, Bulgaria, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, Mongolia, Poland, Romania, and the Soviet Union. During their Communist period, these countries espoused an ideology of political equality between men and women (Gal and Kligman 2000, p. 5; Matland and Montgomery 2003). But women politicians in these Plateau countries were not in truly powerful positions (Fodor 2002; Einhorn 1991; Hanley 2003). Thus, when these countries transitioned to democracy around 1990, making legislatures politically powerful, women’s participation dropped sharply (Matland and M ­ ontgomery 2003; Saxonberg 2000). For example, Hungary had between 20 and 30%

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women in its legislature between 1979 and 1989. But, as in other Communist countries, this legislature was not the seat of ultimate authority. When Hungary transitioned to democracy in 1990, women’s participation in politics dropped to 7%. Some Plateau countries, such as Guyana and Guinea-Bissau, were not formally communist but did have leftist authoritarian governments. Like the Communist countries, these governments kept the number of women in politics artificially high. Once free and fair democratic elections were held, the percentage of women in parliament declined sharply. Comparing countries historical trajectories of growth helps us understand levels of women in parliaments today. That is, in comparing levels of representation across countries in the present, we should keep in mind where they came from. Countries with similar levels of women in their national legislatures in 2015 often took very different historical paths. In some cases, these historical trajectories continue to influence women’s success today and what they might expect to accomplish in the future. In other cases, historical trajectories have been completely upended, often through the institution of gender quotas.

Women in Parliament Today Where is women’s parliamentary representation today? In this section, we consider how economic development, geographic region, democracy, and gender quotas shape women’s representation in national legislatures. By Economic Development Countries with developed economies outpace countries with developing economies in many respects. Living in a developed economy often comes with lower rates of unemployment and poverty, greater access to education, and improved health outcomes. Yet, when we look at women’s political representation today, level of economic development generally does not tell us what to expect. Historically, wealthy countries often topped the world rankings for women parliamentarians. For instance, between 1988 and 2002, Finland, Norway, or Sweden had the highest percentage of women in its parliament. In 2003, however, Sweden was overtaken by Rwanda, which elected 48.8% women in its legislature. And in its next election, Rwanda became the first country in the world to breach the 50% barrier by electing 56% women to its parliament. With the help of gender quotas, economically developing countries were not always lagging in women’s political representation; they began to lead. Today, Rwanda continues to lead the world with 64% women. Economically developed Nordic countries still do well; Denmark, Finland, Iceland, Norway, and Sweden all sit in the top 20 of the global rankings, as do

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Belgium, Spain, and the Netherlands. But, economically developing countries occupy the top four spots in women’s political representation (Rwanda, Bolivia, Cuba, and Seychelles), and 7 countries with developing economies rank in the top 20, including in Africa (Senegal, South Africa, Namibia, and Mozambique), Latin America (Ecuador, Nicaragua, and Mexico), and Asia (Timor-Leste). Even outside of the top 20, economically developing economies often score better than countries with developed economies. Britain is ranked 48th in the world, behind Sudan, Guyana, and Philippines. Overall, there is no simple correlation between a country’s wealth and its share of women parliamentarians. By Geographic Region Looking around the world, we see regional differences in women’s political representation. Figure 3.3 shows how the percentage of seats held by women in national legislatures varies by region. Nordic countries have the highest average rates of women’s participation, followed by the Americas (including the USA) and Europe. Sub-Saharan Africa is right at the world average, with 23% women in the national legislature. Asia and the Arab states rank slightly below the world average, at 20% and 19%, respectively. The Pacific has the lowest levels of women’s participation in any region with just 14% women. Our discussion has thus far focused on the countries that are leading the world in women’s political representation. Countries at the low end of the spectrum are also concentrated in certain regions. Currently, there are five countries that have no women in their national legislature (in the upper or lower house). Of these, one is in the Middle East—Qatar. Other countries in the Middle East have at least one woman in their national legislature, but numbers are still low. Kuwait has one woman parliamentarian, and Lebanon has three. Four of the other countries with no women in their national legislature are all small Asian-Pacific island nations—Micronesia, Palau, Tonga,

Fig. 3.3  Women’s average political representation by geographic region

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and Vanuatu. Micronesia has never had a woman represented in its national legislature. These two parts of the world have generally seen more opposition to gender quotas than elsewhere in the world. By Level of Democracy Women’s attainment of political power varies based on a country’s level of democracy. The level of democracy also influences how effective women are once they have obtained representation in a legislature. Since women’s political representation can be justified on grounds of democratic justice, one might expect that women would be more adequately represented in countries with entrenched democratic processes. Certainly, democracies have clear and consistent rules, which should aid women in seeing how they can work within the system to attain power. But non-democracies lack true elections, meaning that women can be placed into power even when citizens do not support them. Large, cross-national statistical studies generally show that women are not better represented in democratic countries than less in democratic countries (Kenworthy and Malami 1999; Paxton and Kunovich 2003; Reynolds 1999). In fact, some research has even found that women are less well represented in democratic systems (Paxton 1997; Tripp and Kang 2008). One reason for this surprising finding is that Communist countries, such as Cuba and China, have high numbers of women in politics due to the continued use of affirmative action strategies by Communist party elites (Norris and Inglehart 2001). Further, authoritarian countries in Africa such as Rwanda often reserve large shares of parliamentary seats for women. Thus, it appears that some nondemocracies are indeed placing women into power. Yet even excluding Communist countries, level of democracy and the number of women in parliament appear to be unrelated. But, level of democracy is different than democratization. Many countries experience changes—transitions to and away from democracy, and these have consequences for women’s representation. Countries that democratize often have early disappointing gender outcomes, including reductions in women’s political representation (Waylen 2007). For example, during the 1990s, 31 countries in sub-Saharan Africa transitioned to multiparty democracy, and many of these experienced an initial decline in women’s political representation (Yoon 2001). This pattern has been the same for democratic transitions in Eastern Europe and in Latin America. And, even if women are very active during the democratic transition, as they were in Latin America, once democracy is established and political parties are formed, women may be pushed aside (Franceschet 2005; Friedman 1998; Htun 2003; Viterna and Fallon 2008; Saint-Germain and Metoyer 2008). However, such declines and exclusions are often only temporary, and women’s political representation is seen to bounce back in a range of

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countries (Lindberg 2004; Yoon 2001), depending on pre-democratic conditions (Fallon et al. 2012). In fact, many scholars of African politics link democratization to the sweeping gains in women’s political representation across the continent in the last two decades (Bauer and Britton 2006; Fallon 2008). And when looking over long periods of time, expanding civil liberties help explain growth in women’s representation (Paxton et al. 2010; Paxton and Hughes 2015). Civil liberties like free speech and a free press may be necessary for women’s movements to be able to organize and pressure governments for women’s greater inclusion. Apart from women’s numbers, however, there are important differences in women’s representation across democracies and non-democracies. Nondemocratic systems limit the ability of any legislator, man or woman, to ­influence legislation or otherwise make an impact. So, in a non-democratic system, even if women successfully pass legislation in parliament, a powerful president may simply dispose of the parliamentary reforms (but see Bauer and Burnet 2013). Unlike democratic systems constraints on executive power, the legislature in an authoritarian state may have no way to dispute or oppose a president’s intervention. For example, in Goetz and Hassim’s (2003) study of Uganda and South Africa, women’s ability to change the law (not just propose legislation) depended on whether they were in a democracy or a semi-democracy (see also Sater 2007). In some ways, women’s presence matters regardless of the political system. As discussed above, the position of parliamentarian is visible and carries prestige, having important symbolic effects that may improve women’s status in society. Watershed moments, such as the election of the first woman to parliament, were likely just as significant to women in Syria or Kenya as to women in the USA or the UK. Furthermore, as women’s numbers in parliament increase, perceptions of women may change (Norris 1993; Beaman et al. 2009; Alexander 2012; Morgan and Buice 2013). When only a few women are present in politics, people perceive that women’s political roles are exceptional. But as countries move beyond token membership, it changes perceptions about how a parliamentarian looks and acts. With and Without Gender Quotas As a fourth comparison, we look at the current state of women’s parliamentary representation in countries with and without gender quotas. At a basic level, gender quotas simply require that women must make up a certain percentage of a candidate list, a parliamentary assembly, a committee, or a government (Dahlerup 2002). As affirmative action policies, gender quotas are designed to help women overcome obstacles to their election such as less political experience, cultural stereotypes, or incumbency. Most governments and political parties adopting quotas are attempting to move beyond token representation to reach at least a critical minority of 20, 30, or 40%

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women in parliament (International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance 2016), but some are aiming even higher—equal numbers of men and women. Gender quotas can help women meet these goals (Paxton et al. 2010; Paxton and Hughes 2015; Tripp and Kang 2008). Quotas are not only pervasive, but they can also be a game changer for women. As discussed above, quotas are an important reason why many countries have experienced sizable gains. Quotas can put women on the fast track to relatively high levels of women’s representation with a single election. And, over time, quotas have become more effective at increasing women’s numbers in national legislatures (Paxton and Hughes 2015). In 2015, if we look at countries without any gender quotas, the average share of women’s legislative representation is just 15%. This figure jumps by 10 percentage points for countries with gender quotas. Of course, not all gender quotas are created equal. One clear and simple difference between quotas is the level at which representation is required, and countries that require more women tend to elect more women. Samoa, for example, reserves 10% of legislative seats for women and has 10% women in its legislature, whereas Spain requires 40% women among a party’s candidates and currently has 39% women parliamentarians. Some countries even require parity—equal numbers of men and women (Baudino 2003; Bird 2003; Murray 2010; Murray et al. 2012; Opello 2004). Today, eleven countries set the bar at 50% women overall, and four others require parity for at least a subset of legislative seats. Setting a high bar is not a foolproof method for reaching high levels of descriptive representation for women, however. France has had a parity law for more than 15 years, but women are still only 26% of legislators in its National Assembly. Or consider Brazil, which adopted a 25% quota in 1997, and upped the threshold to 30% in 2000; in the four national elections since, women have never been elected to even 10% of seats in the Chamber of Deputies. Although quotas improve women’s political representation, on average, opposition to women’s inclusion may remain formidable.

Conclusion In this chapter, we have briefly introduced the reader to historical trends in women’s representation in national legislatures, arguments for such representation, and variation across countries in their attainment of high levels of women’s representation. A final way to summarize progress in women’s electoral representation appears in Table 3.1, which provides the number of countries that have reached significant thresholds of women’s representation—10, 20, 30, 40, and 50%—by mid-2015. Table 3.1 is a powerful indication of the variation that exists in women’s representation in national legislatures around the world. By 2015, two countries, Rwanda and Bolivia, have achieved gender parity, or more than 50% women in

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Table 3.1  Thresholds of women’s parliamentary representation for 190 countries, 2015 Threshold Number of countries Percentage of total (%)

No threshold reached 37 19.5

10% 62 32.6

20% 48 25.2

30% 31 16.3

40% 10 5.2

50%

Total

2 190 1.1 100.0

Source IPU (2016)

parliament, and 10 other countries have crossed the threshold of 40% women in parliament. Thirty-one countries have at least 30% women in their parliaments, and these countries represent all regions of the world. Forty-eight countries have passed the threshold of 20%, again from all regions, levels of development, and democratization. Low numbers of women’s representation persist in the 50% of countries that have less than 20% women in parliament, and the one-fifth of countries that have not reached 10% women. Still, taking a historical perspective, it is clear that over the last 100 years, women around the world have made inroads into every area of political decision making. From the scattered and sporadic power of queens and tribal leaders, women are today presidents, prime ministers, parliamentarians, and local councilors. In fact, women are not only political leaders but also grassroots activists, revolutionaries, and everyday voters. Truly, the increase in women’s representation in national legislatures over the past century is one of the major trends of the modern world.

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Goetz, Anne Marie, and Shireen Hassim (eds.). 2003. No Shortcuts to Power: African Women in Politics and Policy Making. London: Zed Books. Hanley, Eric. 2003. A Party of Workers or Party of Intellectuals? Recruitment into Eastern European Communist Parties, 1945–1988. Social Forces 81 (4): 1073–1105. High-Pippert, Angela, and John Comer. 1998. Female Empowerment: The Influence of Women Representing Women. Women & Politics 19 (4): 53–66. Htun, Mala. 2003. Sex and the State: Abortion, Divorce, and the Family Under Latin American Dictatorships and Democracies. New York: Cambridge University Press. Htun, Mala, Marina Lacalle, and Juan Pablo Micozzi. 2013. Does Women’s Presence Change Legislative Behavior? Evidence from Argentina, 1983–2007. Journal of Politics in Latin America 5 (1): 95–125. Hughes, Melanie M. 2009. Armed Conflict, International Linkages, and Women’s Parliamentary Representation in Developing Nations. Social Problems 56 (1): 174–204. Hughes, Melanie M., and Aili Mari Tripp. 2015. Civil War and Trajectories of Change in Women’s Political Representation in Africa, 1985–2010. Social Forces 93 (4): 1513–1540. Hughes, Melanie, Pamela Paxton, and Mona Lena Krook. 2017. Gender Quotas for Legislatures and Corporate Boards. Annual Review of Sociology 43: 331–352. International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance. 2016. Gender Quotas Database. Available at http://www.idea.int/quota. Inter-Parliamentary Union. 2016. Women in National Parliaments: World and Regional Averages: Situation as of April 1, 2015. Available at http://www.ipu. org/wmn-e/arc/world010415.htm. Accessed 14 May 2015. Johnson, Deb with Hope Kabuchu, and Santa Vusiya Kayonga. 2003. Women in Ugandan Local Government: The Impact of Affirmative Action. Gender and Development 11 (3): 8–18. Kenworthy, Lane, and Melissa Malami. 1999. Gender Inequality in Political Representation: A Worldwide Comparative Analysis. Social Forces 78 (1): 235–268. Lerner, Gerda. 1986. The Creation of Patriarchy. New York: Oxford University Press. Lindberg, Staffen. 2004. Women’s Empowerment and Democratization: The Effects of Electoral Systems, Participation, and Experience in Africa. Studies in Comparative International Development 39 (1): 28–53. MacKinnon, Catharine. 1989. Toward a Feminist Theory of the State. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press. Mansbridge, Jane J. 1999. Should Blacks Represent Blacks and Women Represent Women? A Contingent ‘Yes’. Journal of Politics 61 (3): 628–657. Matland, Richard E. 2005. Enhancing Women’s Political Participation: Legislative Recruitment and Electoral Systems. In Women in Parliament: Beyond Numbers: A Revised Edition, ed. Azza Karam, 93–111. Stockholm, Sweden: International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance. Matland, Richard E., and Kathleen A. Montgomery (eds.). 2003. Women’s Access to Political Power in Post-Communist Europe. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press. Morgan, Jana, and Melissa Buice. 2013. Latin American Attitudes Toward Women in Politics: The Influence of Elite Cues, Female Advancement, and Individual Characteristics. American Political Science Review 107 (4): 644–662.

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Murray, Rainbow. 2010. Parties, Gender Quotas and Candidate Selection in France. London: Palgrave Macmillan. Murray, Rainbow, Mona Lena Krook, and Katherine A.R. Opello. 2012. Why Are Gender Quotas Adopted? Party Pragmatism and Parity in France. Political Research Quarterly 65 (3): 529–543. Norderval, Ingunn. 1985. Party and Legislative Participation Among Scandinavian Women. Women and Politics in Western Europe 18 (4): 71–89. Norris, Pippa. 1985. Women’s Legislative Participation in Western Europe. West European Politics 8 (4): 90–101. Norris, Pippa. 1993. Conclusions: Comparing Legislative Recruitment. In Gender and Party Politics, ed. Joni Lovenduski and Pippa Norris, 309–330. Newbury Park, CA: Sage. Norris, Pippa, and Ronald Inglehart. 2001. Cultural Obstacles to Equal Representation. Journal of Democracy 12 (3): 126–140. Opello, Katherine A.R. 2004. Explaining the Timing of the French Socialist Party’s Gender-Based Quota. French Politics, Culture & Society 22 (3): 25–50. Pateman, Carole. 1988. The Sexual Contract. Cambridge: Polity. Pateman, Carole. 1989. The Disorder of Women: Democracy, Feminism, and Political Theory. Cambridge: Polity. Paxton, Pamela. 1997. Women in National Legislatures: A Cross-National Analysis. Social Science Research 26 (4): 442–464. Paxton, Pamela, and Melanie Hughes. 2016. Women, Politics, and Power: A Global Perspective, 3rd ed. Thousand Oaks, CA: CQ Press. Paxton, Pamela, and Melanie M. Hughes. 2015. The Increasing Effectiveness of National Gender Quotas, 1990–2010. Legislative Studies Quarterly 40 (3): 331–362. Paxton, Pamela, and Sheri Kunovich. 2003. Women’s Political Representation: The Importance of Ideology. Social Forces 81 (5): 87–114. Paxton, Pamela, Melanie M. Hughes, and Matthew Painter. 2010. The Difference Time Makes: Latent Growth Curve Models of Women’s Political Representation. European Journal of Political Research 49 (1): 25–52. Phillips, Anne. 1991. Engendering Democracy. University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press. Phillips, Anne. 1995. The Politics of Presence: The Political Representation of Gender, Ethnicity and Race. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Pitkin, Hanna F. 1967. The Concept of Representation. Berkeley: University of California Press. Reingold, Beth, and Jessica Harrell. 2010. The Impact of Descriptive Representation on Women’s Political Engagement: Does Party Matter? Political Research Quarterly 63 (2): 280–294. Reynolds, Andrew. 1999. Women in the Legislatures and Executives of the World: Knocking at the Highest Glass Ceiling. World Politics 51 (July): 547–572. Rule, Wilma. 1987. Electoral Systems, Contextual Factors and Women’s Opportunity for Election to Parliament in Twenty-Three Democracies. Western Political Quarterly 40 (3): 477–498. Saint-Germain, Michelle A., and Cynthia Chávez Metoyer. 2008. Women Legislators in Central America. Austin: University of Texas Press.

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Sapiro, Virginia. 1982. Private Costs of Public Commitments or Public Costs of Private Commitments? Family Roles Versus Political Ambition. American Journal of Political Science 26 (2): 265–279. Sater, James N. 2007. Changing Politics From Below? Women Parlimentarians in Morocco. Democratization 14 (4): 723–742. Saxonberg, Steven. 2000. Women in East European Parliaments. Journal of Democracy 11 (2): 145–158. Schwindt-Bayer, Leslie A. 2006. Still Supermadres? Gender and the Policy Priorities of Latin American Legislators. American Journal of Political Science 50 (3): 570–585. Schwindt-Bayer, Leslie A. 2010. Political Power and Women’s Representation in Latin America. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press. Schwindt-Bayer, Leslie A., and William Mishler. 2005. An Integrated Model of Women’s Representation. Journal of Politics 67 (2): 407–428. Swers, Michele L. 1998. Are Women More Likely to Vote for Women’s Issue Bills Than Their Male Colleagues? Legislative Studies Quarterly 23 (3): 435–448. Taylor-Robinson, Michelle M., and Roseanna Michelle Heath. 2003. Do Women Legislators Have Different Policy Priorities Than Their Male Colleagues? A Critical Case Test. Women & Politics 24 (4): 77–101. Tripp, Aili Mari. 2016. Women and Power in Post-Conflict Africa. Cambridge: ­Cambridge University Press. Tripp, Aili Mari, and Alice Kang. 2008. The Global Impact of Quotas: The Fast Track to Female Representation. Comparative Political Studies 41 (3): 338–361. United Nations. 1995. Fourth World Conference on Women Beijing Declaration. Available at http://www.un.org/womenwatch/daw/beijing/platform/declar.htm. Accessed 20 Dec 2012. Viterna, Jocelyn, and Kathleen M. Fallon. 2008. Democratization, Women’s Movements, and Gender-Equitable States: A Framework for Comparison. American Sociological Review 73 (4): 668–689. Waylen, Georgina. 2007. Engendering Transitions: Women’s Mobilization, Institutions, and Gender Outcomes. New York: Oxford University Press. Williams, Melissa S. 1998. Voice, Trust, and Memory: Marginalized Groups and the Failings of Liberal Representation. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press. Wolbrecht, Christina, and David Campbell. 2007. Leading by Example: Female Members of Parliament as Political Role Models. American Journal of Political Science 51 (4): 921–939. Yoon, Mi Yung. 2001. Democratization and Women’s Legislative Representation in Sub-Saharan Africa. Democratization 8 (2): 169–190. Young, Iris M. 1990. Justice and the Politics of Difference. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.

CHAPTER 4

The Impact of Women in Parliament Diana Z. O’Brien and Jennifer M. Piscopo

Most research on women’s presence in politics explores the cultural, ­economic, and political determinants of women’s numeric—or descriptive— representation in national assemblies (Paxton et al. 2010; Reynolds 1999; Tripp and Kang 2008). Increasing women’s descriptive representation has been justified in terms of both fairness (women are half the population, and thus ought to hold half the seats) and outcomes (women bring their gendered experiences and perspectives into parliaments, thus changing the form and content of politics). Indeed, there are major normative and practical implications associated with women’s inclusion in—and exclusion from— national assemblies. The legislature is the branch of government that is explicitly tasked with representing the will of the people. In democratic systems, legislators provide an essential, direct link between citizens and the state, and are expected to give voice to, and act on behalf of, their constituents. National assemblies bear heightened representative burdens as compared to other branches of government, explaining why gender quotas primarily target legislatures. Bolstering women’s presence in these bodies also affects the performance of politics along three dimensions: policies and policymaking; public opinion; and the legislature as workplace. This chapter examines outcomes across each dimension. Collectively, we show that women’s presence has yielded positive

D. Z. O’Brien (*)  Texas A&M University, College Station, TX, USA e-mail: [email protected] J. M. Piscopo  Occidental College, Los Angeles, CA, USA e-mail: [email protected] © The Author(s) 2019 S. Franceschet et al. (eds.), The Palgrave Handbook of Women’s Political Rights, Gender and Politics, https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-137-59074-9_4

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gains alongside setbacks. Those arguing in favor of increasing women’s representation based on beneficial outcomes will find the global evidence largely on their side. Female lawmakers diversify the legislative agenda, attending especially to women, children, and the most marginalized; they have changed attitudes toward women leaders; and they have challenged the masculine bias of legislative organizations. Yet, female lawmakers’ ability to change policy and influence attitudes and behavior can provoke backlash among both citizens and their colleagues, indicating that patriarchal societies will respond unevenly—and often rancorously—to women’s expanded exercise of their political rights.

Policymaking The vast majority of scholarship on the impact of female lawmakers has centered on a key question: Does electing more women change the content of policymaking? Specifically, researchers explore whether electing women leads to more substantive representation—i.e., whether female legislators are more likely than men to represent policy areas of interest to women. The underlying theoretical assumption comes from notions of gender difference: Because women belong to a socially constructed (and typically subordinate) group, they will bring unique experiences, behaviors, and preferences into policymaking. While some scholars contest the validity of this assumption, others find that female legislators do typically represent women. Yet, the exact measures of this outcome vary depending on the institutional and political context, the phase of the policymaking process, and the presence of gender quotas. Conceptualizing Women’s Interests Determining whether female politicians change the content of policymaking first requires knowing which policy interests women should be expected to represent. The question of whether women’s gender identity influences their policy preferences continues to fuel a lively debate among scholars of gender and politics. Feminist theorist Iris Marion Young (2001) rejects the essentialist notion that all women will view their gender identity in the same way, instead suggesting that women’s common experiences as second-class citizens will infuse their worldview. This conceptualization of women as a social group acknowledges intra-group diversity, but still leaves open questions about which policy areas—if any—count as ‘women’s interests.’ Scholars typically use one of three formulations: Women’s interests are either those that directly affect women as women (e.g., reproductive health and gender-based violence), those connected to women’s traditional roles as caregivers (e.g., children), or those tied to the social sphere more broadly (e.g., health care and education).

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Scholars also debate whether female legislators must take particular positions on these issues in order for their preferences to ‘count’ as women’s substantive representation. This struggle largely centers on how to conceptualize policies promoted by conservative women. For instance, Celis and Childs (2012) distinguish between feminist interests and gendered interests. The latter captures policy positions that derive from or even reinforce traditional gender roles. As non- and anti-feminist lawmakers still see themselves as representing women as a group, Celis and Childs (2012) contend that their policy advocacy still matters. Dahlerup (2014) takes the opposite approach, arguing that women’s interests only ‘make sense’ when tied to policy preferences that challenge male dominance. Empirically, how scholars conceptualize women’s interests greatly affects their conclusions about whether substantive representation occurs. For example, in a study of Colombia and Costa Rica, Escobar-Lemmon et al. (2014) looked at bills promoting women’s rights (feminist) and bills aimed at helping children, family, and the poor (gendered). The authors find sex differences in bill introduction for all three areas in Colombia, but only for women’s rights in Costa Rica. They conclude that female legislators in both countries represent women. However, had they narrowed their study exclusively to gendered interests, they would have concluded that female legislators in Costa Rica did not represent women. Further, their operationalization of gendered interests leaves open the question of whether female lawmakers’ efforts to restrict state aid would count as substantive representation. Context and Constraints No matter which interests women represent, they face institutional constraints. Legislatures are highly controlled environments, reducing lawmakers’ ability to unilaterally change policy. Political parties often dominate decision-making, with party leaders setting policy goals and party discipline shaping legislators’ behavior. The broader political context also determines policy outcomes. In parliamentary systems, for example, policymaking often occurs in cabinet and individual MPs have few opportunities to introduce bills.1 Presidents (Piscopo 2014b), international organizations (Walsh 2016), women’s policy agencies (Ayata and Tütüncü 2008), and social movements (Weldon 2002) also affect when party and chamber leaders proceed with gender equality legislation. Party control is especially heightened, and lawmaker autonomy severely compromised, in one-party or authoritarian states (Walsh 2012). Although these constraints should affect both male and female lawmakers, legislatures are structurally biased against women (Duerst-Lahti 2005; Lovenduski 2005). Women remain underrepresented among party and chamber leaders (O’Brien 2015; Schwindt-Bayer 2010). Male leaders also sideline or minimize women’s contributions (Franceschet and Piscopo 2008; Rincker

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2009; Wittmer and Bouché 2013). These constraints speak to the legislature as workplace, and the gendered interactions that shape the daily life of parliaments, a point we consider in more detail below. The Policymaking Process Attending to context and constraints highlight two difficulties inherent in pinpointing women’s policy influence. First, where one looks in the policy process matters. Franceschet and Piscopo (2008) distinguish between substantive representation as process—lawmakers’ efforts to set agendas and advocate for policies—and substantive representation as outcome—lawmakers’ ability to win statutory change. Roll call votes usually reflect party discipline, not individual preference. For this reason, many researchers look to substantive representation as process, finding that women in both the Global North and South introduce and cosponsor bills addressing feminist and gendered interests (Celis 2006; Franceschet and Piscopo 2008; Swers 2005). Female lawmakers also intervene more than male legislators during plenary and committee debates on policy areas that matter to women (Piscopo 2011; Xydias 2007). Gender equity committees and women’s caucuses especially facilitate female legislators’ collaboration on policy change (Barnes 2016). Second, women’s numbers and influence interact in complicated ways, as demonstrated in the debates concerning ‘critical mass’ and ‘critical actors.’ Researchers often ask whether increasing women’s descriptive representation leads to more substantive representation, finding evidence of a positive correlation between both process and outcome. For instance, under majority rule conditions—the decision rule followed by most parliaments and legislatures— women speak less often when they comprise the numerical minority, but advocate more frequently on behalf of children, families, and the poor as their numbers rise (Mendelberg et al. 2014). On the outcome side, in advanced industrialized democracies, higher proportions of female legislators are associated with lower defense spending and less military engagement (Koch and Fulton 2011), and more family-friendly policies (Bratton and Ray 2002; Kittilson 2008). Similarly, in Latin America, higher proportions of female legislators are associated with greater policy attention to women, children, and families (Barnes 2016; Piscopo 2014a; Schwindt-Bayer 2010). These findings offer evidence in support of critical mass theory, which posits that women need to achieve a threshold descriptive representation—usually set at 30%—in order to change institutional cultures and represent women’s interests (Dahlerup 1988). Yet critical mass theory has fallen from favor, as scholars have contested its underlying essentialist assumptions and highlighted the role of institutional constraints. Some researchers have proposed an alternate framework of ‘critical acts,’ focusing on individual initiatives rather than collective action (Celis et al 2008). This framework has appeared especially useful in single-country case studies of policy change. Female MPs in Turkey, for example, held only

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8% of the seats but succeeded in overturning customary law and criminalizing sexual harassment in the workplace (Ayata and Tütüncu 2008). A focus on critical acts also helps explain how female representatives change policy outcomes when parties are highly disciplined or authoritarian (Devlin and Elgie 2008; Walsh 2012; Yoon 2011), and when women face considerable sexism in the chamber as a whole (Franceschet and Piscopo 2008). Women representatives, for example, overturned customary law in Rwanda (Devlin and Elgie 2008), addressed basic needs provisions in Tanzania (Yoon 2011), and passed landmark sexual health legislation in Argentina (Piscopo 2014a). The global evidence thus suggests a link between women’s descriptive representation and substantive representation, though female legislators may find their ability to enact sweeping changes limited by institutional features beyond their control. Do female lawmakers also affect policymaking beyond gendered or feminist policy areas? Initial evidence suggests that women’s presence diversifies the policy agenda (Greene and O’Brien 2016). Beyond policy preferences, gender role socialization also implies that women will have different leadership styles—that they will be more collaborative, inclusive, and sensitive to others’ needs. Interviews with female legislators worldwide support this hypothesis (Barnes 2016; Franceschet et al. 2016), but no research has definitively shown that gendered leadership styles alter policy outcomes. Questions about whether female lawmakers deepen deliberation and enhance responsiveness relate not just to substantive representation, but to how the legislature functions as a gendered workplace—a question we return to below. Gender Quotas If a positive correlation exists between descriptive and substantive representation, then gender quotas—which increase descriptive representation—should also positively impact women’s interest representation. Quotas call attention to the normative importance of women’s representation, creating ‘mandate effects’ that make female lawmakers more likely to represent women (Franceschet and Piscopo 2008). In Morocco and Algeria, for instance, deputies elected under quotas provided more services than deputies elected without quotas (Benstead 2016). Female MPs from parties using gender quotas do act on mandates to represent women, both in the UK (Childs and Krook 2012) and Germany (Xydias 2007). Yet quotas could also generate perceptions that female lawmakers lack the necessary qualifications for office, creating ‘label effects’ that make women reluctant to associate themselves with feminist interests (Franceschet and Piscopo 2008; Rincker 2009). Despite theorizing about how quotas may generate backlash effects (Franceschet et al. 2012; Krook 2015), scholars still know little about when gender quotas enhance women’s substantive representation, and when they work against it—suggesting an urgent need for future research.

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Public Attitudes As public figures, lawmakers do not just make policy; they embody particular notions about who ‘should’ lead the polity. Female lawmakers’ presence can therefore significantly affect citizens’ attitudes about the political system and its leaders. Franceschet et al. (2012) conceptualize symbolic representation— that is, the ideals and values that lawmakers reflect—in terms of its diverse audience effects. Female representatives may alter citizens’ perceptions about the regime and the government, as well as reshape attitudes toward traditional gender roles, and these effects might differ between female and male audiences. Female representatives may also alter female citizens’ political behavior. When women see people ‘like them’ in power, they may become more politically engaged and ambitious. Quotas could further mediate these dynamics, either increasing favorable evaluations of the political system and of women as political leaders, or generating backlash effects that erode public confidence and trust. Women’s presence thus affects citizen attitudes in diverse ways, across outcomes related to the political system, gender roles, and political behavior. The Political System Arguments for increasing women’s descriptive representation often appeal to the normative ideal that the composition of the legislature or parliament should reflect citizens’ diverse identities. This notion of ‘mirror representation’ speaks to the overall legitimacy of the political system, and citizens are indeed more likely to believe that governments are democratic when women are represented in elected office (Atkeson and Carillo 2007; Clayton et al. 2017; SchwindtBayer and Mishler 2005). In the UK, Cowley (2014) finds a positive association between female (but not male) survey respondents’ estimates of the percentage of seats held by female MPs and their reported satisfaction with democracy and trust in politicians and parliaments. Yet, these effects did not hold for women who did not identify descriptive representation as important. Similarly, Espírito-Santo (2016, p. 53) reports that Portuguese survey respondents who favor descriptive representation also believe that the predominance of male MPs constitutes ‘a serious threat to democracy.’ Women’s presence may positively affect citizens’ favorable view of the political system, but especially— or perhaps only—among those who implicitly value mirror representation. Importantly, these findings come from studies operationalizing women’s presence as national-level descriptive representation. Research asking the same question at the subnational or district level typically reports null results (Atkeson and Carillo 2007; Zetterberg 2012). Indeed, Lawless (2004) finds that while female citizens represented by female legislators view the US Congress more favorably, these positive evaluations do not translate into more positive attitudes toward government overall.

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Women as Leaders Symbolic representation also addresses attitudes toward women’s leadership ability. In a cross-national study, Alexander (2012) finds that national-level descriptive representation positively enhances female citizens’ beliefs in their own ability to govern. Other studies examine the municipal level in India, where certain villages are randomly assigned to nominate a female council leader. In villages exposed to female leadership, men and women report less gender bias toward women in public life and are more likely to choose female councilors in future elections (Beaman et al. 2009; Bhavnani 2009). Yet Beaman et al. (2012) caution that male villagers’ embrace of female leadership does not loosen their sexist attitudes toward women’s traditional roles in the household and in social life. In Rwanda, where gender quotas have propelled women into office at all levels of government, Burnet (2012) finds significant backlash effects, including male resentment and marital discord. These studies suggest that women’s increased descriptive representation, particularly under quota systems and/or at the local level, may change attitudes about women’s public roles—while leaving attitudes about their private roles intact. Female Citizens and Political Behavior If women’s presence in legislatures increases citizens’ faith in women’s leadership ability, does it also affect female citizens’ political behavior? Studies have repeatedly uncovered a gender gap in political engagement (also called political behavior or political participation), with women less likely than men to undertake political activities (Desposato and Norrander 2009; Inglehart and Norris 2003; Kittilson and Schwindt-Bayer 2012). Political engagement can include both conventional activities, namely turning out to vote, following politics in the news, discussing politics with friends, or contacting one’s representative, and unconventional activities, such as participating in protests, demonstrations, or civil disobedience. Desposato and Norrander (2009) found that the percentage of female officeholders lowered the gender gap in Latin American women’s conventional political behavior, but not in their unconventional behavior. Most other research emphasizes conventional behavior, echoing Desposato and Norrander’s results. In Sub-Saharan African (Barnes and Bouchard 2012) and European countries (Wolbrecht and Campbell 2007), higher numbers of female lawmakers narrow the gender gap in political participation. Scholars in the USA are more skeptical, finding that the gender gap in political engagement does not narrow as women’s descriptive representation climbs (Lawless 2004). For instance, electing more women to the US Congress does not make female citizens more likely to vote (Broockman 2014; Lawless 2004). While increasing women’s descriptive representation affects women’s political behavior, electing women via gender quotas does not provide any

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additional boost. In Latin America, Zetterberg (2009) finds that neither women’s descriptive representation nor the presence of quotas raises women’s political knowledge or political interest. Kittilson and Schwindt-Bayer (2012) also find few effects for quotas’ impact on women’s political engagement: cross-nationally, quotas slightly narrowed the gender gap in persuading others and political campaigning, but in two prominent quota cases—France and Uruguay—quotas had no impact on various measures of political engagement. Barnes and Bouchard (2012) find similar null results in Sub-Saharan Africa, concluding that women’s political engagement responds to concrete increases in women’s descriptive representation, not the mere adoption of quotas. In fact, Lesotho’s quota law reduced women’s local political engagement (Clayton 2015). Quotas adopted in political systems already seen as exclusionary and illegitimate may undo the positive symbolic effects associated with women’s increased descriptive representation. The presence of backlash effects raises further questions about the relationship between women’s presence, gender quotas, and political ambition. Scholars have uncovered a considerable gender gap in political ambition in the USA (Fox and Lawless 2004), and researchers asking whether women’s presence in Congress closes this gap have uncovered mixed findings (Broockman 2014; Wolbrecht and Campbell 2007). Yet it remains unclear whether this political ambition gap extends beyond the USA, and whether gender quotas—especially those implemented in democratic systems—can inspire women to run for office. The positive relationship between women’s presence in legislatures and parliaments, on the one hand, and citizens’ willingness to support women as leaders, on the other, provides indirect—yet tantalizing— evidence that women’s presence could also inspire women to seek political careers. The relationship between descriptive representation and political ambition offers a fruitful avenue for future research.

Legislatures as Workplaces Beyond policymaking and public attitudes, do female politicians transform legislatures’ internal processes? National assemblies are workplaces with distinct (and often masculine) cultures, and there are gender biases in the personnel, policy, and cultures of these institutions (Duerst-Lahti 2005). Indeed, institutions themselves (re)produce gender (Kenney 1996). Drawing on Acker’s (1990) five dimensions of gendered organizations, we examine how women’s descriptive representation affects the division of labor within the institution; the symbols, images, and ideologies that shape its work; the gendered nature of men’s and women’s interactions; the gendered identities that men and women carry within the institution; and the organizational logic of the institution itself.

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The Division of Labor Within legislatures, women are more likely to work on legislative tasks related to the domestic sphere and/or to women as a group, while men address the public sphere and/or men as a group. Greater descriptive representation is sometimes associated with greater gender specialization, with female legislators concentrating on feminine or feminized policy domains. In other cases, it results in more integration, allowing women to work on a broader set of topics (Bolzendahl 2014). Take, for example, committee assignments. In some assemblies—including US state legislatures (Thomas 1994) and the Swedish Riksdag (Wängnerud 2009)—female legislators have been more likely to serve on traditionally male-dominated committees as their numbers grow. In others, women’s descriptive representation is associated with women’s service on stereotypically female committees. In the German Bundestag, women’s increased presence was linked to the creation of female-dominated committees whose ‘titles and language reinforce stereotypically feminine constructions’ (Bolzendahl 2014, p. 860). In Latin American legislatures, Heath et al. (2005) attribute this phenomenon to male legislators’ efforts to isolate their female counterparts on less desirable committees, which are typically those addressing social policy and women’s issues. As the above discussion on women’s substantive representation indicates, gendered divisions in legislative labor can reflect gender differences in legislative priorities. In European assemblies, the gender variation that remains in committee assignments is often attributed to representatives’ preferences rather than biases against female members (Mateo Diaz 2005). Yet, this explanation does not hold universally. Additional work is needed to establish when differences reflect men’s and women’s priorities versus women’s marginalization. Related research should consider how institutional rules and norms—including candidate selection mechanisms and party discipline— interact with women’s increased representation to re-gender or de-gender parliamentary work, for both women and men. Symbols, Images, and Ideologies Acker further posits that organizations are gendered through the ‘construction of symbols and images that explain, express, reinforce, or sometimes oppose gender divisions’ (1990, p. 146). That is, language, culture, and ideologies link masculinity to work. Case studies and surveys from across the globe reveal myriad symbols and images that reinforce the masculinity of legislatures. As physical spaces, legislatures typically privilege men and maleness. The design of the buildings themselves often evokes virility (Tamale 1999). Masculine norms are further reinforced both by the presence of subsidized bars, men-only gyms, and recreational sports teams (Ballington 2008), and also via the absence of day care centers, women’s bathrooms, or even portraits

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of women on the walls (Devlin and Elgie 2008). Parliamentary ceremonies and rituals are likewise gendered (Rai 2010). Work on Sub-Saharan Africa (Bauer and Britton 2006), Argentina (Franceschet and Piscopo 2008), and Chile (Franceschet 2010) suggests that the business of politics is conducted via masculine rules, as is shown in the months and hours during which the legislature sits, and the use of gendered language that maintains male pronouns. Gender divisions are even enforced via formal and informal dress codes, including rules that prohibited women from wearing trousers in Turkey and Zambia (Ballington 2008) and expectations that female MPs ‘refrain from a frivolous or revealing dress style’ in Belgium (Celis and Wauters 2010, p. 385). While complaints about individual symbols or images are often dismissed as female hypersensitity, as a whole they result in institutions that marginalize women while placing male politicians at ease. Legislatures have also been reluctant to adapt to the changing makeup of their membership. A crossnational survey of parliamentarians suggests that women’s increased presence had little effect on parliamentary dress codes or the provision of childcare (Ballington 2008). In fact, mothers remain dramatically underrepresented in parliaments, and the timing and pace of parliamentary work send the strong message that caregivers do not belong (Campbell and Childs 2014). Female MPs nonetheless continue to challenge these rules and norms (Childs 2004). More comparative research is needed to ascertain when male legislators cling to gendered symbols and images and when they relinquish these privileges. Likewise, how do female legislators use symbols? Little is known about whether women co-opt masculine norms to their advantage or if they create their own feminized symbols and images. Importantly, scholars should systematically ascertain whether and how these symbols and images affect women’s policymaking interventions. Gendered Interactions Gendered organizations are further (re)produced via the interactions between and among women and men. In the legislative context, a large body of research focuses on female legislators’ relationships and experiences with both their male and female colleagues. This work has found that women in legislatures are particularly vulnerable to hostility, stigmatization, and even harassment. Increasing women’s presence sometimes (though not always) increases women’s collaboration with each other, but also exposes female legislators to backlash effects. Negative interactions between male and female legislators appear widespread globally. When deliberating, women speak substantially less than men in most mixed-gender settings, especially when their numbers are few (Mendelberg et al. 2014). In discussions, female politicians in post-communist states report difficultly making their opinions heard (Galligan et al. 2007).

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In the USA, bills sponsored by women are sometimes subjected to greater scrutiny, hostility, and debate than bills sponsored by men (Kathlene et al. 1991), and legislation related to ‘women’s issues’ succeeds more frequently when sponsored by men (Wittmer and Bouché 2013). Like other women, female legislators also experience sexual harassment in the workplace. A group of female politicians in the US state of California released a statement highlighting their experiences with ‘dehumanizing behavior by men with power in our workplaces.’ They noted, ‘Men have groped and touched us without our consent, made inappropriate comments about our bodies and our abilities’ (We Said Enough 2017). Women working in politics across the globe, from the UK to Guyana, have reported similar encounters (Bardall 2016; Phillips 2017). Increasing descriptive representation can exacerbate backlash against female politicians. In both the USA and New Zealand, as women’s presence grows, men become more verbally aggressive and controlling of both committee hearings (Kathlene 1995; Rosenthal 1998) and parliamentary debates (Grey 2002). Focusing on donations to fellow politicians, Kanthak and Krause (2012) find that both men and women devalue their female colleagues as the proportion of women in the US Congress increases. Adverse reactions can be especially acute for women elected via quota policies. Yoon (2011) suggests that quota women in Tanzania feel like ‘second-class’ MPs whose work is not adequately recognized. Female legislators in Argentina believed the quota law resulted in their political professionalism being called into question (Franceschet and Piscopo 2008), and female MPs in the UK elected via their party’s all-women shortlists experienced lingering stigmatization (Childs and Krook 2012). New scholarship also has begun examining the growing number of reports of violence against female parliamentarians (Krook 2017). It remains unclear, however, whether women’s increased representation causes harassment and abuse to also increase, or whether women draw courage from their greater numbers and become more likely to denounce mistreatment. In contrast to the backlash effects among men, bolstering women’s presence in legislatures has positively affected gendered interactions among women. Women in committees are more likely to be inclusive and collaborative as the percentage of female leaders increase (Rosenthal 1998). Female parliamentarians female parliamentarians describe a feeling of camaraderie as their numbers grow (Grey 2002). Within committee hearings, women are better able to control the dialogue and make themselves heard when other women are in positions of authority (Kathlene 1995). More generally, though ‘critical mass’ may not explain policy representation, female legislators may form coalitions to change their working environments, as in recent efforts to make visible and end the sexual harassment of women politicians. Yet, whether women’s presence changes the environment for other women in politics—not just legislators, but women staffers, lobbyists, and journalists— remains an open question.

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Female legislators’ experience in the workplace and their policy impact is thus shaped by both backlash and collaboration. These phenomena may also be interlinked: women may organize in response to male hostility (or male hostility may emerge after women’s coordination). More work is also needed to establish how the institutional context shapes these effects. Barnes (2016) shows, for example, that the impact of increased descriptive representation on female legislative collaboration is conditioned on party strength. Factors including ideology, agenda control, and majoritarian versus consensus-style institutions also likely influence gendered interactions. Gendered Identity Together, gendered workloads, symbols, and interactions shape individual identity, including consciousness about (and presentation of) oneself as a gendered member of an organization (Acker 1990). A large body of research broadly examines whether female politicians present themselves as women. Much of the work on women’s substantive representation discussed above, for example, implicitly relates to the gender consciousness of female legislators. This concept also extends beyond politicians’ efforts to act on behalf of male or female constituents by analyzing feminine and masculine styles of performing politics (Childs 2004; Franceschet et al. 2016; Thomas 1994). British female parliamentarians, for instance, claim that they are ‘less combative and aggressive, more collaborative and speak in a different language’ as compared to their male counterparts (Childs 2004, p. 14). Though some women have a uniquely feminine style of politics, this does not hold universally. On the one hand, there can be costs associated with acting in a feminine manner (Childs 2004). To offset these costs, Rincker (2009) points to ‘masculinized’ women in regional-level Polish assemblies who aim to ‘blend in with their male counterparts and avoid challenging the gendered norms of an institution’ (p. 47). On the other hand, in US state legislatures, both men and women adhere to a more feminine style of politics, emphasizing ‘compromise, consensus-building, getting along with colleagues, being nice, fair, etc’ (Reingold 1996, p. 483). The variation in legislators’ gendered presentation styles appears contingent on long-standing institutional norms and behaviors. At the same time, evidence suggests that these gendered identities are affected by women’s descriptive representation. Though by no means a guarantee (Childs 2004), bolstering women’s presence can allow both women and men to feel less pressured to act in aggressive and masculine ways (Charles 2014). Future work should consider whether, when, and why raising the proportion of seats held by female parliamentarians makes women more (or less) conscious of their gendered identity. More research is needed, moreover, on male legislators’ gender consciousness. Murray (2014) suggests that because men are overrepresented in parliament, they fail to contend with their gender role identity.

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Increasing women’s presence in elected office may thus change male legislators’ perceptions about their own behavior. Organizational Logic Finally, Acker dedicates most attention to the naturalized assumptions and practices that she terms ‘gendered organizational logic.’ Organizational logic encompasses seemingly gender-neutral practices—including formal evaluations, job descriptions, and career ladders—which managers use to control the workplace. Though different from traditional workplaces, legislatures also rely on taken-for-granted rules. That is, there are (in)formal policies and procedures that gender these organizations. Many of the factors discussed within this chapter encompass (and contribute to) gendered organizational logic. One clear parallel between Acker and the political realm is politicians’ promotion once in elected office. Female politicians often face glass-ceiling effects: discriminatory barriers to career advancement that increase for positions higher in the organizational hierarchy (Folke and Rickne 2016). This glass ceiling results in men’s traditional dominance as committee chairs, party leaders, cabinet appointees, and heads of government and state worldwide (Heath et al. 2005; Jalalzai 2013; Krook and O’Brien 2012; O’Brien 2012, 2015). When women do access top positions, moreover, they frequently receive less important and desirable posts. From Latin America to Western Europe, women are less likely to serve on influential committees or to hold high-prestige cabinet portfolios in masculine policy domains. Though women are often relegated to low-prestige and feminized positions, increasing women’s presence in elected office alters this organizational logic. Despite some notable exceptions (Bratton 2005), mounting evidence suggests that increasing descriptive representation is correlated with women’s selection as committee chairs (Kerevel and Atkeson 2013), access to the party leadership (O’Brien 2015; O’Brien and Rickne 2016), appointment to cabinets (Krook and O’Brien 2012; Reynolds 1999), and even presence as head of government and state (Jalalzai 2013). Though bolstering women’s numeric representation clearly facilitates women’s ascension up the political ladder, the relationship between gender and prestige remains under theorized. Cabinet and committee posts associated with feminine issue areas have been marked as both less desirable and prestigious, on the one hand, and also as important venues for women’s substantive representation, on the other. Moving forward, scholars should investigate how the gendered nature of these positions emerges, and whether perceptions of ‘men’s work’ and ‘women’s work’ can change over time. This includes assessing how changes in the perceived gender and prestige of a postinfluence women’s access to power (Barnes and O’Brien 2018), and

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whether women’s appointment to a position affects whether it is subsequently viewed as desirable.

Conclusion The global evidence reveals substantial positive outcomes associated with protecting and promoting women’s right to serve as legislators. Female lawmakers change the policy agenda: They advocate more frequently than men for women’s issues and social policies, especially those associated with marginalized or vulnerable populations. Women MPs also lead citizens to perceive democratic institutions as more legitimate, and they inspire female citizens to become more politically active and aware. Both in the legislature and in society at large, women’s descriptive representation challenges notions that politics is a ‘man’s realm’ organized according to men’s rules. Taken together, women’s impact on policy, public attitudes, and the legislature as workplace draw attention to three central themes. First, numbers do matter. Female lawmakers seem best poised to make a difference when their numbers are high, indicating that ‘critical mass’ retains some explanatory power. When women constitute a larger group in parliament, lawmakers pass more policies friendly to women and citizens update their beliefs about gender roles and the political system. Second, gender quotas matter, and not just because they raise women’s descriptive representation and push women’s numbers closer to (or even beyond) critical mass. Quotas alter when and how female lawmakers are seen as legitimate politicians, in the eyes of both voters and their peers. Female lawmakers elected via quotas do not universally experience obstacles, but impediments to their success appear more frequently in non-democracies. Third, and related, women’s presence provokes backlash. Female lawmakers struggle to become full and equal members of the policymaking process, and their reduced power can further diminish citizens’ positive assessments of their role. In summary, the structure and performance of politics still poses significant obstacles for female lawmakers. These obstacles will only mount as backlash effects occur and deepen. From working hours to dress codes, and from marginalization in committee assignments to verbal aggressiveness in debates, female legislators face gendered barriers in the exercise of their political rights. Advocating for women in politics therefore cannot end with increasing women’s descriptive representation. Proponents must inject gender equality into the everyday practice of politics itself.

Note 1. Though some contexts restrict the use of the word parliament to parliamentary systems, we use the terms legislature and parliament interchangeably to refer to the national assembly.

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CHAPTER 5

New Horizons in Women’s Political Rights Mona Lena Krook

Women first gained political rights, equal to those granted to men, in 1893 in New Zealand (the right to vote) and in 1906 in Finland (the right to run for office). In the intervening years, women have made significant inroads into political life, gaining recognition as a key and influential voting demographic and occupying a growing share of political roles as members of parliament, cabinet ministers, presidents, and prime ministers. Despite these achievements, many women around the world continue to face challenges in accessing their political rights. Despite the universality of women’s right to vote, in diverse contexts women endure serious practical difficulties in realizing their democratic voting rights for highly gendered reasons. UN Women has worked in countries like Egypt with government officials to provide identity cards to women, enabling them to vote for the very first time.1 This is not only a problem in developing country contexts: stricter voter identity laws in several states across the USA may disenfranchise women who change their names upon marriage or divorce, due to potential discrepancies between the names appearing on voter registration rolls and those listed on state identity cards.2 Elsewhere, gendered power structures preclude women’s equal voting rights. In countries like Azerbaijan, barriers include family or proxy voting, whereby male heads of household seek to vote on behalf of all family members—a phenomenon which electoral observers view as a serious threat to the integrity of elections (Nikolayenko 2015). Women’s political eligibility, similarly, has not led to equal levels of political representation. Despite significant progress in recent decades, women constitute less than one-quarter of parliamentarians worldwide (Inter-Parliamentary M. L. Krook (*)  Rutgers University, New Brunswick, NJ, USA e-mail: [email protected] © The Author(s) 2019 S. Franceschet et al. (eds.), The Palgrave Handbook of Women’s Political Rights, Gender and Politics, https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-137-59074-9_5

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Union 2018). To be sure, the rapid and widespread diffusion of electoral gender quotas globally has created new opportunities for women to be nominated as candidates, by either reserving seats for women in elected assemblies or requiring that political parties select more women as part of their electoral slates (Dahlerup 2006; Krook 2009). Although quotas have been adopted in more than 130 countries, however, they remain far from universal. In addition, even where they have been introduced, quotas often meet with stiff resistance—and even overt efforts to undermine their implementation (Krook 2016). In both quota and non-quota countries, therefore, lingering barriers remain to women’s right to run for political office. To overcome these obstacles, some countries have experimented with innovative strategies to enhance women’s political representation. One set of measures involves placing conditions on public funding of political parties (Childs 2013). In some countries, party funding eligibility has been tied to the implementation of gender quotas, as in France and Ireland, where parties lose state subsidies for failing to nominate the requisite share of women. In other cases, where there are no provisions for gender quotas, the law stipulates a bonus in state funding for parties who nominate and/or elect a specified percentage of women, as in Georgia and Haiti (Krook and Norris 2014). A second group of debates entails re-examining the working conditions of parliaments as obstacles to women’s rights to run for political office. Latenight sitting hours, for instance, make it difficult, if not impossible, in practice for women—and parents, more generally—to pursue politics as a career. The absence of parental leave, or the lack of proxy voting for members who are away from the chamber due to caring responsibilities, also presents an acute challenge, both for new parents and for their political parties, in ensuring that elected representatives are able to fulfill their duties (Childs 2016; Palmieri 2011). Perhaps the clearest ‘new horizon’ in defending women’s political rights, however, is the growing momentum globally to recognize and combat the problem of violence and harassment against politically active women (Krook 2017). While widely recognized by practitioners—and increasingly incorporated into their international programming—this topic has yet to be a core topic of academic research. Evidence around the world indicates, however, that female voters and politicians may confront obstacles to participating in public life not faced by their male colleagues. Despite the formal granting of equal political rights, for example, female citizens may be actively prevented from voting or coerced to vote in a particular way by religious or traditional leaders—or even by their own husbands. In the name of traditional gender norms, women’s political campaigns may be sabotaged by family members and party colleagues, while elected women are often targeted for relentless online bullying and harassment. While taking many different forms, these actions seek to send a message that women as a group should not participate in politics—constituting a major challenge to the democratic rights that women first gained more than a century ago. The remainder of this chapter focuses on violence against

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women in politics as a new and pressing challenge to the realization of women’s political rights. The first section maps the global emergence of the concept of violence against women in politics. The second focuses on definitional issues and surveys the various forms this phenomenon takes around the world. The third section presents a short overview of emerging solutions, focusing on the potential role of international organizations, state actors, political parties, and civil society. The chapter concludes that violence and harassment pose a serious threat to women’s political rights—and thus to democracy itself.

Creating a New Global Concept Women have long faced hostility against their political participation. American and British suffrage campaigners were attacked by mobs, imprisoned, and, in some cases, force-fed for demanding women’s right to vote (Walton 2010; Williams 2008). British suffragettes, indeed, faced so much violence in their campaigns that many learned jujitsu, a martial art manipulating an opponent’s force against himself (Looser 2011). And Coya Knutson, a member of Congress from Minnesota, had her political career ruined in the 1950s by rivals who wrote and circulated a letter from her estranged husband, urging her to ‘come home’ (Beito 1990). Demands for women’s right to vote and run for political office inspired such antagonism because they challenge a long-standing divide in many societies, associating men with the public sphere of politics and the economy and women with the private sphere of home and the family (Pateman 1994). As women enter the ‘male’ space of politics, therefore, they have often been viewed as interlopers, as ‘bodies out of place’ (Puwar 2004). They are judged more harshly than their male counterparts, even when they share the same qualifications and performance measures (Eagly and Karau 2002), and as a result, may feel the need to compensate by outperforming their male counterparts (Lazarus and Steigerwalt 2018). The challenges that female political actors face have often been dismissed as the ‘cost of doing politics.’ However, this narrative has begun to change as new terms—like ‘political violence and harassment,’ ‘violence against women in elections,’ and ‘violence against women in politics’—have begun to emerge to describe some women’s experiences in the political sphere (Bardall 2011; Krook and Restrepo Sanín 2016). In response to reports of assault, intimidation, and harassment against politically active women, a growing number of actors have begun to take steps to recognize and raise awareness of this phenomenon. The United Nations General Assembly first called for zero tolerance for violence against female candidates and elected officials in Resolution 66/130 in 2011, and in 2013 a Human Rights Council working group expressed concerns about harassment and attacks used to silence and discredit

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outspoken female politicians and activists. In 2012, Bolivia became the first country in the world to criminalize political violence and harassment against women, stemming from a more than decade-long campaign by locally elected women to document the numerous injuries and abuses they confronted. Resonating across the region, this reform inspired states-parties to the Inter-American Convention on the Prevention, Punishment, and Eradication of Violence against Women to endorse a Declaration on Political Violence and Harassment against Women in 2015. In 2016 and 2017, action on this issue began to accelerate. The National Democratic Institute (NDI) launched the #NotTheCost campaign, accompanied by a suite of tools to observe violence against women in elections, assist political parties in tackling this issue, and document violent incidents against politically active women.3 The Inter-Parliamentary Union (IPU) (2016) published the first global study of sexism, violence, and harassment against women in parliament; the Organization of American States (2017) published a model law to combat violence against women in political life; and UN Women together with the United Nations Development Program (UNDP) (2017) released a programming guide on preventing violence against women in elections. In late 2017, sexual harassment allegations provoked the resignation or dismissal of male parliamentarians and cabinet ministers in Canada, France, and the UK, leading to the revision of party and parliamentary codes of conduct (Krook 2018).

Definitions and Manifestations Synthesizing the definitions given by various international organizations, NDI explains that political violence can be experienced by anyone at any level of the political process. Three characteristics distinguish violence against women in politics: It targets women because of their gender, its very form can be gendered, and its impact is to discourage women in particular from being or becoming politically active (National Democratic Institute 2017). Scholars continue to contest the contours of this phenomenon, however. Nascent research debates whether these acts might simply be subsumed under violence in politics and society more broadly (Piscopo 2016)—or whether they require further theorizing as a particular, identifiable threat to women’s political rights seeking to exclude women as women from participating in politics (Krook and Restrepo Sanín 2016). Elaborating on the latter perspective, some literature goes further to propose that this violence constitutes a clear backlash against women’s increased participation, in particular the use of gender quotas (Albaine 2015; Cerva Cerna 2014), and thus should be seen in the context of other attempts to roll back feminist policy gains (Biroli 2018). Still others highlight the need to recognize intersectional violence against women in politics, pointing out that multiple forms of discrimination may operate simultaneously in these attacks (Kuperberg 2018).

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Sources differ in terms of how many different types of violence they recognize: The Bolivian law identifies two types (physical and psychological), for example, while the IPU names four (physical, sexual, psychological, and economic). This chapter focuses on five different categories of violence: physical, sexual, psychological, economic, and semiotic. While taking various forms, specific acts of violence may fall into multiple categories; some incidents may involve several of these acts simultaneously; and if targets do not respond to one form of violence, perpetrators may escalate their attacks using other types. Physical violence involves bodily injuries inflicted on female political actors and/or their family members. This may include assassination, kidnapping, beating, and domestic abuse. According to Human Rights Watch (2004), various groups sought to intimidate women in Afghanistan in 2004 so that they would not register to vote; bombed a bus carrying female electoral workers; and issued threats against female polling stations.4 In 2016, British member of parliament (MP), Jo Cox, was fatally shot and stabbed as she arrived at a constituency meeting, leading her female colleagues to speak out about sexism and misogyny in British political life. Sexual violence comprises sexual acts and attempts at sexual acts by coercion, including unwelcome sexual comments or advances. This includes sexual harassment, rape, and sexual exploitation. Sexual harassment allegations led to the expulsion of Mbulelo Goniwe, chief whip for the ruling African National Congress Party in South Africa in 2006; the suspension of Massimo Pacetti and Scott Andrews, Liberal MPs in Canada in 2014, followed by a third Liberal MP, Darshan Kang, in 2017; the resignation of Silvan Shalom, interior minister of Israel in 2015; and the removal of Denis Baupin, vice president of the French National Assembly in 2016. In Tanzania, female judges and activists have exposed widespread practices of ‘sextortion,’ or forcing women to perform sexual favors, as a condition for women to advance in the public service and political parties. Psychological violence entails hostile behavior and abuse intended to cause emotional damage. Death and rape threats, stalking, character assassination, and social boycotts are all examples. Speaker of the Italian parliament, Lauri Boldrini, has received bullets in the mail and been burned in effigy, requiring her to be guarded by heavy security detail. In 2016, nearly 50 women in Zanzibar were divorced by their husbands for voting, while in Bangladesh, husbands reportedly confiscated their wives’ identity cards and went with them to the polls. Muslim Women’s Network UK alleged that Muslim male local councilors had systematically sabotaged female candidates by engaging in smear tactics to damage their reputations and by intimidating their family members. Economic violence refers to property damage or destruction, as well as economic manipulation rendering it difficult, if not impossible, for women to perform their political functions. In Pakistan, religious extremists defaced

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posters with photographs of female candidates, while in Libya, Islamists opposed to women’s participation tore down women’s posters. In India, a local councilor came home after the election to find her land and crops destroyed. Attempts at economic manipulation include politicians in Guatemala who threatened women with loss of social benefits if they did not register with a party or pledge to vote for a certain candidate. In Costa Rica and Peru, women were refused offices and telephones, even as their male colleagues received these resources—and even cars—as members of local councils. Semiotic violence, finally, is perpetrated through degrading images and sexist language toward female politicians. One strategy is through sexual objectification, reducing perceptions of competence via sexualized portrayals of women’s bodies. Almost immediately after Croatian President Kolinda Grabar-Kitarović was elected in 2015, national newspapers published stills from an alleged sex tape, and in 2016, photographs supposedly of her in a bikini went viral. A second strategy is through symbolic annihilation, erasing women as actors in the political imagination. In 2009, two ultra-Orthodox newspapers in Israel altered photographs of the new cabinet, replacing two women with men, in one case, and simply blacking the women out, in the other. In Kuwait, legislators opposed to women’s participation repeatedly sought to impeach the first two female cabinet members to retire to the previous all-male status quo.

Emerging Solutions Women’s testimonies suggest that a wide range of perpetrators may be involved: While some abuse can be attributed to members of other political parties, a great deal also comes from women’s own parties, their own communities, and their own families. Together with online harassers—whose identities are often more difficult to ascertain amid fake and anonymous accounts, as well as automated bots and communities of trolls—this landscape calls for a multilevel, multiactor response. A crucial first step is to resist dismissing violence and harassment as simply ‘politics as usual.’ In 2016, NDI launched the #NotTheCost campaign to stop violence against women in politics, arguing that violence is not the cost of doing politics: Women should be able to be politically active without experiencing discrimination, harassment, or assault. On International Women’s Day in 2016, former US Secretary of State Madeleine Albright wrote a powerful article in advance of the #NotTheCost campaign launch, asserting that ‘[w]hen a woman participates in politics, she should be putting her hopes and dreams for the future on the line, not her dignity and not her life.’ At the state level, the National Commission on the Status of Women in Pakistan began collecting official data on violence against women in politics in 2015. In Mexico, various state agencies came together in 2016 to develop

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a protocol to coordinate their work to combat political violence and harassment. Within parliaments, legislators have launched reforms to criminalize political violence and harassment, such as a law passed in Bolivia and bills proposed in at least five other Latin American countries. In 2014, an all-party committee in the Canadian House of Commons instituted a new code of conduct and procedure for handling sexual harassment complaints. Political parties have removed representatives, as the African National Congress in South Africa did in 2006. They have also considered barring members who perpetrate violence and harassment against other members or other parties, as recently proposed in France. Internally, the British Labour Party has instituted rules against sexism, racism, and bullying in party meetings. And Liberal International made a statement on violence against women in politics before the UN Human Rights Council in 2016. Technology companies, while crucial partners on the issue of online harassment, have not developed adequate policies for dealing with abuse against politically active women. To date, users themselves have been the primary drivers of campaigns against online violence and harassment against women in politics through hashtags like #NotTheCost, #NameItChangeIt, and #ReclaimTheInternet. Politicians also have a role to play, as the Bernie Sanders campaign did in early 2016, by condemning the online misogyny and vitriol of some of his young male followers (the so-called Bernie Bros) toward female supporters of Hillary Clinton.

Conclusions Having more women in politics has been viewed in largely positive terms, as leading to attention to a wider range of policy issues, including those beneficial to women; inspiring greater interest and engagement in politics among women as a group, particularly young women; and eroding historical associations between men and politics, generating broader transformations in gender roles. Yet, a growing number of sources worldwide report physical attacks, intimidation, and harassment directed at female politicians, activists, and voters. Reflecting attempts to restrict women’s policy contributions, deter ­women’s electoral participation, and reinforce prevailing gender norms, such acts pose a serious threat to democracy and, in turn, question the progress that has been made globally in terms of incorporating women as political actors. Despite growing international attention to this issue, violence against women in politics remains a largely hidden problem. While often explained away as ‘politics as usual,’ these acts can be understood as violations of both personal and electoral integrity (Bjarnegård 2018). Attempting to stop women as a group from participating in politics seeks to negate the political rights of no less than half the world’s population. Sexist hostility and intimidation also appear to negatively affect women’s political ambition,

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driving female politicians to decide not to stand for (re)election—as well as influencing young women’s willingness to run for office. Sabotaging the political campaigns of female candidates, or inhibiting female officeholders from fulfilling their duties, constitutes a breach of international commitments to protect human rights and end discrimination against women. It also threatens the integrity of the electoral process by violating citizens’ rights to vote for their preferred candidates and see democratic choices respected. Such actions, in turn, deprive citizens of benefits stemming from the inclusion of women’s perspectives in political debates and decision making in matters affecting society as a whole. Recognizing and combatting this phenomenon is thus an emerging global priority, essential for ensuring equal opportunities for women and men to participate in politics, as well as for developing robust democratic institutions and practices.

Notes 1. See http://www.unwomen.org/en/news/stories/2012/7/the-women-citizenship-initiative-will-ensure-citizenship-rights-to-two-million-women-in-egypt (accessed 26 Mar 2018). 2. See https://www.usatoday.com/story/opinion/2013/10/29/voter-id-laws-texaswomens-rights-column/3309505/ (accessed 26 Mar 2018). 3. See https://www.ndi.org/not-the-cost (accessed 26 Mar 2018). 4. Sources for all these examples are on file with the author.

References Albaine, Laura. 2015. Paridad de género y violencia política. Los casos de Bolivia, Costa Rica y Ecuador. In Integridad y Equidad Electoral en América Latina, 148– 171. Mexico City: SOMEE. Bardall, Gabrielle. 2011. Breaking the Mold: Understanding Gender and Electoral Violence. Washington, DC: IFES. Beito, Gretchen Urnes. 1990. Coya Come Home: A Congresswoman’s Journey. Beverly Hills: Pomegranate Press. Biroli, Flávia. 2018. Violence Against Women and Reactions to Gender Equality in Politics. Politics & Gender 14 (3). Bjarnegård, Elin. 2018. Making Gender Visible in Election Violence: Strategies for Data Collection. Politics & Gender 14 (3). Cerva Cerna, Daniela. 2014. Participación Política y Violencia de Género en México. Revista Mexicana de Ciencias Políticas y Sociales 59 (222): 105–124. Childs, Sarah. 2013. In the Absence of Electoral Sex Quotas: Regulating Political Parties for Women’s Representation. Representation 49 (4): 401–423. Childs, Sarah. 2016. The Good Parliament. Bristol: University of Bristol. Dahlerup, Drude (ed.). 2006. Women, Quotas, and Politics. New York: Routledge. Eagly, Alice H., and Steven J. Karau. 2002. Role Congruity Theory of Prejudice Toward Female Leaders. Psychological Review 109 (3): 573–598. Human Rights Watch. 2004. Afghanistan: Women Under Attack for Asserting Rights. Online at http://pantheon.hrw.org/legacy/english/docs/2004/10/04/ afghan9436.htm. Accessed 10 Apr 2018.

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Inter-Parliamentary Union. 2016. Sexism, Harassment, and Violence Against Women Parliamentarians. Geneva: IPU. Inter-Parliamentary Union. 2018. Women in National Parliaments: Situation as of 1 March 2018. Available at http://archive.ipu.org/wmn-e/world.htm. Accessed 10 Apr 2018. Krook, Mona Lena. 2009. Quotas for Women in Politics. New York: Oxford University Press. Krook, Mona Lena. 2016. Contesting Gender Quotas: Dynamics of Resistance. Politics, Groups, and Identities 4 (2): 268–283. Krook, Mona Lena. 2017. Violence Against Women in Politics. Journal of Democracy 28 (1): 74–88. Krook, Mona Lena. 2018. Westminster Too: On Sexual Harassment in British Politics. Political Quarterly 89 (1): 65–72. Krook, Mona Lena, and Pippa Norris. 2014. Beyond Quotas: Strategies to Promote Gender Equality in Elected Office. Political Studies 62 (1): 2–20. Krook, Mona Lena, and Juliana Restrepo Sanín. 2016. Violence Against Women in Politics: A Defense of the Concept. Política y Gobierno (2): 459–490. Kuperberg, Rebecca. 2018. Intersectional Violence Against Women in Politics. Politics & Gender 14 (3). Lazarus, Jeffrey, and Amy Steigerwalt. 2018. Gendered Vulnerability: How Women Work Harder to Stay in Office. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press. Looser, Diana. 2011. Radical Bodies and Dangerous Ladies: Martial Arts and Women’s Performance, 1900–1918. Theatre Research International 36 (1): 3–19. National Democratic Institute. 2017. #NotTheCost: Stopping Violence Against Women in Politics Program Guidance. Washington, DC: National Democratic Institute. Nikolayenko, Olena. 2015. Do Contentious Elections Depress Turnout? In Contentious Elections, ed. Pippa Norris, Richard W. Frank, and Ferran Martínez i Coma, 25–44. New York: Routledge. Organization of American States. 2017. Inter-American Model Law. Washington, DC: OAS. Palmieri, Sonia. 2011. Gender-Sensitive Parliaments: A Global Review of Good Practice. Geneva: Inter-Parliamentary Union. Pateman, Carole. 1994. Three Questions About Womanhood Suffrage. In Suffrage and Beyond: International Feminist Perspectives, ed. Caroline Daley and Melanie Nolan, 331–348. New York: New York University Press. Piscopo, Jennifer. 2016. State Capacity, Criminal Justice, and Political Rights: Rethinking Violence Against Women in Politics. Politica y gobierno 23 (2): 437–458. Puwar, Nirmal. 2004. Space Invaders: Race, Gender and Bodies Out of Place. Oxford: Berg. UN Women/UNDP. 2017. Preventing Violence Against Women in Elections: A Programming Guide. New York: UN Women and UNDP. Walton, Mary. 2010. A Woman’s Crusade: Alice Paul and the Battle for the Ballot. New York: St. Martin’s Press. Williams, Elizabeth A. 2008. Gags, Funnels, and Tubes: Forced Feeding of the Insane and of Suffragettes. Endeavour 32 (4): 134–140.

PART II

Suffrage and Political Participation

CHAPTER 6

Chile: Women’s Suffrage and Political Participation, 1935–2015 Ricardo Gamboa and Miguel Angel López

This chapter analyzes the “Chilean route” to women’s suffrage and how women in Chile came to form part of the electorate and the decision-­making system in general. Like other countries discussed in this volume, Chile suffrage was extended to women through two legislative decisions separated by fifteen years. In 1934, women received the right to vote in municipal elections, yet had to wait until 1949 to be eligible to vote in national elections. In this chapter, we argue that this two-stage process was due mainly to the ruling elite’s interest in observing how women would vote at the municipal level, which was of minor political importance, and delaying their participation in parliamentary and presidential elections at the national level until they felt confident that women’s suffrage would not bring about a significant change in the political landscape. Thus, only when women’s electoral behavior at the municipal level was stable—with a distribution of votes similar to the vote in parliamentary elections—were women conceded the right to vote in elections at all levels of government. In the second part of the paper, we outline some of the consequences of women’s enfranchisement. We argue that the electoral inclusion of women occurred slowly, and even though women had always been a demographic majority, it was not until 1989 that they came to form a majority of the electorate. When it comes to women’s impact as voters, we demonstrate R. Gamboa (*) · M. A. López  Institute of International Studies, University of Chile, Santiago, Chile e-mail: [email protected] M. A. López e-mail: [email protected] © The Author(s) 2019 S. Franceschet et al. (eds.), The Palgrave Handbook of Women’s Political Rights, Gender and Politics, https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-137-59074-9_6

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that, with some exceptions, Chile exemplifies a “traditional gender gap,” in the sense that a greater proportion of women than men support right-wing or Catholic parties. Finally, when we look at the distribution of candidates by gender in the last 25 years and women’s access to elected posts, we see that women’s inclusion remains far from complete. We conclude by noting that the recent change in Chile’s electoral law, which now includes a gender quota, may improve women’s political representation.

The Chilean Route to Women’s Suffrage Debates about women’s suffrage began in Chile in the late nineteenth century. The 1833 Constitution, which established the foundations for Chile’s post-independence political system, introduced a censitary voting system. Chileans over the age of 21 could vote if they were married or over the age of 25 if they were unmarried. In both cases, to be allowed to vote citizens had to be able to read and write, possess some real estate, or to prove an income above a certain amount, and be inscribed in the electoral register. Even though the Constitution did not expressly exclude women, the electoral law did so by only contemplating the inscription of men in the electoral register. In this context, throughout the nineteenth century women were excluded not only from the possibility of voting but also from aspiring to public positions such as being a government minister (because to become one, a person must enjoy the right to vote). As a result, women rarely participated actively in the political debate. The best-known exception occurred in the 1850s, when a conflict erupted between clericals and anti-clericals, dividing the conservative elite between Regalists (partisans of the supremacy of state authority over the Catholic Church) and Ultramontanes (defenders of Church autonomy). Large numbers of women mobilized to support the Archbishop of ­Santiago and defend the demands of the Catholic Church (Gaviola et al. 1984, p. 19; Maza 1995, p. 141). Later, in 1865, a review called “Echo of the Ladies of Santiago” appeared, in which a group of upper-class women sought to express their opinions about public affairs, particularly the issue of religion (Errázuriz 2005). This was the background against which the issue of women’s suffrage was raised for the first time. In 1865, the conservative politician Abdón Cifuentes publicly defended the idea that women should be allowed to vote, but his gesture produced no concrete results (Maza 1995, p. 144). The debate resurfaced in 1875 when some women went to inscribe their names on the electoral register, taking advantage of the fact that the Constitution did not prohibit it. Some of these women were successful (Eltit 1994, p. 21), although ultimately, they were not allowed to vote. But their action generated an intense debate between conservatives and liberals (the two main political forces of the day), with conservatives supporting women’s

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enfranchisement while the liberals rejected it. In this context, it is worth ­noting Cifuentes’ argument: If the political order can prejudice them as it can any man, with what right do you close the gates of legality and prevent them from defending themselves and procuring a remedy in the same political territory in which they suffer harm? You impose taxes on women, women pay them, but you prohibit them from any involvement in the investment of the tribute they pay. Given a voice and vote so that they can guard the social interests in which they hold an interest, so that they can oversee the conduct of the administrators whom they pay, their ability disappears immediately, their incapacity is quickly evident. (cited in Maza 1995, p. 154)

The distinguished constitutionalist Jorge Huneeus expressed the other side’s argument, maintaining that the prohibition in question was justified by the norms that “God established by attributing a series of duties to women in society, and above all in the family, that are truly incompatible with the exercise of citizenship in its full extension” (1879, pp. 33–34). Despite these different views, we believe that arguments against the inclusion of women were largely due to beliefs about women’s conservatism, which they had made clear when they mobilized in defense of the Church. The liberals’ rejection, then, sprung from the expected electoral losses that women’s political inclusion would entail. In any case, the liberal position prevailed: A reform to the electoral law in 1884 expressly prohibited the inscription of women. Despite expressly prohibiting women’s inclusion, the debate over women’s suffrage re-emerged at the beginning of the twentieth century. A key catalyst was the emergence of the first women’s organizations. Although holding different ideological views, women’s groups organized activities aimed at improving the situation of women in society and in particular promoting legal equality between men and women. The Belén de Sárraga Centers, which were created following the visit to Chile in 1913 of the Spanish speaker they were named for; the Reading Circle, led by Amanda Labarca; and the Ladies’ Social Club (Gaviola et al. 1984, p. 28; Eltit 1994, p. 49) were particularly important. Likewise, in 1917, the conservative Luis Undurraga presented a bill in congress to give the vote to women. This initiative came to nothing, as the other parties saw it merely as an attempt by conservatives to secure their own electoral interests (Gaviola et al. 1984, p. 36; see also Kirkwood 1986). Later, in 1919, the National Women’s Council was created, a new organization also led by Labarca, while in 1922 the first political party representing women was established, the Civic Women’s Party (Partido Cívico Femenina), led by Ester La Rivera. In addition, during the 1920s, several parties opened their doors to women by creating women’s sections. Examples include the Women’s Section of the Conservative Party, the Women’s Liberal Assembly, The Radical Women’s Assembly of Santiago, and Socialist Women’s Action (Gaviola et al. 1984, p. 47).

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Although there were no advances yet on the suffrage issue, other state decisions sought to improve women’s political and legal status. In 1923, after the Chilean state approved the 5th International Pan-American Conference, the government pledged to establish equal political rights between men and women. Likewise, in 1925, Decree Law 328, known as the Maza Law for its author, the liberal politician José Maza, recognized new civil rights for women, allowing them to administer their own incomes and to exercise any occupation, unless forbidden by a judge at the request of the husband. Moreover, the law entitled women to act as witnesses in legal disputes. Finally, the new Constitution of 1925, while not giving women the vote, did not exclude it altogether. Indeed, the committee that drafted the text stated explicitly in its discussion that the issue should be resolved by the electoral law (Ministerio del Interior 1925, p. 389). There was very little progress during the next few years, given the major institutional and political crisis the country faced between 1924 and 1932. The scenario changed decisively in the 1930s, however. Women got the right to vote (and be elected) in municipal elections in 1934, and in 1949, this right was extended to presidential and congressional elections at the national level. Thus, Chile adopted a formula similar to other countries (e.g., the UK and Belgium), whereby the enfranchisement of women was a two-step process (Rodríguez-Ruiz and Rubio-Marín 2012, p. 10). Below, we review the main elements of this process and explain why it had these characteristics. The first step was the establishment of women’s right to vote at the municipal level. Although this entered force in 1934 with the promulgation of Law 5357, a prior detail is relevant. In May 1931, a short while before he was overthrown, the dictator Carlos Ibañez issued Decree Law 320, which formally introduced women’s suffrage at the municipal level. This law envisaged a plural voting formula. While granting women the vote, it did not establish political equality between men and women, in that women were allowed to inscribe themselves in only two of the three electoral registers the law contemplated. Moreover, the minimum age requirement for women’s inscription was 25, while for men it was 21. In fact, however, this norm never actually entered force. The issue quickly returned to the agenda when institutional normality was restored in 1932. As part of a discussion of a municipal reform bill, a parliamentary motion supported by legislators from different parties proposed that women be enfranchised in municipal elections. It is notable that despite the cross-party support for this norm—and its fairness—the parties were deeply divided on how the vote should be given to women. The position that finally triumphed proposed a formula of “broad and equal suffrage,” i.e., that women should have equal access to (municipal) suffrage, complying with the same requirements as men, namely being more than 21 years of age, and knowing how to read and write (López and Gamboa 2015, p. 128).

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The second option, for which various formulas were proposed, was to establish in practice a more “restricted” system for women. During the legislative debate, three “restricted suffrage” initiatives emerged. The first proposed that women should be eligible to vote on reaching the age of 25, while the second established that only municipal taxpayers should participate in the election of their authorities. This last initiative, as proposed by José Maza, was certainly very prejudicial for women. At that moment, for example, women represented only 15% of the economically active population, so that very few would have been able to vote on the same terms as men. Both proposals were quickly discarded (López and Gamboa 2015, p. 129). However, the third initiative came close to being approved. Presented by parliamentarians belonging to the liberal, radical, and conservative parties, it proposed a plural voting system. Five attributes would provide a right to vote, so that each person would have one vote for each of the five attributes they possessed. Among other things, these referred to age, literacy, possession of a university degree, or the exercise of a profession. Even though these attributes were not restricted to either sex, in practice the proposal greatly prejudiced women. Given women’s low participation in the labor market and the small number of female professionals at the time—women were not admitted into universities until 1877—the great majority of women could only achieve three votes. Although the Senate approved this reform, the Chamber of Deputies rejected it, leading to its failure. Two factors were vitally important in the rejection of the plural vote formula. First, in the parties whose legislators had proposed this alternative there was no consensus on partially integrating women, with the majority favoring the broad suffrage alternative. Second, women’s organizations, which enjoyed renewed growth during this period— especially following the emergence of the Committee for Women’s Civil Rights, led by Felisa Vergara and Amanda Labarca—flatly rejected all these alternatives (López and Gamboa 2015, p. 129). Thus, the “broad and equal suffrage” formula finally prevailed. This gave both men and women, who had reached the age of 21 and were able to read and write, the right to vote in municipal elections. Notably, voting rights were also given to foreigners who met certain requirements. In the years that followed, women’s struggle continued. While accepting that suffrage could be granted gradually, the various women’s movements always made it clear that their struggle would continue until there was full equality of political rights between men and women (Maza 1998, p. 351). The suffragist movement became stronger, and in 1935, the Movement for the Emancipation of the Chilean Woman (MEMCH) was created, led by Elena Caffarena. In turn, women with links to the political right created National Women’s Action. Then, in 1944, when discussion of the extension of the right to vote in other elections had already begun, a much larger association was created, the Chilean Federation of Women’s Institutions

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(FECHIF), which grouped together more than 200 organizations under the leadership of Amanda Labarca. In this context, in 1945 a new legislative initiative to grant “complete suffrage” to women emerged, after a previous attempt in 1941 had been unsuccessful. Presented by parliamentarians from different parties (liberals, radicals, socialists, communists, and conservatives), with the decided support of women’s organizations (Eltit 1994, p. 60), this was the version that finally passed into law in 1949. Its passage through Congress, unlike what happened in the discussion of municipal suffrage, was not complicated by differences over equal rights to suffrage between men and women. The only points of discussion were, first, whether the vote for women should be obligatory, as the electoral law stipulated for men. Since the objective was to establish political equality between men and women, it was decided that women’s voting would likewise be obligatory. Second, there was a discussion over whether a new register should be drawn up for women or the municipal list, created years previously, should be used for this purpose. Given that ordering the ­re-inscription of women could have a negative effect on electoral participation, it was decided that the women’s register would be used in future for presidential and parliamentary elections. This explains why, at least until 1973, women voted in separate polling booths from men. On this point, a question emerges: Why was this parliamentary initiative not approved until 1949, if municipal suffrage already existed and the bill enjoyed cross-party support? In our opinion, and not discounting the influence of other factors, a key element of the explanation lay in the predicted impact of the women’s vote on the correlation of forces between the parties. Indeed, as López and Gamboa show (2015, p. 131), in the first municipal elections held after the establishment of the women’s vote (in 1935 and 1938), the female electorate strongly favored the right and particularly the Conservative Party. More than 55% of women’s votes in these elections went to liberal and conservative candidates. In contrast, left-wing parties got significantly fewer votes from women than men. This was true also of the main party in government, the Radical Party. In the elections that followed, however, the scene changed and the gender gap benefiting the right-wing parties began to close. Equally, in the case of some left-wing parties and particularly the Socialist Party, the differences between the votes they received from men and women were less notable. In this way, the distribution of the female vote leveled out during the 1940s. In our opinion, this is the key to understanding why the law’s approval came in 1949 and not earlier. By then, it was clear that the incorporation of women into the electorate in the more important national elections would not entail a very significant change in the relative electoral weight of the various parties. Knowing this, they joined together in approving a law that granted the vote to women on the same terms as men. Chile was the twelfth country in Latin America to do so (Ramírez et al. 1997, p. 744).

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The Impact of Women at the Polls: Electoral Inclusion and the Gender Gap How did women’s enfranchisement affect party politics in Chile? Two questions in particular will concern us: First, how did women’s electoral participation evolve between 1935 and 2009; second, how did women’s political preferences change over time, when seen from the perspective of the gender gap (Inglehart and Norris 2000)? On the first question, the main point to note is that the incorporation of women into the electorate was a gradual process. Figure 6.1 shows the participation data by sex in two municipal elections (1935 and 1944), and then in the presidential elections held between 1952 (the first in which women participated) and 2009. Even though they were always a majority of the population between 1950 and 1970 (between 50.5 and 50.7%), and the potential female electorate had been similar in size to the potential male electorate since 1935 (López and Gamboa 2015, p. 131), the proportion of women voters was never equal to the percentage of the population they represented until 1970. In fact, when they were only able to vote in municipal elections, women never represented more than 20% of the voters (López and Gamboa 2015, p. 131). Yet, after 1952, women’s electoral participation began to change, increasing substantially. The introduction of measures in Law 14,851 of 1962 that made electoral inscription virtually obligatory played an important role in

90 80 70

82.4 80.8

70 65

60

54.7

50 40 30 20

30 19.2

35

45.3

53.5 47.5

52.1 47.9

52.3 47.7

53.1 46.9

53.4 46.6

53.6 46.4

17.6

10 0

1935 1944 1952 1958 1964 1970 1989 1993 1999 2005 2009 (327) (498) (954) (1250) (2530) (2962) (6797) (6968) (7055) (6942) (6977)*

Men (%)

Women (%)

Fig. 6.1  Integration of women in the electorate, 1935–2009, presidential elections (Source Elaborated by the authors using Maza (1995) and www.servel.cl) *Total Voters by year (in thousands)

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the increase. These measures brought about a substantial increase in electoral registration, of men as well as women, with women now reaching up to 50% of the electorate. However, as Fig. 6.1 shows, Chileans registered massively to vote between 1988 and 1989, with the restoration of democracy. Since then, women have made up a percentage of voters that is consistent with their proportion of the general population, always more than 52% (INE 2010, p. 97). Thus, since 1989 women’s participation fluctuated between 52.1 and 53.6% of the voters. We will approach the subject of women’s electoral behavior from the perspective of the gender gap (Inglehart and Norris 2000) and in particular the supposedly different electoral preferences of men and women. As we shall see, Chile belongs—or did so at least until 2005—among those countries that have a “traditional gender gap,” in the sense that a greater proportion of the female electorate has consistently tended to favor right-wing and/or Catholic parties. Tables 6.1 and 6.2 show how women’s preferences for the different candidates were distributed in presidential elections from 1952 to 2009. In Table 6.1, we provide data for the four presidential elections held between 1952 (the first time that women could vote in an election of this type) and 1973, the year when the democratically elected government of Salvador Allende was overthrown in military coup that led to a lengthy period of dictatorship. The category “right-wing” includes the candidates supported by the traditional parties of that political sector—Conservative and Liberal— or their successor, the National Party.1 The category “center” includes the candidates of the Radical Party (PR) and/or the Christian Democrat Party (PDC) for 1952 and 1958 and only of the latter party for 1964 and 1970. Finally, the category “left-wing” refers to the candidates supported by the main parties of that tendency, the Socialist Party (PS) and the Communist Party (PC), whose candidate was always Salvador Allende. With the single exception of 1964, right-wing candidates obtained a considerably higher percentage of votes from women voters than they did from men (i.e., there was a positive gender gap). The opposite was true of leftwing candidates, who obtained a notably smaller proportion of votes from women voters than they did from men in all the elections (a negative gender gap). The case of the center is striking in that it also shows a positive gender gap in all the elections, especially since 1958. It is relevant to note that the center’s candidacies in 1964 and 1970 were led by members of the PDC, a party with strong links to Catholic sectors, even though its platform was far removed from the right-wing platform (see also Lewis 2004). As López and Gamboa show (2015, p. 132), this pattern can be seen also in the case of the congressional elections of this period. Also, more distinctions may be drawn given that the individual votes of the parties are considered in this case. Two points are relevant. First, on the right, the Conservative Party had a greater gender gap than the Liberals. Second, of the center parties, the PDC had large and positive gender gap, while the PR’s was neutral

Source Compiled by the authors

38.8

31.9

6.9

6.0 3.9

20.2 39.8 64.1 29.9

0.4 5.6 14.4 3.7

5.8 32.4 45.2 42.0

19.8 34.2 49.7 26.2

32 34.1

1952 1958 1964 1970

26.0 30.2

Men (%)

Men (%) Women Gender (%) gap (%) 4.8 22.3 32.8 30.9 −1.0 −10.1 −12.4 −11.1

Women Gender (%) gap (%)

% voting for left-wing parties

% voting for center parties

Election % voting for right-wing parties year Men (%) Women Gender (%) gap (%)

Table 6.1  Gender gap in presidential elections 1952–1970

48.4 3.2 5.1

Men (%)

43.0 3.6 4.5

−5.4 −0.4 −0.6

Women Gender (%) gap (%)

% voting for other

30.0 35.3 47.5 48.3

% of women on electoral register

6  CHILE: WOMEN’S SUFFRAGE AND POLITICAL PARTICIPATION, 1935–2015 

93

26.0 22.6 44.1 42.3 43.9

32.8 26.0 50.5 48.9 44.1

6.8 3.4 6.4 6.6 0.2

59.0 58.5 50.9 44.7 30.5

51.6 57.5 45.3 47.0 28.8 −7.4 −1.0 −5.6 2.3 −1.7

Gender gap (%)

Men (%) Women (%)

Men (%)

Women Gender (%) gap (%)

% voting for center-left parties

% voting for right-wing parties

Source Compiled by authors

1989 1993 1999 2005 2009

Election year

Table 6.2  Gender gap in presidential elections 1989–2009

– 5.5 3.7 7.0 6.8

Men (%) – 3.9 2.7 4.0 5.6

– −1.6 −1.0 −3.0 −1.2

Women Gender (%) gap (%)

% voting for left-wing parties

15.9

21.3

14.9

18.7

Men (%) Women (%)

1.6

1.0

Gender gap (%)

% voting for other parties

51.5 51.7 52.0 52.4 52.5

% of women on electoral register

94  R. GAMBOA AND M. A. LÓPEZ

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or negative (López and Gamboa 2015, p. 132). The PS and the PC had a negative gender gap in all the elections. This tendency remained unchanged after the restoration of democracy in 1989, at least until 2005. Table 6.2 shows the results of the five presidential elections held since that year.2 Because of a shift in the pattern of political alliances since 1989, the data are not expressed in the same way as in the pre-1973 period. The category “right-wing” includes the candidates supported by the two main rightist parties, National Renovation (RN) and the Independent Democratic Union (UDI). The category “center-left” refers to the candidates supported by the Coalition of Parties for Democracy (CPPD), which grouped together center and left-wing parties (PDC, PS, PR, and a new center-left party, the Party for Democracy (PPD)). Finally, the category “left-wing” includes mainly those candidates backed by the PC, which did not form part of the CPPD and competed together with other small groups. This situation changed in 2013; a new coalition emerged (the New Majority) which combined the old CPPD and the PC. Despite the change in political alliances, it is striking how the tendency noted previously reproduced itself at least until 2005. Thus, as before, we note a positive and large gender gap in the vote for right-wing candidacies (on average 5%), even though it dropped considerably in 2009. The gender gap was negative in the case of the three center-left candidacies until 1999, despite the presence of the PDC. Notably, this changed substantially in 2005 when the center-left presented its first woman presidential candidate, Michelle Bachelet, who went on to win the presidency. Later, this tendency was reversed in 2009. Finally, in the case of the PC and its allies, the traditional tendency of a negative gender gap can be observed. In view of this recent trend, the question arises whether Chile is progressing toward a “modern gender gap,” where women voters are more likely to support leftist parties and candidates, with male voters more supportive of the right. “Modern” gender gaps in many “post-industrial societies” like the USA, France, or Germany began to emerge in the 1990s (Inglehart and Norris 2000, p. 458). While this hypothesis certainly cannot be discarded, we do not yet have enough evidence to confirm it, especially due to abolishment of separate polls through the legislative change in 2012 (mentioned above). Although it is possible that Chile is moving toward having a more “modern” gender gap, we shall see in the next section that on other related matters such as women’s integration into elected bodies, Chile is still notably behind countries in other parts of the world and, indeed, even falls behind other Latin American countries. Women as Candidates: An Unbalanced Political System As we have seen, since 1989 women have been a clear majority in the electorate. Yet, a very different picture emerges if we look at the figures on the gender distribution of candidates (Table 6.3). Whether in local or parliamentary

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Table 6.3  Candidates for Senate, Chamber of Deputies, and Municipal Councils Election year

Number (%) Candidates for Senate

Number (%) Candidates for Chamber of Deputies

Election year

Women

Men

Women

Men

1989

7 (6.4)

33 (7.9)

1993

3 (5.5)

103 (93.6) 52 (94.5)

51 (13.3)

1997

10 (15.2)

56 (84.8)

84 (19)

386 (92.1) 333 (86.7) 358 (81)

2001

2 (4.3)

44 (95.7)

54 (14.2)

2005

9 (13.6)

57 (86.4)

63 (16.3)

2009

8 (15.1)

45 (84.9)

73 (17)

2013

12 (17.9)

55 (82.1)

91 (19.4)

Total

51 (11)

412 (89)

449 (15.4)

1992 1996

327 (85.8) 323 (83.7) 356 (83)

2000 2004 2008

379 (80.6) 2462 (84.6)

2012 Total

Municipal Councillors

Women

Men

1047 (16.1) 956 (17.5) 828 (18.4) 1254 (20.2) 2411 (25.4) 2590 (26.2) 9086 (21.2)

5465 (83.9) 4513 (82.5) 3681 (81.6) 4949 (79.8) 7075 (74.6) 7308 (73.8) 32,991 (78.8)

Prepared by the authors based on official results. www.servel.cl

Table 6.4  Distribution of candidates by gender: Chamber of Deputies 1989−2013 W 1989 1993 1997 2001 2005 2009 2013 Total

33 51 84 54 63 73 91 449

M

Total

W (%)

M (%)

Total (%)

386 333 358 327 323 356 379 2462

419 384 442 381 386 429 470 2911

7.9 13.3 19.0 14.2 16.3 17.0 19.4 15.4

92.1 86.7 81.0 85.8 83.7 83.0 80.6 84.6

100 100 100 100 100 100 100 100

W Women, M Men Source Prepared by the authors based on official results. www.servel.cl

elections, male candidates dominate the ballot papers.3 In fact, as Table 6.4 shows, 89% of the total number of candidates for the Senate between 1989 and 2013 were men, and only 11% were women. In the seven elections to the Chamber of Deputies held since 1989, Table 6.4 shows that only 15.4% of the candidates for parliamentary seats were women. Equally, in the case of municipal elections (considering only the election of councilors),4 the figure is a little better but still very deficient: Only 21.2% of the candidates for councilor since 1992 have been women (Table 6.5).

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Table 6.5  Distribution of candidates by gender: Councilors 1992−2012 W 1992 1996 2000 2004 2008 2012 Total

1047 956 828 1254 2411 2590 9086

M 5465 4513 3681 4949 7075 7308 32991

Total

W(%)

M (%)

Total (%)

6512 5469 4509 6203 9486 9898 42777

16.1 17.5 18.4 20.2 25.4 26.2 21.2

83.9 82.5 81.6 79.8 74.6 73.8 78.8

100 100 100 100 100 100 100

W Women, M Men Source Prepared by the authors based on official results. www.servel.cl

Yet if we compare data from the first elections (1989 for the Senate and the Chamber of Deputies and 1992 for councilors) with the most recent (2013 and 2012, respectively), some progress is evident. In the case of the Senate, the proportion of female candidates increased from 6.4 to 17.9%, for the Chamber of Deputies from 7.9 to 19.4%, and for councilors from 16.1 to 26.2%. Even so, this was not a linear progression: In the parliamentary elections, some years recorded reverses. So, is this unequal gender distribution of candidates the same in all parties? If we consider just the local council elections since 1992, we can see that while there are differences among the parties, they are hardly significant. Party ideology does not seem to dramatically affect women’s presence, as all parties appear to favor male candidates. The average percentage of female candidates fielded by each party since 1992 was 18.9 for the PDC, 19.3 for RN, 19.6 for the PS and PC, 21.4 for the PPD, and 22.8 for the UDI. However, on a positive note, we can see that since the 2004 elections the proportion of female candidates has exceeded 20% in all the parties considered, although in none has it yet reached 30%. Naturally, these figures are reflected in women’s access to elected posts. Only 11% of members of parliament elected since 1989 and 17% of local councilors elected since 1992 have been women. However, progress is again evident here. While in 1989 only nine women were elected to parliamentary posts (5.6% of the total), this figure rose to 18.6% in 2013. Likewise, while in 1992 (in the first local election since 1989) only 11.8% of those elected were women, in the elections that followed this figure increased consistently, reaching 25.2% in 2012 (PNUD 2014, p. 240). These figures are far from good, especially when considering the gains in women’s representation being made elsewhere in Latin America. Beginning with Argentina in 1991, most countries in the region had adopted legislated gender quotas by 2010 and quota laws were producing substantial increases in the number of women in politics in many countries. Indeed, in Chile the need to implement mechanisms to encourage greater participation by women in politics had been under discussion for years, and some notable results have

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been achieved. For example, various political parties (the PS, PDC, and PPD in particular) have introduced gender quotas in their selection of candidates and party officials (PNUD 2014, p. 282). Moreover and more importantly, for the first time in Chile’s history a new electoral law introduced gender quotas for congressional candidates, even if only as a temporary measure. In effect, Law 20,840 of May 2015, which put an end to the binomial system and replaced it with a moderately proportional one, established that for the next four parliamentary elections (2017, 2021, 2025, and 2029) “neither male candidates nor female candidates may exceed 60% of the total number of candidates for each party.” In addition, two other incentives were established. The first was that for each woman elected as a member of parliament in those elections a reward of around $18,000 would be given to the parties they belonged to. The second was that women who compete in these elections have a right to a greater reimbursement for campaign expenses than men. To be sure, these changes aim to promote a greater participation of women in politics. However, we must wait for the results of the next elections to know if they will have a positive effect. Moreover, these measures must be accompanied by others that without compromising democratic principles effectively remove the remaining obstacles that prevent women from participating equally in politics.

Conclusion This chapter analyzed the slow and uneven “Chilean route” to women’s suffrage, the slow integration of women into the electorate, and women’s electoral behavior (i.e., the gender gap in voting). We showed that, for a very long time, even after the return of democracy, Chile exhibited the characteristics of a traditional gender gap. But with the election of Chile’s first female president in 2006, there is some evidence that the traditional gender gap may be changing and that the country may be advancing toward a “modern gender gap.” All in all, as we said, this evidence on this point remains inconclusive. Finally, this chapter examined the distribution of candidates by gender and women´s access to elected posts. In this respect, we found that despite the positive evolution of the indicators, Chile still has much ground to make up. In this sense, the new norms establishing gender quotas in electoral matters seem to be a step forward. Even so, they must be complemented by other measures that help end the deficit in women’s participation in politics.

Notes 1. In the case of 1964, there was no right-wing candidate strictly speaking, since the right-wing parties decided to support the PDC in order to block the election of Allende as president. The “other” candidacy corresponds to the Radical Party, which originally was to be supported by Conservatives and Liberals. For this reason, we do not include it as being of the “center” as we have done with the other radical candidates.

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2. We have not taken the 2013 election into consideration because since 2012 precise voting data by sex are not available. This is because the old division between male and female voting precincts was abolished. 3. See Hinojosa and Franceschet (2012) for a more detailed analysis of this point. 4. We restricted the analysis to local council elections, as there have been direct and separate elections of mayors only since 2001. Moreover, data from the council elections are more useful, since they are the only ones in which the parties compete across the national territory.

References Eltit, D. 1994. Crónica del sufragio femenino. Santiago: Sernam. Errazuriz, J. 2005. Discursos en torno al sufragio femenino en Chile 1865–1949. Historia 38 (2): 257–286. Gaviola, E., X. Jiles, L. Lopresti, and C. Rojas. 1984. Queremos votar en las próximas elecciones. Historia del movimiento femenino chileno, 1913–1952. Santiago: Centro de Estudios de la Mujer. Hinojosa, M., and S. Franceschet. 2012. Separate But Not Equal: The Effects of Municipal Electoral Reform on Female Representation in Chile. Political Research Quarterly 65 (4): 758–770. Huneeus, J. 1879. La Constitución ante el Congreso. Santiago: Imprenta los Tiempos. INE. 2010. Compendio Estadístico. http://www.ine.cl/canales/menu/publicaciones/compendio_estadistico/pdf/2010/1.2estdemograficas.pdf. Accessed 13 Dec 2015. Inglehart, R., and P. Norris. 2000. The Developmental Theory of Gender Gap: Women’s and Men’s Voting Behavior in Global Perspective. International Political Science Review 21 (4): 441–463. Kirkwood, J. 1986. Ser Política en Chile. Las feministas y los partidos políticos. ­Santiago: FLACSO. Lewis, P. 2004. The ‘Gender Gap’ in Chile. Journal of Latin American Studies 36 (4): 719–742. López, M., and R. Gamboa. 2015. Sufragio Femenino en Chile: origen, brecha de género y estabilidad, 1935–2009. Revista de Estudios Sociales 53: 124–137. Maza, E. 1995. Catolicismo, Anticlericalismo y la extensión del sufragio a la mujer en Chile. Estudios Públicos 58: 137–195. Maza, E. 1998. Liberales, radicales y la ciudadanía de la mujer en Chile: 1872–1930. Revista de Estudios Públicos 69: 319–356. Ministerio del Interior. 1925. Actas Oficiales de las Sesiones celebradas por la Comisión y Subcomisiones encagadas del Estudio del Proyecto de Nueva Constitución Política de la República. Santiago: Imprenta Universtaria. PNUD. 2014. Auditoría a la Democracia. Más y mejor democracia para un Chile inclusivo. Santiago: PNUD. Ramírez, F., Y. Soysal, and S. Shanahan. 1997. The Changing Logic of Political Citizenship: Cross National acquisition of Women’s Suffrage Rights, 1890 to 1990. American Sociological Review 62: 735–745. Rodríguez-Ruiz, B., and R. Rubio-Marín. 2012. Introduction: Transition to Modernity, the Conquest of Female Suffrage and Women’s Citizenship. In The Struggle for Female Suffrage in Europe: Voting to Become Citizens, ed. B. Rodríguez and R. Rubio, 1–46. Brill: Leiden and Boston.

CHAPTER 7

Colombia: Civil Conflict, Violence, and Women’s Political Participation Juliana Restrepo Sanín

Compared to other countries in Latin America, Colombia was late in granting women the right to vote. The first country in the region to adopt universal suffrage was Uruguay, which granted this right in 1927. In 1929, Ecuador and Puerto Rico followed. Most countries approved women’s suffrage between the 1930s and early 1950s. Women’s voting rights were granted in Colombia only in 1954 and under unusual circumstances, namely the military dictatorship of Lieutenant Colonel Gustavo Rojas Pinilla. It is remarkable that Colombia occupies this second-to-last place in Latin America, given that the Constitution of the Province of Velez, one of the country’s regions, granted women the right to vote in 1853. This Constitution explicitly said that all inhabitants in the province had the right to vote “without distinction based on sex” (Velásquez Toro 1995, p. 175). These were the first women to gain the right to vote in Latin America. However, women in Velez did not exercise their suffrage at the time, for reasons that are unclear. Women’s right to vote in Velez was rescinded when this Constitution was nullified in 1854 or 1855 (Aguilera Peña 2003; Villareal Reyes 1995). The definitive recognition of women’s right to vote and be elected was possible after several years of struggle by a few small women’s organizations who mobilized and pressured members of the two political parties to grant women full citizenship. These associations were organized mainly in the

J. Restrepo Sanín (*)  Josef Korbel School of International Studies, Denver, CO, USA J. Restrepo Sanín  One Earth Future, Broomfield, CO, USA © The Author(s) 2019 S. Franceschet et al. (eds.), The Palgrave Handbook of Women’s Political Rights, Gender and Politics, https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-137-59074-9_7

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largest cities in a country that, back in the 1930s and 1940s, was still mostly rural. The women who worked in these groups were largely middle and upper middle class and educated. Many were school teachers and came from families with a history of political activism, mostly from Liberal and Socialists circles but a few also from more conservative circles (Restrepo 2011). This chapter analyzes the Colombian campaign in support of women’s voting rights and political participation. The largest mobilization happened in the late 1930s and 1940s, with a boost following the end of World War II. This was a tumultuous period of Colombian history, with increasingly polarized partisan politics and attempts to destabilize electoral politics. One of the most important events in Colombia’s history happened in the midst of the women’s suffrage debate: the assassination of Liberal presidential candidate, Jorge Eliecer Gaitan, on April 9, 1948. This event, known as the Bogotazo, worsened the already turbulent and violent relationship between the two main political parties, the Liberals and the Conservatives, and started what is simply known in Colombia as La Violencia (The Violence). This context framed many of the arguments and attitudes in favor of and against women’s political rights. In the end, women’s suffrage in Colombia was only possible as part of an attempt to pacify the country and create an environment of clearer political and electoral rules that would, at least in theory, put an end to the violence. After analyzing the process to guarantee women’s right to vote, the chapter discusses the current state of women’s political participation, both as voters and as candidates and elected officials. The analysis focuses on how political parties promote women’s participation and reach out to women using gender-sensitive agendas, as well as identifies some difficulties women face when exercising their political rights, framing all these discussions is Colombia’s recent history of civil conflict. After the Bogotazo, guerrilla groups formed in the 1960s, including the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (Fuerzas Armadas Revolucionarias de Colombia, FARC), and right-wing paramilitary groups and mafias appeared in the late 1970s and 1980s. The presence of these groups and the state’s fight against them has had a deep impact on electoral politics in the country. This struggle shaped the design of the 1991 Constitution and continues to impact political participation, from voters’ access to the ballot boxes to regions plagued with electoral fraud to the recent referendum on the peace accord with the FARC. The presence of armed actors, consequently, has had a profound impact in Colombian women’s political participation.

Women’s Struggle for Full Citizenship Women in Colombia have organized and participated politically since independence, with several women, such as Manuela Sáenz de Santamaría and Policarpa Salavarrieta, playing key roles in those processes. However, ­women’s right to vote, along with other rights, was excluded from those struggles.

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Aside from the already mentioned Velez Constitution, the recognition of many women’s rights was only achieved in the early twentieth century. In 1932, women gained the right to own their property after marriage and in 1934, the right to access higher education (Restrepo 2011). However, Colombian women were forced to continue organizing and lobbying members of Congress to demand their right to equal citizenship. In 1944, after a female lawyer was rejected in her quest to become a judge, feminist women in Colombia created the Colombian Women’s Federation (Union Femenina de Colombia, UFC) to promote women’s rights (Luna and Villareal Reyes 2012). This organization was composed of middle class and upper class educated women. Many were affiliated with the Liberal Party and therefore had connections with party members, some of whom publicly supported women’s right to vote. A second organization, the Women’s Alliance (Alianza Femenina) was created in 1945 with the specific purpose of “bringing all Colombian women together around the common goal of getting full citizenship and rights” (Luna and Villareal Reyes 2012, p. 102). This organization was closer to socialist sectors but attempted to attract women from all ideologies. These two organizations relied on media specifically directed at women to gather support for women’s right to vote. The magazine Agitación Femenina, edited by Ofelia Uribe and the radio show, Sutilezas, were created by leaders of the UFC. They also had the support of the editors of Letras y Encajes, the most important women’s magazine in Colombia at that time. Although it had a conservative editorial line, Letras y Encajes was very vocal in its support for women’s suffrage, especially in the 1940s when almost every issue of the magazine included articles about why women should be granted the right to vote (Fonturvel 1942; Restrepo 2011). These magazines engaged the debates that were happening regarding the vote and confronted the arguments against it, at a time when none of the political parties openly supported women’s right to vote. The Liberals opposed it based on the argument that women would vote for whomever their priests or husbands told them, bolstering support for the Conservatives (Villareal Reyes 1995). The Conservatives, in contrast, did not openly discuss women’s suffrage. Arguments from authorities in the Catholic Church suggested, however, that if women were given the right to vote, they would leave their homes unattended and would become brusque and rude “like men” (Velásquez Toro 1995). Such behaviors went against traditional conceptions of women’s roles, as well as the idea that the public sphere belongs to men while women are “queen of their home” (Restrepo 2011). From this perspective, women’s “invasion” of the public space would wreak havoc in Colombian society (Reyes 1996). Another argument against granting women the right to vote was that women did not have the “mental capacity” to vote. Such claims later morphed into suggestions that women were simply not educated enough to participate in politics (Restrepo 2011). Similar to suffragettes in other countries, who

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faced analogous arguments, suffrage activists in Colombia quickly pointed out that some women were, in fact, better prepared to vote than some men who could not even read. Women also noted that as educators of the “men of tomorrow,” they should have a say in education, family, and health policy. Moreover, they suggested, women were better positioned to understand the needs of women, children, and families. This, in turn, made it even more necessary to grant women this right. As one suffrage campaigner wrote in an essay appearing in Letras y Encajes: I truly cannot find today any real reason to keep [the right to vote from], for example, mothers or widowers who are in charge of their children’s education, putting up with the burdens and responsibilities of this task, women, who, without having a voice or a vote in [city] councils, suffer from the laws made by men, and every day put up with those laws that have not been created to make their tasks easier or to protect them. (Sarcey 1929, p. 526)

Opponents never directly addressed this argument, but, rather, continued implying that, based on Catholic doctrine, women’s place was in the home (Restrepo 2011). Women found important supporters in some recognized personalities of Colombian political life. After the end of World War II, media outlets associated with the Liberals came out in favor of women’s right to vote, arguing that it was a sign of modernity and progress. Women, they argued, would bring much-needed political renewal and would contribute to the reconstruction of the world and the pacification of the country (El Diario, 21 August 1945). The end of the war also transformed the Catholic Church’s position regarding women’s suffrage. Pope Pious XII called attention to the need to grant women the right to vote so that they would become the defenders of Christian values against Communism. This position was supported by Conservatives in the country. However, when a Conservative government was elected in 1950, women were once again denied equal citizenship. Broad debates regarding women’s right to vote were, for the most part, limited to suffrage, with little mention of women’s right to be elected. Women’s magazines and sections in newspapers, however, discussed the possibility of women occupying elected and unelected public offices. These discussions were framed in terms of women’s traditional roles in the home, suggesting, for example, that the education and health ministries be given to women. Other discussions centered on whether women should organize their own political party, although this ultimately led to the conclusion that women should align with the two traditional parties (Restrepo 2011). One notable contribution to these debates came from a well-known female journalist who published a weekly column in the Liberal newspaper, El Diario. She proposed that political offices, including elected positions,

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should be divided into thirds: one given to the Conservatives, one to the ­Liberals, and one to women (Restrepo 2011). This position is remarkable given that, at that time, there were no discussions about gender quotas or reserved seats of any type. Her proposal was never discussed as were many others made by women since, for the most part, politicians and political parties considered politics to be “a men’s issue.” Women were not supposed to discuss these topics, nor should they be paid attention to when they did. The Bogotazo increased the partisan violence in the country to unimaginable levels. Gruesome, violent massacres, especially in the rural areas, became part of everyday life, and political and religious leaders used their positions to incite violence against their political rivals (Acevedo 2003). During this time, the debates regarding women’s right to vote were suspended (Restrepo 2011). To pacify the country, the two main parties supported the dictatorship of Lieutenant Colonel Rojas Pinilla in 1954. The Lieutenant Colonel convened a Constitutional Assembly and included two women as members: Esmeralda Arboleda and Josefina Valencia. These women presented a bill to grant women the right to vote, which was approved by the Assembly on August 25, 1954, as Legislative Act No. 3 (Luna 2001; Reyes 1996). Rojas Pinilla, importantly, was not a particular supporter of women’s rights. However, the Constitutional Assembly experienced both domestic and international pressures to support the suffrage legislation. On the one hand, women’s organizations were more actively lobbying members of the Assembly. On the other hand, international organizations, including the United Nations and the Organization of American States (OAS), of which Colombia was a founding member, emphasized the importance of women’s political rights. Indeed, the Inter-American Commission on Women—part of the OAS structure—was created in 1928 with the purpose of promoting women’s rights in the Americas. By 1954, only Colombia and Paraguay had not granted suffrage to women. As other countries in the region had “survived” even after women had gained the right to vote, there were no more arguments against the vote that could stand up to closer scrutiny (Villareal Reyes 1995). Despite women having gained the right to vote, they could not exercise it, as all political rights were suspended during the dictatorship of Rojas Pinilla. Moreover, the Lieutenant Colonel did not make any efforts to increase the number of women holding national identity cards that would allow them to vote should elections be held (Registraduría Nacional de Estado Civil 2012). The dictatorship lasted until 1957 when the Liberals and Conservatives agreed to share power to curtail the political violence. This political agreement, the National Front (Frente Nacional), was approved by voters in a plebiscite on December 1, 1957 (Acevedo 2003). The plebiscite also asked citizens to vote in favor or against women’s suffrage. In total, nearly two million women (nearly 42% of all of those who voted) cast their ballots, and the plebiscite was approved (Morales 2016).

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After the plebiscite passed, there were renewed calls by progressive women to include women in political decision-making. Femina, the pseudonym of Migdonia Baron, who was one of the most widely recognized and read female journalists with a weekly column in the Liberal newspaper, El Diario, wrote: There are issues in which women’s intervention is necessary. Let’s say, for example, things related to education, hygiene, charity, the national standard of living; the protection of children; part of the work regime -because many women are blue-collar workers.- Issues related to social security and pensions; youth crime, justice issues, administration; the protection of life; good name. All these issues affect men and women equally, so women have to dedicate attention and time to study them with authority and conscientiousness. (Fémina 1957)

Although the Liberal Party had created a women’s section days before women were granted the right to vote, there was no real interest from this party, or the Conservative Party, to include women in leadership positions or as candidates for elected offices. Even in progressive circles, women’s political participation was seen as secondary to their roles as wives and mothers (Restrepo 2011).

Women’s Representation After the Vote The approval of women’s suffrage did not grant women full participation in politics, however, and women’s participation in elected office in Colombia remains low to this day. This is even more evident when compared to other countries in the region. Currently, the Senate has 30% women and the Chamber of Deputies only 15.1%—statistics which compare unfavorably with the regional average of 28% (IPU 2018). There is no extensive data regarding women’s political participation after they were granted the right to vote. When Lieutenant Colonel Rojas Pinilla approved Legislative Act No. 3, he granted women the right to vote. However, the Constitutional Assembly did not change the article regarding the right of women to have a national identity card. Thus, although women could vote—which was paradoxical, in any case, in a dictatorship—they could not be elected or appointed to political office because they lacked this document (Registraduría Nacional de Estado Civil 2012). After the return to democracy in 1958, very few positions were subject to election. All local and state-level executives were appointed. Until 1994, the percentage of women in the Chamber and the Senate remained below 10%. By 1997, the percentage of women in the Chamber reached 11.7%, and in the Senate, it remained at a mere 6.9% (IPU 2017). At this time, Colombia had a similar share of women in parliament as the other countries in the region. The country began to fall behind, however, as other states started to

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adopt gender quotas and parity laws despite the 1991 Constitution, granting women equal rights with men in access to public administration and political parties (Wills Obregón 2007). In the late 1980s, diverse groups started to push the government for a constitutional change. The 1886 Constitution, governing the country at the time, was perceived as outdated, did not recognize many human rights, and gave extraordinary power to the state and the armed forces, which in turn legitimized the force used by illegal armed groups (Ramírez and Muñoz 2011). Pressures for reform increased after the assassination of a magistrate and three presidential candidates by the mafia in 1989. A group of students started to promote a referendum known as the “Seventh Ballot” (Séptima Papeleta), asking Colombians whether they wanted a new Constitution. Four out of the eight students who promoted this vote were women (Semana 2016a). Even though this referendum was non-binding, it started a larger movement to support a new Constitution. A Constitutional Assembly was formed in 1991, and the new Constitution was approved that same year. However, despite women’s prominent presence in the movement for a new Constitution, only four of the 68 members of the Constituent Assembly were female (Ramírez and Muñoz 2011). The 1991 Constitution recognized many social and political rights and eliminated the power of the Catholic Church in political decision-making. It also recognized the rights of ethnic and racial minorities, along with the rights of self-determination and freedom of religion. Article 13 states that the state must promote real and effective equality for marginalized groups. Article 40 explicitly mentions women’s political participation, stating that “Authorities must guarantee the adequate and effective participation of women in decision-making in public administration.” However, the Constitution also provides that political parties are autonomous entities and that the state does not have a right to meddle in their internal affairs. Although the 1991 Constitution recognized women’s equality, the number of women in elected political positions did not increase after its approval. Given the low numbers of women in politics, a quota law—establishing a minimum of 30% women on candidate lists, as well as for executive positions in public administration—was proposed and adopted in 1998 (Law 581). Importantly, it did not establish placement mandates or sanctions for non-compliance. In 2001, the Supreme Constitutional Court declared the quota unconstitutional because it restricted party autonomy (Piscopo 2015; Wills Obregón and Cardozo García 2010). The numbers for state and local offices have been consistently low as well. By 1994, women served as only 55 of the 1012 mayors across the country, a mere 5%. By 1998, this number was 65 (6%), and by 2002, this number was 76 (7%). The numbers are even worse for governors. In 2001, out of 32 governors, only one was a woman. By 2015, this number had only increased to 5 (16%) (Mesa de Género de la Cooperación Internacional 2016).

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Regarding local and state legislatures, women constituted 5.2% of city councils in 1993. This number increased to 10.3% in 1997, 13.79% in 2007, 17.8% in 2011, and 16.6% in 2015 (Mesa de Género de la Cooperación Internacional 2016; Wills Obregón 2007). Similar patterns can be seen in state assemblies. In 1997, women were only 5.6% of state Assembly members. The number increased to 6% in 2007 and 18.8% in 2016 (Mesa de Género de la Cooperación Internacional 2016). These data are even more disheartening when analyzing the number of women who vote. In the 1958 plebiscite, fewer women than men turned out to vote. This pattern is not surprising, given that many women did not have the identification card needed to be able to vote (Registraduría Nacional de Estado Civil 2012). However, over the past decade, women have constituted the majority of the voters. Currently, women are 52% of all registered voters (Registraduría Nacional de Estado Civil 2012). Moreover, they exercise this right at greater rates than their male counterparts. Surveyed in 2006, for example, 41% of women reported they voted in the previous election while only 33% of men did so. Asked about their voting activity more generally, 30% of women said that they always voted, compared to 26% of men; 16% of women responded that they sometimes voted, while only 14% of men said so; and only 6% of women reported they did not vote (DANE 2007). Despite the first quota law being overturned in 2001 by the Supreme Constitutional Court, a new quota law was passed in 2011. This new quota was possible by a constitutional amendment that “redefined political parties as essential components of the democratic state,” forcing them to function under constitutional principles (Piscopo 2015). Law 1475 established a 30% quota law on electoral lists for legislative offices at every level of government. Although this law helps protect and guarantee women’s political participation, elections in 2014 did not raise women’s representation to 30%: Only 20.9% of Members of Congress are women. This number remains so low that the Electoral Observation Mission of the OAS that year determined that complementary mechanisms were needed to achieve parity. Among the measures suggested by the Mission were alternation, public financing of women’s campaigns, and implementation of effective sanctions for non-compliance (OAS 2014).

Political Parties and Women’s Political Participation As in other countries (Caul 1999; Sanbonmatsu 2002), political parties place significant barriers in the way of women’s political participation in Colombia. Although they have a constitutional mandate to include women in the electoral lists, most parties fail to actively promote women’s equality—on both their electoral lists and the policies they promote. During the discussions regarding a political reform in 2003, women’s organizations had lobbied political parties to include the adoption of gender quotas. However, even though some parties approved of this measure, it was not included in the final proposal (Wills Obregón and Cardozo García 2010). In fact, this reform

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created additional obstacles to women’s political participation by eliminating the possibility that parties could present several lists at the same time, in turn increasing competition within political parties (Wills Obregón and Cardozo García 2010). The same political reform also promoted the creation of caucuses within Congress. As a result, a women’s caucus (Bancada de Mujeres) was created in 2006 with the 26 Congresswomen and Senators elected that year. This coalition was comprised of women from different parties and had the purpose of promoting women’s interests. The Bancada proposed a bill to address violence against women (Law 171 of 2006) and to increase protective measures for women who were victims of acid attacks (Law 239 of 2012) (Congreso Visible 2013; Wills Obregón and Cardozo García 2010). The women’s caucus also promoted the creation of the Legal Commission for Women’s Equality in Congress to analyze legislative proposals and suggest recommendations to improve gender equality (Guzmán Rodríguez et al. 2013). International organizations and NGOs in Colombia developed a campaign called “More women, more democracy” (Más mujeres, más Democracia) in 2005. This campaign had the purpose of promoting women’s political participation. Parties signed an agreement in support of the campaign, but the campaign was ultimately not successful as a standalone measure (Wills Obregón and Cardozo García 2010). For the 2006 elections, political parties only included 18% women on their electoral lists. This slow progress was not surprising, given that most political parties rarely promote women to leadership positions in their organizations—even when they adopt policies to this effect. The Political Parties Gender Equality Ranking developed by the Mesa de Género de la Cooperación Internacional, a group of international organizations working in Colombia, found that the average of women in national leadership positions within political parties was 18% in 2012. For administrative positions, which are much less powerful and prestigious, this figure was 38.82%. Perhaps the most striking pattern is in the Liberal Party which, despite establishing a 30% quota law for leadership positions (Mina 2013), has no women on the party’s national executive committee. Out of 26 members of the Conservative Party’s national executive committee, only eight are currently women. Similarly, the governing National Unity Party has only five women out of 22 national executive committee members. One of the opposition parties, the Polo Democratico Alternativo, has only seven women among its 33 committee members. The other opposition party, the Democratic Center, establishes that at least one woman must be part of the national, regional, and local committees. Closer analysis reveals, however, that besides the women’s representative, the other women among the board occupy administrative positions, such as accountant or secretary.1 Although political parties are required by law to designate part of their budget for activities related to women’s leadership, many parties do not comply with these regulations. The law mandates that a minimum of 5% of the budget be spent on such activities, but the average for all parties is only 2%.

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Parties like Afrovides, the Indigenous Authorities of Colombia (Autoridades Indígenas de Colombia, AICO), Polo Democratico, and the Green Party do not apply any part of their budget to women’s leadership. The governing National Unity Party only assigns 0.1% (Mina 2013). Together with shortcomings in quota implementation, these patterns show lacking enforcement of complementary policies to increase women’s political participation.

Access to the Polls in a Context of Political Violence The study of voting behavior in Colombia has not been consistent. There are only a few research studies that analyze particular elections without trying to find larger, overtime patterns. Moreover, these studies tend to look at voters as a homogeneous block, and most do not have data segregated by sex, race, ethnicity, or region. This vacuum makes it harder to analyze voting behavior and access to the polls. However, it is clear that the context of political violence in which women’s right to vote was granted continues and still influences political behavior in Colombia today. Ortegón (2010) hypothesizes that one of the mechanisms interfering with voter turnout is the presence of armed groups, which have been found to pressure voters to abstain or vote for a particular candidate. The armed conflict, even in the absence of direct pressures, may also generate dissatisfaction with the democratic institutions, affecting turnout. Research has found that being a victim of violence reduces the probability of voting by 42% (Ortegón 2010). The National Unit for Victims in Colombia has determined that men and women are equally likely to be victims of violence. However, women between 18 and 50 years of age are more likely than men of the same age to be victims. This pattern is significant, given that this age range coincides with the largest share of women voters (USAID, n.d.). Besides the potential of violence affecting women’s right to vote, the armed conflict has affected women’s rights as elected officials. Presidential candidate Ingrid Betancourt and her vice presidential pick, Clara Rojas, were kidnapped by the FARC in 2002 while they were campaigning. Former senator Piedad Cordoba was also kidnapped by paramilitary groups due to her political activity (Semana 2016b). Although men in politics have also been victims of violence, these cases are remarkable given women’s low political participation: Betancourt’s slate was the first time in which both the presidential and vice presidential candidates were female. Besides these two high-profile cases, women in elected office increasingly report more incidents of violence. Research results suggest that women at all levels of government are harassed and persecuted because they are perceived as transgressors in the male world of politics (Krook and Restrepo Sanin 2016). A recent study by the Netherlands Institute for Multiparty Democracy found that among 166 women elected to legislative positions at all levels of government, 70% of them had been victims of some form

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of violence (Restrepo Sanin 2016). The most common type of violence was symbolic violence, including silencing women during sessions, restricting or impeding their right to speak, the denial or concealment of information necessary to do their jobs, and false accusations of corruption. Women politicians also reported receiving death threats against themselves or their families. Women also had restricted access to economic resources provided by the political parties to all candidates, even though the state mandates that part of the budget must be given to women. Importantly, the perpetrators of this violence are not illegal guerrillas or paramilitaries. Most of the women in the survey reported that the perpetrators were members of the same party, and in 47% of the cases, it involved colleagues from the same institutions in which they worked (Restrepo Sanin 2016). Along with resistance to comply with gender quotas, these patterns suggest that political parties still refuse to accept the inclusion of women in the political sphere and to adopt effective strategies to achieve parity in decision-making.

Conclusions The struggle for women’s political rights in Colombia has been affected by the civil conflict that has shaken the country since the mid-twentieth century. Women gained the right to vote during a military dictatorship supported by both political parties in an effort to pacify the country. The return to democracy meant not only the ratification of this right but also the first time that women were allowed to vote. The first time women voted, they were 41% of the voters. This share, however, has increased over time, such that today women are 52% of the voters. After women gained full political citizenship, the struggle has been focused on increasing their descriptive representation. The number of women in elected office has been historically low. The 1991 Constitution gave women some tools to push for further gender equality in political rights by making the state responsible for guaranteeing women’s access to public office in equal conditions as men; yet, the country still lags compared to its neighbors. The 1998 quota law was declared unconstitutional by the Supreme Constitutional Court, regarding its application to elections—although it continued to apply for non-elected positions within the government. The political reform approved in 2003 strengthens political caucuses in Congress and supported the creation of a women’s caucus with the purpose of advancing women-friendly public policy and increasing women’s political participation. This caucus has been effective in promoting some legislation in favor of women, but it has not been able to achieve substantive increases in women’s political participation at all levels of government. A new gender quota law was approved in 2011. This quota established a minimum of 30% women for all electoral lists in which more than five seats are to be elected. The quota has only increased the number of women to

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22%—still five points below the regional average of 27%. Women’s numbers also remain low for other elected offices, especially executive positions. The presence of armed forces, both legal and illegal, has affected the development of electoral processes throughout the country. In the past, women politicians have been kidnapped, armed groups pressure voters—both men and women—to vote for a particular candidate, and there are significant regions of the country at risk of electoral crimes. Consequently, a new phenomenon is starting to be recognized: violence against female politicians. This problem affects the work of elected and appointed women at all levels of government. It also represents a significant barrier to women’s political participation and an affront to women’s political rights in a country with already low levels of women in politics. Ensuring that women are safe—both as voters and as candidates and elected and appointed officials—remains a challenge for the Colombian government, even as the armed conflict formally ended. Doing so is in their interests, however, as guaranteeing women’s political rights is not only beneficial to women but also strengthens democracy and electoral processes.

Note 1. All this information was obtained through each party’s web site.

References Acevedo, Dario. 2003. Prensa y confrontación política en Colombia: 1930–1950. In Medios y nación: historia de los medios de comunicación en Colombia, ed. Ministerio de Cultura. Bogotá: Editora Aguilar. Aguilera Peña, Mario. 2003. Por primera vez, la mujer tuvo derecho a votar en 1853, 150 años de la Constitución de la provincia de Vélez. Revista Credencial Historia, July. http://www.banrepcultural.org/revista-70. Accessed 15 Oct 2017. Caul, Miki. 1999. Women’s Representation in Parliament: The Role of Political Parties. Party Politics 5 (1): 79–98. Congreso Visible. 2013. Agenda legislativa tema de género del 17 al 19 de junio de 2013. Bogotá: Congreso Visible. http://www.congresovisible.org/agora/post/ agenda-legislativa-tema-de-genero-del-17-al-19-de-junio-de-2013/5304/. Accessed 15 Oct 2017. DANE. 2007. Encuesta de Cultura Política 2007. Informe de Resultados. Bogotá: Departamento Administrativo. http://www.dane.gov.co/files/investigaciones/ ecpolitica/informe_ECP_07.pdf. Accessed 29 Aug 2016. El Diario. 1945. “Vía libre para la acción.” Newspaper “El Diario”, suplement “Avanzada”, Agosto 21 de 1945. Medellin, Colombia, August 21. Fémina. 1957. La hora de la verdad para las colombianas. Newspaper Archive. Medellin, Colombia, December 5. Fonturvel, B. 1942. La mujer y el voto. Magazine “Letras y Encajes” 16: 6027–6030. Medellin, Colombia.

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Guzmán Rodríguez, Diana Esther, and Silvia Cristina Prieto Dávila. 2013. Participación política de las mujeres y partidos. Posibilidades a partir de la reforma política de 2011. Bogotá: DeJusticia. http://www.dejusticia.org/files/r2_actividades_ recursos/fi_name_recurso.600.pdf. IPU. 2018. Women in National Parliaments Statistical Archive. Interparliamentary Union. http://archive.ipu.org/wmn-e/classif.htm. Accessed 8 July 2016. Luna, Lola G. 2001. El logro del voto femenino en Colombia: la violencia y el maternalismo populista, 1949–1957. Boletín americanista 51: 81–94. Luna, Lola G., and Norma Villareal Reyes. 2012. Movimientos de mujeres y participación política: Colombia del siglo XX al siglo XXI. Bogotá: Gente Nueva. Mesa de Género de la Cooperación Internacional. 2016. Las Muejeres en el poder político local. El Tiempo, February 28. Accessed 29 Aug 2016. Mina, Lucía. 2013. Ranking de Igualdad de Mujeres y Hombres en los Partidos Políticos. Bogotá: Mesa de Género de la Cooperación Internacional en Colombia. http://moe.org.co/home/doc/moe_nacional/2013/Informes%20Mujeres/cartilla_ranking.pdf. Morales, Cindy. 2016. El día en que Colombia votó por primera vez en un plebiscito. El Tiempo, July 30. http://www.eltiempo.com/politica/gobierno/primer-plebiscito-en-colombia-y-primera-votacion-de-mujeres-en-el-pais/16651716. Accessed 20 Sept 2016. OAS. 2014. Base de datos de Misiones de Observación Electoral y Recomendaciones. Washington, DC: Organization of American States. http://www.oas.org/eomdatabase/about.aspx?lang=es. Ortegón, Mauricio. 2010. Conflicto armado y participación electoral en Colombia: El caso de la elección presidencial. Pléyade (5): 46–70. https://dialnet.unirioja.es/ servlet/articulo?codigo=3273798. Accessed 23 Sept 2016. Piscopo, Jennifer M. 2015. States as Gender Equality Activists: The Evolution of Quota Laws in Latin America. Latin American Politics and Society 57 (3): 27–49. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1548-2456.2015.00278.x. Ramírez, Eric, and Ana L. Muñoz. 2011. El poder constituyente y la carta de derechos en la Constitución Política de Colombia de 1991. Administración & Desarrollo 39 (54): 119–132. Registraduría Nacional de Estado Civil. 2012. Voto Femenino: Cuestión de Equidad de Género, p. 70. Bogotá: Registraduría Nacional de Estado Civil, December. http:// www.registraduria.gov.co/rev_electro/2012/rev_elec_dic/revista_diciembre2012. html#01. Accessed 29 Sept 2016. Restrepo, Juliana. 2011. Mujeres, prensa escrita y representaciones sociales de género en Medellín entre 1926 y 1962. MA thesis, Universidad Nacional de Colombia. Restrepo Sanin, Juliana. 2016. Aproximación a la Violencia Contra las Mujeres en Política en Colombia. Bogota: NIMD. Reyes, Catalina. 1996. La vida cotidiana en Medellín: 1890–1930. Bogotá: Colcultura. Sanbonmatsu, Kira. 2002. Political Parties and the Recruitment of Women to State Legislatures. Journal of Politics 64 (3): 791–809. Sarcey, I. 1929. Estados Generales del Feminismo. Magazine Letras y Encajes 3 (36): 596. Medellin, Colombia, July. Semana. 2016a. 25 años después de la Séptima Papeleta. Semana. http://www.semana.com/nacion/multimedia/25-anos-despues-de-la-septima-papeleta/421113-3.

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Semana. 2016b. Narváez, ¿tras el secuestro de Piedad Córdoba? Semana, March 18.  http://www.semana.com/nacion/articulo/narvaez-tras-secuestro-piedadcordoba/337256-3. USAID. n.d. Mujeres y Conflicto Armado. Bogotá: USAID, Unidad para la Atención de Víctimas, OIM. https://www.unidadvictimas.gov.co/sites/default/files/documentosbiblioteca/mujeres.PDF. Velásquez Toro, Magdala. 1995. Aspectos de la Condición Jurídica de la mUjer. In Las mujeres en la historia de Colombia, vol. 2, 3 vols., ed. Magdala Velásquez Toro, 173–182. Santafé de Bogotá: Consejería presidencial para la política social Grupo ed. Norma. Villareal Reyes, Norma. 1995. Mujeres y Espacios Políticos: Participación Política y Análisis Electoral. In Las mujeres en la historia de Colombia, vol. 2, 3 vols., ed. Magdala Velásquez Toro, 319–347. Santafé de Bogotá: Consejería presidencial para la política social Grupo ed. Norma. Wills Obregón, María E. 2007. Inclusión sin representación: La irrupción política de las mujeres en Colombia (1970–2000). Colección Vitral. Bogotá: Grupo Editorial Norma. Wills Obregón, María E., and Florentina Cardozo García. 2010. Los partidos colombianos y la representación de las mujeres (1990–2006). Colombia Internacional 71: 127–149.

CHAPTER 8

Mexico: The Long Road to Women’s Suffrage Gabriela Cano

Introduction Women in Mexico gained the right to vote in 1953 during the administration of Adolfo Ruiz Cortines. Articles 34 and 115 of Mexico’s Constitution were amended to give women the right to vote and to stand as candidates for federal, state, and municipal elections. Although universal suffrage had been enshrined in the 1917 Constitution, it has only included women since 1953. The movement that led to the 1953 amendment was led by Amalia de Castillo Ledón, a suffragette and experienced diplomat of considerable standing both in Mexico and abroad. Importantly, Castillo Ledón enjoyed the support of President Ruiz Cortines, who requested her help in organizing a signature-collection campaign and large-scale events at which female workers, campesinos, leaders, writers, and journalists could show their support for women’s suffrage (Cano and Vega 2016, pp. 108–109). The Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI)—the ruling party with full control over the electoral process—lent additional support, giving its political backing and organizational structure to these mass gatherings (Hernández Rodríguez 2016, p. 83). The numerous signatures collected and the large crowds of people at various events undermined objections to women’s suffrage, namely the lack of a collectively voiced demand for women’s right to participate in elections. Most countries in Latin America enfranchised women in the years immediately preceding or following the Second World War. Uruguay, Brazil, and Costa Rica were the first to do so, while Chile and Argentina were in the

G. Cano (*)  El Colegio de México, México, Mexico e-mail: [email protected] © The Author(s) 2019 S. Franceschet et al. (eds.), The Palgrave Handbook of Women’s Political Rights, Gender and Politics, https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-137-59074-9_8

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second wave. Strictly speaking, Mexico also belongs to the latter group, since it established women’s suffrage at the municipal level, the first level of government, since the end of 1946. The UN Charter, signed the previous year, explicitly established in its preamble equal rights for men and women. That explicit commitment was largely due to the intervention of Amalia de Castillo Ledón, who participated in the Chapultepec Conference where the Charter was drafted. The Mexican government showed a certain awareness of the UN’s declaration of equality yet still barred women from voting at the state and federal levels. At the municipal level, women’s suffrage was established with the amendment of Article 115 of the Constitution, at the initiative of President Miguel Alemán. Importantly, gendered ideas informed this decision: Women’s suffrage at the local level was justified by drawing comparisons between the municipality and the home. The similarities between the municipality and the home and family mean that women’s participation in municipal elections could be considered an extension of their duties as wives and mothers. Taking part in local elections was therefore not seen as eroding women’s feminine and maternal identity, but rather, as allowing women to enrich the life in the municipality by introducing into local government values practiced in the home (Cano 2006, pp. 547–548). This association between the municipality and the home had a depoliticizing effect on women’s electoral involvement, however. As an extension of the domestic responsibilities of mothers, wives, and daughters, the act of voting in municipal elections was not considered a genuinely political act. President Alemán omitted to mention the democratic justice inherent in the measure, and also overlooked the historical precedents of women’s suffrage, meaning that the constitutional amendment was presented as the government granting a privilege to Mexican women.

Post-revolutionary Mexico: Suffrage Delayed It seems paradoxical that Mexico, as the only Latin American country to live through a revolution in the early decades of the twentieth century, would also be one of the last to establish universal women’s suffrage. Although the social confusion and new political spaces opened up by the Mexican Revolution created opportunities to put women’s suffrage on the public agenda as a political demand, the revolutionary and post-revolutionary elites resisted giving women the right to vote. Women’s suffrage was resisted because the revolutionaries believed that women were more conservative and religious than men, and that enfranchising women would erode the revolution’s achievements. When it came to elections, women were expected to have voted against secularizing reforms that limited the Church’s influence on society, as instructed by the revolutionary government. Women’s suffrage was thus framed as posing a danger to education, labor, and agrarian reforms

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and even for the continuity of the revolutionary government itself. This stereotypical view of women as conservative actors in elections was so deeply entrenched that it effectively delayed women’s suffrage in Mexico by almost half a century. The winds of electoral change reached revolutionary Mexico from the USA, where the social movement in favor of giving white women the vote gathered strength with the First World War, which started in the midst of Mexico’s armed revolutionary movement. The issue stimulated enough interest to be discussed at the 1916 Feminist Congresses in Yucatán and at the Constitutional Congress in Querétaro, which ratified a new Political Constitution for Mexico in 1917. The Feminist Congresses in Yucatán were organized at the initiative of the revolutionary government of that Mexican state. Salvador Alvarado, the constitutionalist governor, assembled and funded these congresses in order to bring women teachers closer to his government in an effort to persuade them to provide secular education. For the revolutionary forces, the Catholic Church’s influence on society was a main obstacle standing in the way of progress and, therefore, the involvement of women school teachers as agents of secularization was an essential means of instilling secular values and a rational education among children and women. An agreement was reached at the end of the second congress to allow women’s suffrage, but only at the municipal level. The issue was controversial and most of the participants at the congress had doubts about women’s electoral involvement. However, this did not dissuade Hermila Galindo—the only women to form part of the constitutionalist elite and who consequently wielded a certain amount of influence on the Yucatán government—from taking advantage of the congresses to mount a strong defense of women’s equal suffrage as an act of democratic justice (1916 Primer congreso 1975, pp. 195–202). Galindo developed her argument on two levels. First, she focused on the equality of women’s individual rights based on principles of justice: As individuals and holders of rights, women were obliged to obey laws, pay taxes, and pay penalties in case they committed a crime; therefore, it was not only fair but right and just for them to enjoy the same rights as men to participate in the elections of their governors. The second aspect of Galindo’s argument drew on women’s role as mothers: Women’s responsibility for their children was another justification for suffrage. She argued that women had a twofold interest since their vote would help them protect their children and express their interest as individuals who formed a part of society. The dual nature of their interest gave extra power to the suffragettes’ cause. Opponents to women’s suffrage also expressed their opinions. Although they recognized the justness of the demand, they rejected women’s electoral participation due to concerns that women lacked the requisite education to vote with a proper understanding of the matters at hand, or to stand for election in a responsible fashion. The defenders of suffrage, on the other hand, disputed this by arguing that women would only begin to acquire awareness

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as citizens once they gained experience at the ballot boxes, and hence, it was essential for their right to be respected. The issue of women’s right to vote reached the 1916–1917 Constitutional Congress that drew up and ratified a new constitutional charter establishing agrarian property rights and recognizing important labor rights, such as the eight-hour workday, among other revolutionary measures. In regard to women, the Constitution promulgated pay equality, but rejected women’s suffrage. The refusal to give women the vote was decided without any significant argument because most members of the constituent assembly considered women’s suffrage to be undesirable and impractical in Mexico, apart from seeing the whole affair as laughable and ridiculous. The only argument explicitly advanced was the lack of collective movements in favor of women’s rights to vote (Diario de los debates 1960, vol. 2, p. 983). The fact that the issue was even on the agenda of the committees at the Constituent Congress at all was largely due to Hermila Galindo’s high-profile role in the Constitutionalist ranks. Galindo sent one of the three petitions received by the Constituent Congress. One of the other two petitions was in support of women’s suffrage, but the third, by Inés Malváez, opposed it. Malváez’s position was a strategic one. She argued that Mexico’s women lacked the necessary education to vote responsibly and to oppose the Church’s interests, and she therefore concluded that women should not enjoy the right to a vote. Inés Malváez was not the only figure to fear women’s support for the clergy and the counter-revolutionary effect of their vote. Indeed, her view was symptomatic of a widespread anxiety among the revolutionary and post-revolutionary political elites. This concern even came to influence defenders of women’s suffrage, such as Hermila Galindo, who took a more flexible approach and did not ask that all women be enfranchised, instead demanding the right to vote only for cultured, educated women who practiced a profession (Galindo 1917, pp. 239–240). Educational shortcomings affected both men and women, yet were considered an impediment only for women’s suffrage. Venustiano Carranza, the most powerful leader of the triumphant revolutionary faction, admitted that low levels of education posed a major obstacle to Mexican democracy. He wrote that excluding those without proper schooling from the right to vote might be reasonable but was unacceptable since the constitutional charter had its grounding in a popular movement. Carranza’s position was more a political stance than anything else, and women’s suffrage did not form a part of it. The revolutionary leader shared the contemporary view that women’s place was in the home and with the family, both of which were completely detached from the country’s electoral life. But not all politicians thought the same way: José Domínguez Garrido, for example, indicated that lack of education was not exclusive to women, but a widespread problem affecting men and women alike, making it unjustifiable that only women should be denied the right to vote (Ramírez Garrido 1918, pp. 47–48).

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Article 34 of the Constitution was drafted using the grammatical masculine gender, enshrining men’s exclusive right to participate in electoral processes. But this form of writing was ambiguous: By not explicitly including or excluding women, it could be interpreted as being inclusive. Indeed, Hermila Galindo read it that way when announcing her candidacy as deputy. The text’s ambiguity made it possible for Galindo to be accepted as a legal candidate for whom people could vote and who could occupy an elected position. Hers was an exceptional case, however, and her candidacy and campaign were only successful thanks to her membership in the revolutionary political elite. By contrast, women were not allowed to vote at the ballot boxes for the district in which Galindo was a candidate for a seat in Congress. The following year, a new electoral law was enacted that explicitly established that only men were allowed to participate in civil elections, thus slamming the door shut on inclusive interpretations of the electoral law, at least at those district and federal levels where the law applied. Opposition to women’s suffrage tended to be partial rather than total. Those opposing women’s right to vote did not reject it in absolutist terms; in other words, they did not stand against women’s suffrage on principle, but argued for the need to postpone it until such time as women gained a certain level of education. Another variant of this position was to restrict the vote to specific sectors of women, either to those women who espoused a progressive ideology, were literate, or had a minimum level of schooling. Both the delay and limitations to women’s vote were based on the conviction that women professed a deeper religious faith and were therefore more likely than men to follow the political lead of the clergy. Only the post-revolutionary governments in three Mexican states—San Luis Potosí, Tabasco, and Chiapas—brought in women’s suffrage, with or without limitations, in the mid-1920s, in the midst of an atmosphere of political radicalism and social experimentation. The three states in question had reformist governments who were putting into effect agrarian and anticlerical measures, as well as promoting women’s education and their inclusion in the salaried workforce, albeit maintaining the view that women’s main place of activity should be the home. Each of these states applied different specific measures in regard to women’s suffrage. In San Luis Potosí, the governor Rafael Nieto passed a decree giving the vote to women of legal age who would read and write; in Tabasco, Tomás Garrido Canabal determined that voting rights would only be granted to women of unquestioned moral standing, with socialist views and a sufficient level of culture—qualities not defined in the legislation and that sought to prevent conservative women from voting (Torres Vera 2001, pp. 120–121). Chiapas was different, however. Governor César Códoba established universal women’s suffrage without applying any restrictions at all (Osten 2007, pp. 3–5). The political elite in the southeast of Mexico, with its large indigenous population, did not seem to have taken on board the fear of women’s conservative vote.

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The reforms of San Luis Potosí and Tabasco proved short-lived because they were repealed when the governments responsible for adopting them were defeated by their opponents. In Chiapas, however, women retained their suffrage until the 1953 Constitutional Reform established their right to vote at all levels of government and throughout the country. Yet perceptions of women’s conservatism were bolstered following their visible participation in the Cristero uprising in the mid-1920s to reject the government’s secularist and anti-clerical reforms. The movement was based in the west of Mexico, and its supporters and collaborators included both men and women. However, the revolutionary elites considered that the greatest threat was posed by the ‘Cristeras’ rather than by the men who took up arms to fight for this cause, as if the mobilization of men would not have had the same or a higher intensity than that of women and as if the men’s religious fervor was somehow weaker than that of the women who participated in the Cristero war as messengers, spies, and by providing refuge for people on the run from the government forces. Later, women’s support for the presidential candidacy of José Vasconcelos further entrenched beliefs about women’s conservatism. In 1929, the Anti-Reelection Party (Partido Antireeleccionista), in opposition to the National Revolutionary Party (PNR), was established that same year in order to ensure that the handover of political power took place peacefully and without the use of weapons. Vasconcelos had been Rector of the National University and Minister of Public Education (SEP), achieving great successes in both positions before severing his ties with the government. His political platform included women’s suffrage, and some of the women teachers who had worked with him in the SEP were among his supporters and committed to secular education; they were not pious and carried out a number of political roles, yet they were still singled out as being anti-revolutionary. The fear of giving women the vote was such that even firm supporters of equality adopted a gradualist stance. Margarita Robles de Mendoza, a representative at the Inter-American Commission of Women and in 1929, Secretary of Women’s Action of the PNR, argued that granting women suffrage was unnecessary since education had to come before giving women electoral rights. The idea of women’s conservatism reemerged at the subsequent presidential elections when the opposition groups enjoyed support from women (Robles de Mendoza 1931, pp. 37–38). The issue of women’s suffrage entered the public debate during the presidency of Lázaro Cárdenas, from 1934 to 1940. The United Front for Women’s Rights (Frente Único-Pro Derechos de las Mujeres), an association of female workers and campesinos, pronounced their support of the right for women to vote, as did the Mexican Women’s Atheneum (Ateneo Mexicano de Mujeres), whose members included writers and journalists. With a supportive political climate for women’s voting rights, President Cárdenas submitted a

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draft reform bill for Articles 34 and 115 of the Constitution to Congress, which might have established universal suffrage for women in the late 1930s. The reform bill was passed by the Chamber of Deputies and the Senate, but it was never enacted due to the fear of conservatism being attributed to the women’s vote, and it suffered an unusual fate of not being published in Mexico’s official gazette, the Diario Oficial (Cano 2007, pp. 175–179). The public statements in support of suffrage did not prevent the Reform from being put on hold, in a highly irregular situation, given the fear that the women’s vote might shift the electoral balance in 1940 in favor of the opposition candidate. Of course, such an outcome was unlikely because the large organizations of female workers, campesinos, and members of the middle class were affiliated and subjected to the power of the ruling party, which maintained control over elections at every level. Even though it never entered into force, Lázaro Cárdenas’s constitutional reform stands out for its egalitarian premise, namely that women should enjoy the same rights as men. The reasoning makes no reference to maternity, women’s responsibilities in the home, or their specific contributions to electoral life, aspects present in most of the Mexican supporters of women’s right to vote (Cano 2007, pp. 171–174). The suffragette’s discourses, praising women’s traditional identity, gained momentum at the end of the Second World War. Dedication to home and family continued to be viewed as central to women’s lives, except that now female identity also included their participation in elections. Amalia de Castillo Ledón, Mexico’s top politician and diplomat in the mid-twentieth century, coined the term ‘feminine feminism’ as a way of defending women’s right to vote and to have a job outside the home, provided that they maintained their traditional femininity, which means treating men kindly and pleasing them with an attractive presence and an obliging attitude. The emphasis on the feminine meant the rejection of any personality trait or attitude that might be interpreted as masculine, ranging from an independent character to the lack of interest in marriage or motherhood. Women’s access to suffrage, politics, and professional occupations was considered acceptable as long as this did not jeopardize the priority that mothers and wives needed to give to the family (Cano and Vega 2016, p. 100). Mexican society was immersed in a process of modernization in the mid-twentieth century, but women’s suffrage was not always considered a desirable part of progress. When Adolfo Ruiz Cortines made a commitment to establish women’s suffrage in 1952, during his presidential campaign for the PRI, although the issue had gained a certain level of acceptance by that stage, women’s lack of electoral experience and education was still considered an obstacle for them being granted the right to vote.

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Women’s Electoral Participation Women participated for the first time in some state and federal elections in Baja California, a federal zone in Mexico’s northeastern border region with the USA that was constituted as a Mexican state in 1953, the same year in which women were granted suffrage. Aurora Jiménez de Palacios was elected as federal deputy and became the first woman to win a seat in the Chamber of Deputies. Women stood for elections in 1955, and four women federal deputies were elected in the 43rd Legislature. In common with Jiménez de Palacios, the first female federal deputies as well as the first female senators and the first female municipal president and the first female governor were candidates for the PRI. With the inclusion of the female population in 1958, the electoral roll increased by more than 50%. The electoral results proved that the political elite’s fears about women’s conservatism or pro-clerical tendencies were groundless. Indeed, it even appeared that women’s vote shored up the power of Mexico’s ruling party. Adolfo López Mateos, the PRI candidate, received more than 90% of the vote, compared to the 74% the party gained in the previous presidential election. Of course, women’s suffrage was not the only element that benefitted the PRI, as the party also had profited from the country’s sustained economic growth and stability (Zamarrón 2015, p. 20). The PRI’s discourse clearly targeted the female urban demographic, however, which was expanding rapidly thanks to the period’s economic growth and stability. While the ruling party insisted on women’s role in the home, the opposition parties, the Popular Party (PP), and the National Action Party (PAN) were engaged in a more political and modernizing discourse. The PP emphasized equal rights and duties for women, and the PAN invited them to participate in political activities organized by the opposition (Tuñón 2002, pp. 139–143). During that period, electoral competition was nonexistent or extremely limited since the organizational apparatus of the PRI as ruling party ensured its success at almost every level of government. Electoral positions were defined through political negotiations within the party, between worker and campesino groups as well as the general public, and internally within each one of these groups. Electoral processes were rituals in which the power of the PRI and the political system was renewed on a periodic basis. The most sustained opposition came from the PAN, set up in 1939 and developed from being a weak organization to winning elections in municipal contests in the mid-1980s and in state elections by the end of that decade. The PAN evolved out of opposition to the regime of Lázaro Cárdenas, bringing together members of the professional and middle classes, with its leaders coming from Catholic organizations before developing a closer relationship and eventually affiliating itself with the Christian Democratic movement. Noted for being a stalwart opposition party that represented the interests of a minority without challenging the political system, the PAN became a very important

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anti-authoritarian vehicle in the Mexican democratic transition (Loaeza 2010, pp. 157–195). The 1988 presidential federal elections marked a watershed in Mexico’s electoral history, because there was genuine competition for the first time. The PRI faced strong opposition and only won 54% of the vote, hardly a wide enough margin to stay in power. The election was fiercely contested, and although this did not change the final outcome, it did produce a powerful civil protest movement that sent a shock wave through the political system (Hernández Rodríguez 2016, pp. 186–187). It was the beginning of the period known as the democratic transition. The opposition political parties became stronger, and the government took measures to increase the reliability and transparency of electoral processes. One significant change was that the organization of the elections was no longer the remit of the Ministry of the Interior (Secretaría de Gobernación) but was placed under the control of an autonomous organization that drew up the electoral register, issued voter identifications, and received complaints and challenges to the results. Society’s expectations for change increased, meaning that the following presidential election had the highest voter turnout on record. The 1994 presidential election in Mexico saw a 77% turnout of voters on the electoral register. The PRI won the elections again, and it was only in 2000 that it lost to the PAN, terminating the period in which the PRI had controlled the federal executive branch, as well as a legislative majority and a majority of state governments—an era spanning more than 60 years in which the party ruled firstly as the National Revolutionary Party (PNR), followed by the Party of the Mexican Revolution (PRM), and finally as the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI). The PAN won the presidency in two successive elections, in 2000 and again in 2006, and remained in power for twelve years. In 2012, the PRI won back the presidency and the PAN reverted to being the opposition party, although it did secure wins in state and municipal elections. The Party of the Democratic Revolution (PRD) also achieved various electoral successes. Women have participated in every stage of the democratic transition, but most research has focused on candidacies, underlining difficulties faced by women when contesting an electoral position at the various levels of government, in a society in which politics continues to be codified as a male-­ dominated sphere. The role of women as voters, on the other hand, has been the subject of far fewer studies. Nevertheless, the available research has focused on some aspects of women’s role in elections, namely their participation at the ballot box and their party preferences, the patterns of women’s voting, and the similarities and differences to men’s voting. Generally speaking, the voting behavior of both men and women has been influenced by the same factors: level of education and involvement in the labor market, while ideological and religious values have not had a decisive impact. In other words, women’s support for the ruling party has not

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stemmed from a time-honored conservative tendency or a greater level of religious faith, but can be better explained by an analysis of structural factors (Torthon Granados 2013, p. 96). This refutes the conventional wisdom that women in Mexico are inclined to be more conservative. One study found that women were more inclined than men to vote for the ruling party in the federal presidential elections of 1994 and 2000. According to this view, women would have preferred the PRI to retain the presidency, since a larger proportion of women voted for the party than of men (Torthon Granados 2013, p. 97). The women’s vote has traditionally been a niche of the PRI. The greater level of identification of women with this party, however, declined between 2000 and 2006, the period in which Mexico had a president from the PAN. In this same interval, women began to identify more with the opposition party, the PRD. The realignment of women’s identification with a particular party was not an isolated phenomenon, but coincided with a reduction in political partisanship of the entire adult population as a whole, both among men and women. The same trend has been seen not only among those who went to the ballot boxes but also among those who abstained from voting (Moreno and Méndez 2007, pp. 62–64). Society’s modernization has increased women’s participation in political and electoral activities. One remarkable aspect of the 2012 presidential elections was that women participated more than men, by 8%: 66.08% of women on the electoral register cast their vote, as opposed to 57.77% of men. The most significant gap was found in the 30–39-year-old range. The overall turnout was just 62.8% of the electoral register (Vidal Correa 2015, p. 325). Despite an increase in electoral turnout among women, and the fact that most adult women—from the youngest to the oldest—decided for whom to vote, there are still habits that obstruct, or otherwise completely prevent, women from freely exercising their free right to suffrage. According to data from 2010, between 6.3 and 8.7% of women ask permission from their husbands or fathers to decide their vote, and this is more prevalent among women who speak an indigenous language (Survey on Discrimination 2010).

Challenges to Women’s Participation as Voters One of the conditions that has limited the vote of indigenous women derives from what is known in Mexico as ‘usos y costumbres’—a type of common law based on traditional practices—practiced in some communities with a deeply rooted identity and culture. In Mexico, indigenous communities have the right to decide on their forms of cohabitation, social, and economic organization. The Constitution recognizes their right to elect their representatives according to their customs, provided that this does not contravene any applicable national legislation. However, some communities in municipalities in the states of Oaxaca, Hidalgo, and Morelos have barred women in recent

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years from participating in elections based on these laws. For example, in the state of Oaxaca in 2012, a total of 417 municipalities were governed by ‘usos y costumbres’ and women were discriminated against in 12% of these; the others accepted their political participation. In Asunción Tlacolulita, women’s right to participate in community decisions was recognized only as recently as 1998 in a communal assembly. A different situation faces the municipality of Santiago Yaveo, where women have been discriminated against following the electoral results that were disputed in 2002 due to various kinds of irregularities. The elections were annulled and held again, in accordance with constitutional law (Luna Ramos 2013, pp. 195–2015; Dalton 2014, p. 316). One expression of the limitations facing women in some indigenous communities is found in the case of Eufrosina Cruz, whose electoral victory to become municipal president of Santa María Quiegolani was rejected on account of her gender. After official complaints were lodged, Cruz has since embarked on a political career that has led her to standing election for—and winning—a seat as a federal deputy representing the PAN. In the state of Hidalgo, the hñaahñus, also known as Otomis who have settled in the Valle del Mezquital, reject women’s participation in community decisions. This happens in the municipalities of Ixmiquilpan, Tasquillo, Nopala, Huichapan, and Chapantongo (Luna Ramos 2013). Men have the right to be heard and vote in community assemblies, in the understanding that they represent the women in their family. Widows or single mothers usually attend the assemblies, but are excluded from taking an active part and rarely have the right to be heard (Rivera Garay 2006, p. 256). Indigenous communities that exclude women from participating in decision-making are exceptions to the norm and located in specific regions. Of greater concern is the more general lack of interest in politics found throughout society and in all regions of Mexico. Indeed, high levels of apathy represent the most significant barrier facing the electoral participation of both women and men. This disinterest in political matters is slightly more prevalent among women than among men, because politics continues to be coded in Mexican culture as a masculine activity. The lack of trust in parties and in institutions has eroded women’s and men’s interest in participating in elections. The illegal misappropriation of funds, the personal enrichment of publicly elected politicians at every level of government, as well as problems with electoral integrity and transparency constitute significant challenges for Mexican democracy, affecting both men and women.

Conclusion Women’s suffrage was delayed in Mexico by fears among the political elite of women as conservative actors that would endanger the secularization of society and the education, labor, and agrarian reforms. The continuity of the ruling party would also be threatened. Women’s voting rights were extended in

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stages: first at the local level and then at the federal level. The local vote was a limited risk the political elite was willing to take in order to sustain the government’s modernizing image at a time when women’s suffrage gained momentum in the international arena. When women finally voted in presidential elections in 1958, their electoral behavior was similar to men’s. Fears of women’s conservatism proved ungrounded; their vote shored up the power of the ruling party that had strongly resisted women’s enfranchisement. The presidential elections of 1988 were a watershed in Mexican political history as there was electoral competition for the first time. Expectations for change fueled female and male voter turnout in the next presidential elections. However, such optimism was short-lived as lack of interest in politics soon extended throughout society, affecting both men and women. High levels of political apathy and the widespread distrust in political parties and elected government officials, increasingly tarnished by scandals of corruption, have become the greatest challenge for electoral participation of women (and of men) and indeed for the survival of a democratic government.

References 1916 Primer Congreso Feminista de México. 1975. México: Año Internacional de la Mujer. Cano, G. 2006. Debates en torno al sufragio y la ciudadanía de las mujeres en México. In Historia de las mujeres en España y América Latina, I. Morant, (dir.). Madrid: Cátedra Editores. Cano, G. 2007. Ciudadanía y sufragio: el discurso igualitario de Lázaro Cárdenas. In Miradas feministas sobre las mexicanas del siglo XX, M. Lamas (coord.). Mexico City: Fondo de Cultura Económica, CONACULTA. Cano, G., and P. Vega. 2016. Amalia González Caballero de Castillo Ledón: entre las letras, el poder y la diplomacia. Tamaulipas: Instituto Tamaulipeco para la Cultura y las Artes. Dalton, M. 2014. ¿Es la democracia apta para las mujeres? El caso de las presidentas municipales de Oaxaca. In 15 años de políticas de igualdad. Lo alcances, los dilemas y los retos, S. López Estrada, E. Maier, M. L. Tarrés, and G. Zaramberg (coords.). Mexico City: El Colegio de México, El Colegio de la Frontera, Facultad Latinoamericana de Ciencias Sociales. Diario de los Debates del Congreso Constituyente. 1960. 2 vols. México: Instituto Nacional de Revolución Mexicana. Encuesta Nacional sobre Discriminación en México. 2010. Mexico City: Consejo Nacional para Prevenir la Discriminación. http://www.conapred.org.mx/userfiles/ files/Enadis-2010-RG-Accss-002.pdf. Accessed 1 May 2017. Galindo, H. 2010. Petición hecha por nuestra directora al H. Constituyente sobre el derecho al voto de la mujer, 1917. In Sol de libertad, Hermila Galindo: feminista, constitucionalista y censora legislativa en México, ed. R. M. Valles Ruiz. Durango: Instituto de Cultura del Estado de Durango. Hernández Rodríguez, R. 2016. Historia mínima del Partido Revolucionario Institucional. Mexico City: El Colegio de México.

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Loaeza, S. 2010. Acción nacional. El apetito y las responsabilidades del triunfo. Mexico City: El Colegio de México, Centro de Estudios Internacionales. Luna Ramos, M. 2013. El voto de la mujer bajo el régimen de usos y costumbres en México. In Retos a 60 años de la aprobación del voto de las mujeres en México. Mexico City: Instituto Federal Electoral. Moreno, A., and P. Méndez. 2007. La identificación partidista en las elecciones presidenciales de 2000 y 2006. Política y gobierno XIV (1): 43–75. Osten, S. 2007. The Implications and Legacies of Chiapas 1925 Women’s Suffrage Decree. Revista Pueblos y fronteras digital II (3). https://doi.org/10.22201/cimsur.18704115e.2007.3.236. Accessed 1 May 2017. Ramírez Garrido, J.D. 1918. Al margen del feminismo. Mérida: Talleres Pluma y Lápiz. Rivera Garay, M.G. 2006. La negociación de las relaciones de género en el Valle del Mezquital: un acercamiento al caso de la participación comunitaria de las mujeres hñahñus. Estudios de Cultura Otopame V: 249–266. Robles de Mendoza, M. 1931. La evolución de la mujer en México. Mexico City: Self-Published. Torres Vera, T. 2001. Mujeres y utopía. Tabasco garridista. Mexico City: Universidad Juárez Autónoma de Tabasco. Torthon Granados, M.A. 2013. La brecha de género en las elecciones presidenciales en México. Revista Legislativa de Estudios Sociales y Opinión Pública VI (12): 73–100. Tuñón, E. 2002. ¡Por fin… ya podemos elegir y ser electas!. Mexico City: CONACULTA, Instituto Nacional de Antropología e Historia. Vidal Correa, F. 2015. La participación política en México: entendiendo la desigualdad entre hombres y mujeres. Revista Mexicana de Ciencias Políticas y Sociales LX (223): 317–355. Zamarrón, M.A. 2015. Un siglo de elecciones en México visto a través de las estadísticas. Examen, Año XXIV (243): 15–43.

CHAPTER 9

New Zealand: A Country of Firsts in Women’s Political Rights Jennifer Curtin

On 19th September 1893, New Zealand became the first country in world to give all women the right to vote.1 There were of course other territories where women had won the franchise earlier than this; Pitcairn Island gave women the vote in 1838, Wyoming in 1869 and Utah in 1870. Nevertheless, New Zealand, along with the colony of South Australia, was one of the pioneers of universal suffrage and a quarter of a century ahead of its “mother country” Britain. Volumes on women’s political rights usually acknowledge New Zealand as the first, but Nolan and Daley (1994) argue that for many years Australasian exceptionalism sat on the margins of suffrage histories. It was more common to focus on the sometimes violent struggles for the vote in the UK and the east coast of the USA. By contrast, the New Zealand story represents a peaceful, multifaceted incremental campaign, underpinned by liberal political ideals, settler egalitarian hopes and a desire for moral reform. With the centennial of women’s suffrage in New Zealand in 1993 came a proliferation of projects, programmes and publications, dedicated to documenting and celebrating the campaign and its success (Clement and Johnson 1992; MWA 1994; Smith 1993). A national conference, featuring renowned local and international feminist historians and political scientists, was held in Wellington. Attended by around 450 scholars and activists, the event included a reception at Government House, hosted by New Zealand’s first woman Governor General, Dame Catherine Tizard. Sixteen of the 54 papers presented were published in a comparative volume edited by Caroline Daley J. Curtin (*)  University of Auckland, Auckland, New Zealand e-mail: [email protected] © The Author(s) 2019 S. Franceschet et al. (eds.), The Palgrave Handbook of Women’s Political Rights, Gender and Politics, https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-137-59074-9_9

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and Melanie Nolan (1994), ensuring feminist histories of New Zealand and Australia featured alongside those of the USA, Britain and Europe.2 As such, the centenary moment resulted in considerable in-depth research into the history of women winning the right to vote, with new sources explored, old explanations refined and sometimes revised, and an increasing number of feminist actors identified as critical to the mobilization process. What becomes evident is that although the Women’s Christian Temperance Union (WCTU) was important in the process of political mobilization, liberal and radical equal rights’ campaigners had laid a foundation of support amongst parliamentarians and communities prior to the organization of the moral reformers (Page 1993). Moreover, although British feminism and the writings of John Stuart Mill were influential, there was also a form of “settler feminism” that drew on both liberal and traditional ideas of (Pākehā) womanhood in the new colony.3 Yet we still know relatively little about what women did with their vote prior to the advent of surveys; why, post-suffrage, it took so long for New Zealand women to win the right to stand for parliament (1919); and why it took until 1933 before the first woman was elected to parliament and until 1984 before the number of women parliamentarians reached double figures. We do know that although the campaign for the vote was quieter in New Zealand than elsewhere, the achievement of votes for all women was hardwon. The enfranchisement process, in the context of colonization, heightened Māori and settler women’s political interests, ultimately leading to high levels of turnout and a range of policy reforms that some have attributed to women entering the electorate.

Winning the Vote The settlement of the New World and the establishment of British colonies and self-governing states were not uniform in process. In the case of New Zealand, it is important to remember that although some Māori met the first British explorers in 1769, colonization took longer, with settlers (mostly “ordinary” Britons) arriving from the 1830s onwards. As such, New Zealand was being populated (predominantly) by Britons in a period when the Anti-Slavery Society was gaining momentum, when the ideas of James and John Stuart Mill and the Chartists were prominent, and when a partnership with Māori was cemented through the signing of the Treaty of Waitangi, the terms of which were later contested (Atkinson 2003). These elements of apparent progressivity were tempered by the fact that many missionaries and settlers struggled to recognize the leadership of Māori women, preferring instead to deal with their male counterparts. When the Treaty of Waitangi was signed in 1840, only 13 Māori women signed (out of some 512 signatures). This is despite the fact that Māori women traditionally had a say in the affairs of the tribe in the runanga (meeting house), making speeches and contributing to key decisions (Higgins and Meredith 2011).

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Nevertheless, the spread of the Chartist movement to Australia and New Zealand cannot be underestimated. While not explicitly committed to the rights of women, the Chartist demands included universal male suffrage, the secret ballot and the abolition of the property requirement for parliamentary candidates. Alongside this, other “radical liberals,” Fabians, and socialist immigrants brought with them a desire to build, if not a classless, then a more egalitarian society than the one they left behind (Belich 2001). Thus, when the 1852 New Zealand Constitution Act (UK) established a House of Representatives, its electors included more than the traditional elite: all males over the age of 21 who owned, leased or rented a property of a certain value were eligible to vote, including the indigenous Māori men. Universal suffrage for Māori men was introduced in 1867, with the establishment of four Māori seats and the separate Māori roll. The franchise extended to all men over 21 in 1879. The lack of substantial landed gentry in the newly settled colony meant traditional arguments that mob rule, class legislation, and the expropriation of property would follow universal male suffrage had little traction in the New Zealand context. Indeed, several English commentators in the 1850s argued New Zealand’s property qualification was the most liberal of all colonies whereby almost all men, labourers as well as gentlemen, could exercise the right to vote. Atkinson argues this might be overstating the case, but by 1858, 74% of the male population were entitled to vote (Atkinson 2003, pp. 34–35). Moreover, from the 1870s, Liberal-led governments, often with the support of Labour independents, legislated land reforms, labour rights and old-age pensions, embedding a social liberalism that might be considered peculiar to New Zealand and Australia (Castles 1985; Curtin 2015; Sawer 2003). These socially liberal ideas and initiatives were to provide Pākehā feminists committed to advancing the rights of women with arguments that were likely to appeal to like-minded male parliamentarians. Theirs was not a “radical” feminist set of arguments; they reassured those who would listen that the vote would maintain rather than challenge women’s traditional roles as wives and mothers. But their vote would prompt future governments to take better care of women and children (see Dalziel 1986, for more on this position). Carole Pateman (1994, p. 331) argues that New Zealand women won the vote after a relatively short organized campaign beginning with the establishment of the WCTU in 1885, but this conclusion overlooks the more informal, grass-roots campaigning undertaken by both Māori women and by those involved in the WCTU. Indeed, the fight for women’s franchise “began well before the publicity seeking suffragists took to the streets” (Nolan and Daley 1994, p. 2). It is thought that the first documented claim for votes for women was written by Mary Ann Müller in 1869. In “An appeal to the men of New Zealand,” Müller, using the pseudonym “Femina,” wrote a 3000word essay which was distributed in pamphlet form. She argued that women

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should have the right to vote because women possessed “all the requisites which legally qualify a man for that right” (Müller in Lovell-Smith 1992, pp. 59, 60–61). She claimed that many women had more education than some of the working-class men who had already been given the franchise. Müller also reminded readers that New Zealand was governed by a Queen and so it made no sense, and was unjust, to disqualify women from exerting a fraction of this power through the vote (Müller in Lovell-Smith 1992). In 1871, Mary Colclough gave her first public lecture on the rights of women. Colclough had published on this topic and others as “Polly Plum” in the New Zealand Herald during the 1860s and 1870s. Influenced by John Stuart Mill’s writings, she attacked the “legal subjection” of women and ridiculed the idea that women should be educated only for the home (McLintock 1966). She believed women were entitled to careers, to be economically independent, in addition to their roles of wife and mother. And she argued that justice demanded that women should not be subject to laws they had no part in making and so should therefore be granted the right to vote (Malone 2013). Thus, these early Pākehā settler feminists tended to draw on discourses of equal rights, and several, including Müller, were able to influence a number of the more liberal-leaning parliamentarians who were supportive of equal rights. The first parliamentary discussion of the issue was raised by J. C. Andrew in 1874, although no bill resulted. Then, in 1878, Robert Stout, a senior Liberal politician in Premier Grey’s government, and converted to the cause by Mill’s writings, proposed that women ratepayers be eligible to vote for and be elected as members of the parliament (Page 1993). The bill did not pass, and over the next seven years, three more female franchise bills were introduced into the New Zealand Parliament, each of which likewise did not succeed. The desire for full political citizenship was not a radical claim in the New Zealand context. Women ratepayers in Nelson and Otago had won the right to vote in municipal elections in 1867, and this right was extended to all municipalities in 1876. A year later, women were granted the right to vote and stand for election to school committees and regional boards. In 1893, Elizabeth Yates became the first female elected Mayor (of Onehunga in the Auckland region) in the British Empire. These local initiatives indicated a growing popular support for women’s political rights and were not limited to Pākehā women. Māori women were active in petitioning the government on land rights and women’s suffrage. Women’s rights advocates, such as Meri Mangakāhia, Niniwa-i-te-rangi, Takarea Te Heuheu and Sophia Hērangi, participated in the Kotahitanga movement to establish the Māori parliament (created in 1892). Te Kotahitanga was a means to address land confiscation and the protection of Māori rights under the Treaty of Waitangi and Māori women formed committees specifically to argue for the right of women not only to vote but also to stand for the Māori parliament, something they achieved in 1897 (Higgins and Meredith 2011; Rei 1993).

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It was from 1885 onwards that more formal suffrage organizations were founded and members mobilized. Mrs Mary Leavitt of the US-based Woman’s Christian Temperance Union visited NZ in 1885, and a New Zealand branch was established, with Kate Sheppard appointed NZ’s WCTU Franchise Superintendent in 1887. Sheppard was to become the face of the suffrage movement in New Zealand and is memorialized on the New Zealand ten-dollar note. As was the case with the WCTU elsewhere, moral reform, Christian virtue and prohibition were key ideas linked to demands for women’s suffrage. It was argued that women were deemed to be “less accessible than men to most of the debasing influences,” making bribery and corruption less effective. Indeed, it was claimed the presence of women at the polling booth would have a “refining and purifying effect.” Providing women with the vote was also necessary because women were more constantly concerned with the welfare of future generations, more cautious, and more likely to provide a different standpoint to their male counterparts on legislation and its impacts (WCTU 1888 in Lovell-Smith 1992, p. 66). Although the WCTU is fairly credited with leading the organized campaign, women beyond the educated middle class were also being mobilized. In 1889, the Tailoresses Union was established in Dunedin, where there was a large working-class population. Vice Chair Harriet Morison was a passionate advocate for the right to vote as well as the need to ensure better pay and conditions for her members (Harper and Nolan 1993). Members of the Tailoresses Union provided over a third of the signatures on the 1891 petition and again in 1892 (more on these below; Page 1993). Several Māori women also signed the 1892 and 1893 petitions, and many joined the temperance movement from the 1870s onwards, which meant by the early 1890s, Māori women were involved in two suffrage movements simultaneously (Rei 1993, pp. 15–18). Many Māori were located in rural areas, making it unsurprising that Māori women are seldom recorded as having been involved in the urban-based franchise leagues. Nevertheless, in 1893, when it was asked in the House of Representatives whether voting rights should be extended to Māori women, there was a roar of unanimous approval (Page 1993, p. 12). Moreover, Ngahuia Te Awekotuku argues that some Māori women had already exercised their vote in national elections. When the four Māori seats were established in 1867, the votes were often cast in the whare rūnanga (the tribal meeting houses) in the presence of scrutineers. As the ancestral homes of all Māori, these meeting houses were open to both women and men, and given voting was less formally organized than it is today, it is likely that some women voted alongside their men. Te Awekotuku notes that this is a story not often told because it is anecdotal, but is significant because it records women’s participation “through mother lines and grandmothers stories” (Te Awekotuku 2016). In 1887 and 1888, four petitions requesting suffrage were presented to either the House of Representatives or the Legislative Council (upper house) with each attracting more signatures than the last. The petition presented to

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the House of Representatives in 1891 included 9000 signatures, 19,700 the following year, and 31,871 signatures in 1893. Meanwhile, three further suffrage bills were introduced by progressive politicians; some were sponsored by members of the government, others were led by non-government members. For example, John Hall, an independent with conservative leanings, believed women would vote conservative, and was keen to see women awarded the franchise. Several of these bills were encumbered with exceptions, special conditions, and one included giving women the right to sit in parliament as well as the right to vote (in 1887). Although there was often majority support in the House of Representatives, the process was complicated by reticence amongst those appointed to Legislative Council who tended to be more conservative. The latter voted down one bill (in 1891) and almost scuppered the successful 1893 Act (Hutching 2010). Opponents of the extension of the franchise were many and vocal. Some railed against any form of franchise for women, invoking the public–­private divide, claiming “nature did not ordain that women should take part in public life” (Gisborne 1878 cited Atkinson 2003, p. 86). As the campaign continued, other objections emerged. Women would be “unsexed” by involvement in the grubby world of politics; they would neglect their domestic duties and their new-found political rights would cause dissension between husband and wife. Equal rights arguments were also dismissed; while women might engage in paid work and pay taxes, they could not bear arms to defend their country and so should not vote (Hutching 2010). Suffragists rebutted each of these claims in publicly distributed leaflets, in rational terms, and invoking allied male politicians from home and abroad (WCTU 1899 in Lovell-Smith 1992). There were also political interests at stake. There was a belief that giving women the vote would amount to giving two votes to husbands or fathers, and some conservatives were worried what that would mean for their chances of winning government. Of greater concern for supporters of the liquor industry was the increasing strength of the temperance movement and the political traction being gained by the WCTU. One significant opponent of female suffrage was Premier Richard Seddon. Although a Liberal, Seddon’s allegiances were with the liquor lobby, and his liberalism never extended as far as previous Liberal Premiers Grey or Ballance. Along with Henry Fish, a parliamentary member of the conservative opposition and an ardent anti-suffragist, Seddon was determined to represent the liquor lobby’s interests and on numerous occasions used his influence in both chambers to thwart the various bills that came before parliament. Meanwhile, Fish organized for anti-suffrage petitions to be signed on a promise of payment (Hutching 2010) and publicly derided all who supported the suffrage cause. Despite these manoeuvrings, the bill which incorporated the franchise for women (Electoral Act 1893) was passed on 19th September 1893, 10 weeks before the general election.

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Post-suffrage: Women’s Impact as Voters The work of the suffragists did not end with the passage of suffrage legislation. Opponents had argued that women were unlikely to enrol because they were constitutionally uninterested in politics, and suffrage campaigners were keen to prove them wrong (Hutching 2010). However, what may have seemed a daunting task proved to be a rewarding one. On the first day of female registration, queues of women waited to enrol, and then once enrolled, these women were able to register other electors. Registration meetings were held around New Zealand, and groups of women were organized to make home visits for the purpose of enrolling women who might not otherwise visit a registration centre. In addition, for many suffragists, the enrolment process offered them an opportunity to educate and guide the new female voters (Grimshaw 1987, p. 97). The work of Patricia Grimshaw (1987) demonstrates in detail how keenly various groups worked to garner women’s enrolment and votes once political citizenship was extended. Temperance societies joined the WCTU suffragists in their efforts to enrol women and encourage them to support the candidates who stood for state regulation of the liquor industry. Allies of the liquor traders also established their own working parties to register those women voters who did not support prohibition (see also Atkinson 2003). A number of religious pressure groups seeking the introduction of bibles in schools encouraged women to register, and church leaders from a range of denominations took to preaching to women about enrolling and vote choice. At this time, political parties were still in their infancy, but all sides of politics recognized the significance of a mass of new women voters entering the electorate. As a result, the Liberals encouraged women to join their associations, the Conservatives focused their registration efforts on rural women, and those politicians who had opposed the suffrage waited nervously (Grimshaw 1987, pp. 96–99). Indeed, there were few candidates who felt sufficiently assured of their seats not to make concessions to female constituents in their electioneering. Grimshaw (1987, p. 102) notes how appeals were sent on elegant, sometimes perfumed, notepaper, with sprays of forget me nots, while politicians’ wives held tea parties. Some candidates recalled famous women from recent history, and others discussed the potential for New Zealand to become a utopian society. Although less is known about how trade unions promoted the vote amongst women, we can be sure that Harriet Morison from the Tailoresses Union encouraged women voters to eject Henry Fish (Harper and Nolan 1993). A number of Māori women formed political committees in districts to support particular candidates, although turnout by sex in the Māori electorates is not recorded. By the closing date of enrolment in 1893, over 109,000 women, estimated to be about 80% of the eligible female population, were registered on the electoral roll. Another 35,000 women had registered in advance of their

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second election in 1896. And it is apparent that female voters took advantage of their new-found political rights in November 1893. The day was sunny, and women began to vote early and throughout the day. Some came to vote in groups, others took turns to look after each other’s children (Page 1993, p. 15). Of the women who were enrolled in 1893, 82% turned out to vote. Moreover, female turnout was 15 percentage points higher than their male counterparts (67%, see Table 9.1). Although this initial gender gap in turnout quickly closed, women continued to vote in good numbers throughout the remainder of the nineteenth century and into the twentieth century. That women were not able to stand for parliament does not appear to have acted as a significant deterrent. Thus, despite the limited amount of time between the passage of legislation and the election on 28 November, Grimshaw (1987, p. 103) argues the enthusiasm of the new female electorate, coupled with the efforts of political parties and pressure groups produced a “highly commendable” result given the male electorate had not enrolled in remarkably larger numbers. The Liberals won a decisive victory, increasing their majority to 54 seats, compared to 14 Opposition candidates and two independents. Scholars agree that it is difficult to assess the influence of women on the result (Atkinson 2003). That the Liberals were easily returned may have been a result of increased support from male voters as well as from new female voters, given their labour and land reforms. At the time, Liberal Premier Richard Seddon suggested that women would follow their husbands’ vote choice, meaning his government had nothing to fear (Page 1993). But not all agreed that women would necessarily vote Liberal. John Hall, former conservative-leaning premier and ally of Kate Sheppard, had argued for female suffrage in part on the basis that women might be more likely to support the conservatives because of their traditional family values. Indeed, conservative parties in the UK and elsewhere were watching for the result of the women’s vote in New Zealand, with one observer noting, Table 9.1 Turnout rates by sex, New Zealand, 1893–1919a

Election year 1893 1896 1899 1902 1905 1908 1911 1914 1919

Male % 67 75.9 75.9 78.4 83.9 81.1 84.4 85.4 81.5

Female % 82.4 76.4 73.2 74.5 82 78.3 82.5 83.7 79.5

Gender gap (% point) 15 0.5 −2.7 −4 −2 −2.8 −2 −1.7 −2

Source Electoral Returns, various years aMy thanks to Anastasia Turnbull and Robert Peden of the Electoral Commission for facilitating my visits to access this data

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“it will … very largely affect the attitude which we in the Conservative Party may take in respect to women’s suffrage when we learn in what manner it operates in NZ” (cited in Atkinson 2003, fn. 43, p. 104). Those who worked to educate women as voters were divided on how women should or would vote. Some argued that supporting the established political parties was necessary to promote women’s collective interests, while others encouraged their sisters to select the best candidate, one who espoused a commitment to better laws to protect women and children, to better working conditions for women and to control alcohol and gambling (Grimshaw 1987, pp. 97–98). Many candidates did speak to these issues, although the Liberal candidates had a stronger claim, given the majority had supported women’s franchise, industrial arbitration and were predisposed to additional welfare measures. It was at the constituency level that the impact of women as voters appears most discernible. In a number of cities, anti-temperance candidates lost their seats, while in Dunedin, most commentators at the time assumed that women had caused the defeat of anti-suffrage Henry Smith Fish. The three successful Dunedin candidates were all endorsed by the Women’s Franchise League, as they had been sustained supporters of the woman’s cause. In more marginal seats, where non-Liberal candidates managed to retain their seats, it was argued this was because they had proved themselves to the local Franchise league as candidates worthy of the women’s vote (Grimshaw 1987, pp. 104–105; Hutching 2010). Grimshaw concludes that the Liberal win was probably predictable and reinforced by those women who attempted to exert an independent vote for their respective candidates based on character and policy position (1987, pp. 105–106). Eight years after the first three elections under universal franchise, Sidney Smith wrote that a number of the anti-franchise arguments had been proven false. There was no obvious sign of predicted domestic misery. Women were welcomed at polling booths, receiving respectful attention and no harassment. Indeed, the presence of women had transformed elections, with the “riotous horseplay of bygone days having disappeared,” replaced by “flowers and gay dresses … a semi-festival, bright and decorous” (Smith 1905, p. 96). Finally, Smith reminded readers that those Legislative Councillors who had called on the governor to block the franchise because it would disastrously affect the financial equilibrium of the colony and undermine London’s credit, were proved wrong. Prosperity said Smith, remained uninterrupted (1905, p. 97).

Women’s Influence as Political Actors In 1908, Edith Searle Grossman wrote that New Zealand’s early feminist success was due in part to the fact that many of the “artificialities and conventionalities of an old civilisation were shaken off among the uncompromising

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realities of early colonial days” (cited in Page 1993, p. 17). However, New Zealand women did not want to eschew completely their traditional female roles—their claims for political citizenship were underpinned by a desire to enhance their position as “colonial helpmeet” (Dalziel 1986). They wanted their interests as wives and mothers addressed by their political representatives, but they did not want to undertake this representation themselves. This mix of liberal and traditional ideas may explain in part why New Zealand women did not agitate for the right to stand for parliament, immediately following their enfranchisement. Histories of what happened in the years following the 1893 election are slim at best. Dorothy Page argues that although Kate Sheppard stood down from her various offices, local women’s organizations continued to meet and debate the policies they wanted to see advanced by lawmakers (Page 1996, p. 10). Franchise Leagues morphed into Women’s Political Leagues, a range of women’s institutes were established, and the WCTU began publishing the White Ribbon journal which provided a forum for such women’s groups to consolidate their priorities (Page 1996, p. 13). In 1896, the National Council of Women was established and soon became known by some as the “Women’s Parliament.” Overseas observers were struck by its radicalism and its wide range of interests, and its members and leaders used their influence to lobby parliamentarians and to ensure women were well-informed political citizens (Page 1993, p. 19; 1996, p. 13). It is difficult to identify a direct causal relationship between women’s post-suffrage activism and policy change. Premier Seddon attributed many of the reforms initiated by his government to the pressure brought on his government by women voters (Grimshaw 1987, p. 121). Sidney Smith (1905, p. 99) in recounting the struggle for the franchise argued that women voters had led to the temperance vote increasing threefold and predicted increased support for temperance candidates (indeed New Zealand almost went “dry” in 1919). Smith also credited women’s influence with a number of reforms including changes to divorce law, and laws governing pensions for the aged poor, whereby conditions were made the same for both sexes. He commended labour law reforms introduced to protect the health of women and girls through limited hours, fixed holidays and an enforced minimum wage. Legal separation was made easier, and the Testators Family Maintenance Act prevented a man “from willing away his property without making suitable provision for his wife and family” (Smith 1905, p. 100). Smith concluded by stating, “in most countries civilization is an excrescence, in NZ it is an efflorescence. Without wishing to exaggerate, it may be safely said that the advent of women into the politics of this colony has been a great moral gain” (Smith 1905, p. 102). Some years later, in 1928, the President of the National Council of Women listed 44 pieces of legislation on which she claimed the organized effort of women as voters had had a decisive influence. In 1930, economic historian J. B. Condliffe agreed, arguing that reforms to divorce law and the introduction

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of a range of welfare measures, including the old-age pension in 1898, were directly attributable to women winning the vote (Page 1993, p. 19). However, not all were convinced that women’s influence was significant, with some of the most ardent advocates of women’s political rights critical of the fact that no purification of politics or parliamentary behaviour had followed women’s entry into the electorate. There was also “disgust” in Premier Richard Seddon’s continued popularity and in women’s growing attachment to political parties. It had been assumed that women would vote independently for candidates with higher moral character, which would override partisanship and create a “better” type of representative (Grimshaw 1987, p. 120). Yet women themselves do not appear to have believed that their presence in parliament as representatives was necessary to purify politics, and explanations for why women did not pursue the right to stand with more vigour remain patchy. It is evident that Kate Sheppard continued to speak out against the fact that women like herself were “legally disabled” from standing for election to parliament, as did other individual women who had been elected to local councils. Sheppard believed the role of the National Council of Women was to ensure that legislative deliberation would not always be one-sided and that there would not always be a need for separate women’s councils and men’s councils (the parliament) (Grimshaw 1987, pp. 113–114). Some commentators were not averse to the idea of women’s presence in parliament but argued it was unlikely women would care to quit the sphere of home life for a public political career (Evening Post 1891). And interestingly, a number of the anti-suffrage parliamentarians admitted that their fears that the women’s vote would lead to disaster were unjustified. Indeed, Oliver Samuel spoke in support of the bill to admit women to parliament stating “I think now that I overlooked the fact …that an equal number of men also are unfitted to judiciously exercise the franchise” (cited in Grimshaw 1987, p. 120). The Women’s Parliamentary Rights Act was finally passed in 1919, and three women candidates stood for election later that year, without success (although Ellen Melville who stood for the Reform Party in an Auckland electorate was placed second. She stood several more times as an independent, as she was not reselected by the Reform Party, but without success). Between 1919 and the election of the first woman in 1933, we know very little about how many women stood as candidates. Key texts that cover New Zealand elections and parties discuss the occupation, age and educational qualifications of candidates, but seldom mention sex (Milne 1966; Mitchell 1969). Data collected for the elections between 1946 and 1975 indicate almost 93% of general election candidates were men, with women comprising only 2.5% of Labour and National candidates in 1946 (Aitkin 1980, p. 199). Indeed, by-elections were to become the primary avenue for women’s entry into parliament; between 1919 and 1945 five of the six women elected won by-elections. This suggests that the major political parties saw little connection between women as voters and the recruitment of women as candidates.

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It was to be the women’s movement of the 1970s and activism within the political parties that provoked a change in the descriptive representation of New Zealand women (Curtin 2012).

Conclusion New Zealand was a country of partial firsts; while technically the first country to give all women the right to vote, thereby implementing universal suffrage, and the first in the British Empire to elect a woman mayor, it was to take another 26 years for women to win the right to stand for parliament. It then took a further 14 years for the first woman to be elected, and the first Māori woman was not elected until 1949 (to the Māori seat of Matiu). Although surveys undertaken from the 1960s onward suggest women were more likely to vote conservative, it was the Labour Party that would prove more open to the recruitment of women as candidates. New Zealand’s early progress on women’s political rights is best explained by a combination of three overlapping influences. First, liberal ideas about equal rights for women promulgated by British liberals and British feminism fitted snugly with the aspirations of many who had emigrated to the new colony and laid the foundation for later feminist activism. The arrival of the WCTU from the USA in the 1880s and its combination of moral reformism, feminism and leadership of Kate Sheppard ensured an organized campaign resulted. However, alongside these two impulses existed a local support for women’s rights that was expressed in two ways: through Māori women’s activism for formal representation in the Māori parliament, and a brand of “settler feminism” that viewed equal political rights as a natural extension of women’s expanded role as colonial helpmeet. In this way, women’s suffrage was won without violence, but not without a fight.

Notes 1. Note that New Zealand was a self-governing colony at this time. 2. The “Suffrage and Beyond” Conference was held at Victoria University of Wellington in August 1993 and was endorsed by the International Federation for Research in Women’s History. My thanks to Professor Melanie Nolan for providing this information. 3. Pākehā is the Māori term for white or European New Zealanders. Māori women were also active around issues of inter-tribal political representation and land rights’ claims.

References Aitkin, J. 1980. Women in New Zealand Politics. In New Zealand at the Polls: The General Election of 1978, ed. H. Penniman. Washington, DC: American Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research.

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Atkinson, N. 2003. Adventures in Democracy: A History of the Vote in New Zealand. Dunedin: University of Otago Press. Belich, J. 2001. Paradise Reforged: A History of the New Zealanders. From the 1880s to the Year 2000. Auckland: Allen Lane, Penguin Press. Castles, F.G. 1985. The Working Class and Welfare: Reflections on the Political Development of the Welfare State in Australia and New Zealand 1890–1980. Wellington and Sydney: Allen and Unwin and Port Nicholson Press. Curtin, J. 2012. New Zealand. Gendering Parliamentary Representation: A Mixed System Producing Mixed Results. In Women and Legislative Representation: Electoral Systems, Political Parties, and Sex Quotas, ed. M. Tremblay, 197–209. New York: Palgrave Macmillan. Curtin, J. 2015. Revisiting Social Liberalism and Feminism in New Zealand. In Feminism, Social Liberalism and Social Democracy in the Neo-Liberal Era. Four Essays, ed. A. Yeatman, 51–66. Sydney: Whitlam Institute, University of Western Sydney. Clement, C., and J. Johnston. 1992. Women and the Vote: Extracts from the Hawera Star (1892–1893). Hawera: Christine Clement. Daley, C., and M. Nolan. 1994. Suffrage and Beyond: International Feminist Perspectives. Auckland: Auckland University Press. Dalziel, R. 1986. The Colonial Helpmeet. Women’s Role and the Vote in Nineteenth Century New Zealand. In Women in History: Essays on European Women in New Zealand, ed. B. Brookes, C. Macdonald, and M. Tennant, 55–68. Wellington, New Zealand: Allen and Unwin and Port Nicholson Press. Evening Post. 1891. Women’s Franchise, Volume XLI, Issue 143, 19 June, 2. Grimshaw, P. 1987. Women’s Suffrage in New Zealand. Auckland: Auckland University Press. Harper, P., and M. Nolan. 1993. Harriet Russell Morison. In The Suffragists: Women Who Worked for the Vote, ed. D. Page. Wellington: Bridget Williams Books/Dictionary of NZ Biography. Higgins, R., and P. Meredith. 2011. Te mana o te wāhine – Māori women, Te Ara— The Encyclopedia of New Zealand. http://www.TeAra.govt.nz/en/te-mana-o-tewahine-maori-women/print. Accessed 13 Oct 2016. Hutching, M. 2010. Leading the Way: How New Zealand Women Won the Vote. Auckland: HarperCollins. Lovell-Smith, M. 1992. The Woman Question: Writings by the Women Who Won the Vote. Auckland: New Women’s Press. Malone, J. 2013. Colclough, Mary Ann—Dictionary of New Zealand Biography. In Te Ara—The Encyclopedia of New Zealand. http://www.TeAra.govt.nz/en/biographies/2c25/colclough-mary-ann. Accessed 10 Nov 2015. McLintock, A.J. 1966. COLCLOUGH, Mary Ann, “Polly Plum”—An Encyclopaedia of New Zealand. In Te Ara—The Encyclopedia of New Zealand. http://www. TeAra.govt.nz/en/1966/colclough-mary-ann-polly-plum. Accessed 10 Nov 2015. Milne, R. 1966. Political Parties in New Zealand. Oxford: Clarendon Press. Mitchell, A. 1969. Politics and People in New Zealand. Christchurch: Whitcombe and Tombs. Ministry of Women’s Affairs (MWA). 1994. Celebrating Women: A Suffrage Year Handbook. Wellington: Suffrage Centennial Year Trust Whakatū Wāhine. Nolan, M., and C. Daley. 1994. International Feminist Perspectives on Suffrage: An Introduction. In Suffrage and Beyond: International Feminist Perspectives, ed. C. Daley and M. Nolan. Auckland: Auckland University Press.

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Page, D. 1993. The Suffragists: Women Who Worked for the Vote. Wellington: Bridget Williams Books/ Dictionary of NZ Biography. Page, D. 1996. The National Council of Women: A Centennial History. Auckland: Auckland University Press and Bridget Williams Books. Pateman, C. 1994. Three Questions About Womanhood Suffrage. In Suffrage and Beyond: International Feminist Perspectives, ed. C. Daley and M. Nolan. Auckland: Auckland University Press. Rei, T. 1993. Māori Women and the Vote. Wellington: Huia Publishers. Sawer, M. 2003. The Ethical State? Social Liberalism in Australia. Carlton, VIC: University of Melbourne Press. Smith, R. 1993. The Ladies Are at It Again! Gore Debates the Women’s Franchise. Wellington: Women’s Studies, Victoria University of Wellington. Smith, W.S. 1905. Outlines of the Women’s Franchise Movement in New Zealand. Christchurch, Dunedin, Wellington, Melbourne, London: Whitcombe and Tombs. Te Awekotuku, Ngahuia. 2016. LATE at the Museum—He Mana, He Wahine. Auckland Museum, Radio New Zealand, August 14. http://www.radionz.co.nz/ national/programmes/smarttalk/audio/201812162/late-at-the-museum-he-mana-he-wahine. Accessed 10 Oct 2016.

CHAPTER 10

Finland: Suffrage, Nation, and Political Mobilization Irma Sulkunen

When Finland’s unicameral parliament convened for the first time in March 1907, there were nineteen women among the newly elected members of parliament (MPs). Social Democrats were the largest group with eighty seats, nine of which were held by women. Ten women were elected in the non-socialist group. The nineteen women comprised less than ten percent of the total of 200 MPs. Nevertheless, they were exceptional in that they represented the first women in Europe to obtain both the vote and the right to stand as candidates in parliamentary elections (Markkola and Ramsay 1997). This chapter explores how this radical reform came about. How was it possible that a solution that women in many Western countries could only dream of was achieved in Finland, a geographically peripheral country that in 1809 had been annexed as an autonomous grand duchy into the Russian Empire? What were the cultural and political factors that allowed the reform to go through and what was their relationship in comparison with other Western countries? The chapter focuses on, first, the relationship between nation-building and women’s suffrage and, second, the ‘public-private’ dichotomy connected to gendered citizenship in Finland.

I. Sulkunen (*)  University of Tampere, Tampere, Finland e-mail: [email protected] © The Author(s) 2019 S. Franceschet et al. (eds.), The Palgrave Handbook of Women’s Political Rights, Gender and Politics, https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-137-59074-9_10

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The Social and Political Background of Women’s Suffrage In contrast to many other countries, the introduction of female suffrage in Finland took place not only exceptionally early but also surprisingly rapidly and almost ‘unnoticed.’ The intensive struggle lasted only a short time, culminating in a few hectic days in early November 1905. A general strike that had spread from Russia had halted traffic and closed shops and factories. Communications had broken down, and even private households had been plunged into disorder as servants abandoned their duties and crowded into the squares to occupy public spaces and aggressively present their demands. The most important demand was for the implementation of universal and equal suffrage, including the right of women to vote and stand in elections (Haapala et al. 2008; Jussila 1979). Illustrating the rapid development of events, on the fourth day of the strike Tsar Nicholas II issued a manifesto with a promise that suffrage would be granted in Finland according to the demands of the strikers. In addition, the Tsar promised to restore ‘legal’ conditions to the country, meaning that the Russification measures that had been instigated in Finland a few years earlier would be dropped. Apart from a few dissenting voices, ‘universal and equal suffrage’ was understood to mean that the same rights would be granted to both sexes. In accordance with this interpretation, a parliamentary reform bill was speedily drawn up and passed in all the Finnish legislative organs in the spring of 1906. Apart from some small details, the Tsar approved the bill presented by the Finnish Senate on May 3, 1906. As a result, Finnish women were the first in Europe to gain the right to vote, and the first women in the world to be granted, without restriction, the rights to vote and run for parliament as full citizens (Sulkunen 2006). It would be naive to imagine that mobilization by Finns alone had forced the Tsar of Russia into agreeing to a reform that was exceptional not only within the empire but in fact represented the acme of democratic progress in international terms as well. Although there was strong pressure in support of the reform in Finland, its passage was ultimately made possible by events on the world political stage and their impact on Russia. Defeat in the war against Japan had exacerbated the already-inflamed domestic situation in Russia, sparking a wave of strikes in 1905, and led to disturbances throughout the empire, including Finland. Attempts to calm the situation resulted in the granting of greater democratic rights, like the establishment of the Duma (parliament) in Russia and reform of the parliamentary system in Finland. At the same time, no promise of reform would have been given unless the demands had been regarded as constituting a real threat. Moreover, the Finns took advantage of the unsettled situation in Russia and strove to achieve the greatest possible unanimity in order to get the suffrage reform through as quickly as possible. The handling of the bill at its different stages clearly shows that fear of missing a favorable political opportunity induced the Reform Committee, the Senate, and the members of the Diet to approve the

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reform in a much more radical form than they would probably have done in a stable political situation. There is broad consensus that this political situation was decisive in influencing the exceptionally early introduction of women’s suffrage in Finland. Indeed, some male scholars have even suggested that the granting of female suffrage was treated as a routine matter, or was passed ‘semi-accidentally’ as a kind of by-product of the great political drama. According to this view, men had achieved their own suffrage through struggle and astute tactics, and along the way, the same rights came to be accorded to women (Jussila 1979; Mylly 2006; Perttilä 1984). However, this interpretation not only ignores the active contribution of women but also leaves open some important questions regarding women’s political rights. The fact that the crisis in Russia and the wave of strikes that it created provided Finnish statesmen with an excellent opportunity to further their own interests does not explain why women’s right to vote was included in the demand for universal and equal suffrage, or why the demand was passed with relative ease and with such little opposition. Moreover, why gender conflict played a surprisingly insignificant role during and before the parliamentary reform remains an open question. One contributing factor is that the corporative parliamentary system broke down exceptionally slowly, in contrast to other Western countries. Inherited from the times when Finland had belonged to Sweden, the Diet consisted of four estates: Nobles, Burghers, Clergy, and Peasants. At the beginning of the twentieth century, this system remained in force in Finland, rendering it exceptional within the Nordic region. Norway adopted a unicameral system in 1814, and Denmark and Sweden established bicameral parliaments in 1843 and 1866, respectively. During the course of the nineteenth century, male suffrage was extended across many Western countries, at the same time that the question of female suffrage appeared on the political agenda. The Finnish Diet nonetheless appeared progressive in comparison with political arrangements elsewhere across the Russian empire. Bound to the representation of the four estates, the Finnish system was unable to keep up with the rapid progress that was taking place in society, resulting in serious grievances in the late nineteenth century. Power was concentrated in the hands of the two higher estates, with the Nobles, in particular, having disproportionately strong representation in the Diet. At the same time, new educated groups like teachers, people working in trade and commerce, and the rapidly growing industrial population and other groups of urban workers were deprived of suffrage altogether because they did not fall within the categories of the four estates. At the end of the century in several cities, some members were eventually able to take part in parliamentary elections on the basis of their tax-paying ability. The rapid growth of landless groups, however, remained disfranchised even within the Peasants’ estate.

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At the beginning of the twentieth century, the situation reached a point where only seven to eight percent of the total population of the country was enfranchised, and among the peasants, the percentage was even lower (Koskinen 1997). The limitations of this system became even clearer after reforms to local elections. According to a decree on rural municipalities passed in 1865, everyone who paid municipal taxes was eligible to take part in local elections, including women who were not subject to the authority of the master of a household. In towns, a reform of municipal administration passed in 1873 granted the right to vote in municipal meetings to all tax-paying members of good repute who had jurisdiction over themselves and their property, whether they were men or women.

The Divided Suffrage Movement: Class and Gender Paradoxically, the conservative parliamentary system and its underlying logic—social control and exclusion—helped to advance women’s suffrage in Finland. Since limitations on national citizenship affected not only women but also huge groups of men, the sense of injustice that grew along with the changes taking place in society created a commonality of interests between disfranchised groups. The social structure of the Finnish suffrage movement, indeed, made no distinction between the sexes. Women were active in the workers’ movement, which played a leading role, as well as other popular movements pressing for a radical extension of the vote. Women also participated prominently in public demonstrations supporting implementation of universal and equal suffrage for both sexes. This considerably increased the force of the movement, and women’s participation from the very outset made the demand for the women’s right to vote an inseparable element in extending democratic rights. Another important group involved in the suffrage question was the temperance movement, which was the most important popular movement in Finland at the end of the nineteenth century and the early years of the twentieth century. Organized into a single national organization, Raittiuden Ystävät (Friends of Temperance), the movement drew the vast majority of its members from the working class. At the turn of the century, the proportion of women members grew to half or more than half of all members. In fact, the leading figures of the Finnish women’s movement were active members, irrespective of their party-political affiliations. The movement adopted national prohibition as its goal, and as the temperance struggle intensified, this aim became inextricably entwined with the demand for suffrage. When the workers’ movement also decided to demand prohibition, it considerably strengthened the front that was demanding universal and equal suffrage (Sulkunen 1990a, 2006). Despite cooperation between the temperance movement and other popular movements, the movement for women’s right to vote in Finland was itself

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divided into two factions. One group sought to promote women’s suffrage as a separate issue, while the other strove to combine the suffrage goals into a unified program without distinctions of gender. However, the separate suffrage movement was never more than a very marginal group. Even when the suffrage struggle was at its height, members of Suomen Naisyhdistys (Finnish Women’s Association), which was established in 1884, and Unioni Naisasialiitto (Unioni, League of Finnish Feminists), which split from it in 1893, numbered together well under 2000. In comparison, by the early twentieth century, nearly 20,000 women were members of the temperance movement, and almost as many women were members of the workers’ movement (Sulkunen 1990b). The low level of support for the feminist organizations can be explained in part by the fact that their demand for suffrage did not cover all women but aimed only at franchise for women on the same basis as men—in other words, according to the criteria of estate and wealth. This stance was logical in that, given the extremely conservative suffrage situation prevailing in Finland, it was natural to assume that any reforms would happen in stages in accordance with the general Western model. That is what began to happen in Finland in the late nineteenth century: with the advent of new forms of production, economic liberalism gained a foothold, first in the Burghers’ estate, whose interests lay mainly in getting barriers to industry and trade removed, and then among the Clergy and the Peasants. Significantly, however, the Parliament Act of 1869 for the first time included sex among the limitations on suffrage for the lower estates. Previously, widows had been able to vote in the Peasants’ estate on the grounds of ownership of land, but the new Act deprives them of this privilege. Gender-based limitations came to affect elections in the Burghers’ estate when a constitutional change in 1879 excluded ‘female persons, married and unmarried’ from the right to vote (Mylly 2006; Sulkunen 2006). These limitations were in conflict with the Decrees on Rural Municipalities (1865) and Urban Municipalities (1873), according to which gender was not an obstacle to participation in local voting. The line drawn by the Parliament Act was an important step in defining sex as a major category in political rights. It also drew the line between local and national concepts of political citizenship, with the former following the principle of liberal economic independence, and the latter that of a gendered division of spheres of life based on a dichotomy between the male and female identities. However, this principle was not clearly enunciated in connection with the passing of the Act, and as a result, the role of sex as a basis for discrimination in political rights appears to have been unclear for a long time to many politicians. The exclusion of women from parliamentary elections swiftly made the issue a subject of public debate. The Finnish Women’s Association addressed the matter, as did Minna Canth, a pioneering writer of realist literature in Finland and an influential advocate of social engagement (Gripenberg 1905,

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1909; Jallinoja 1983). The issue was also debated in the Diet of 1885, but without any result. Thereafter, women’s right to vote was raised as a separate issue in the Burghers’ estate. In 1897, four representatives in the Diet submitted a motion demanding: ‘All women in this country who fulfil the conditions laid down in the constitution for elective franchise should be granted the same right to vote as men’ (Valtiopäivät 1897). This proposal led to no direct results, but afterward the matter continued to be discussed in the Diet until the parliamentary reform of 1906. One issue in these debates revolved around how to address the enfranchisement of women whose wealth exceeded the threshold level for the right to vote at the local level. Did their municipal franchise entitle them to vote in parliamentary elections? What was the relationship between local and national franchise? What role did sex play in defining this relationship? And to what extent did the liberal principle of voting on the basis of personal economic or intellectual achievement include women? How could the principle of economic independence be reconciled with the gendered division of spheres of life? The debates in the Diet clearly reveal the pragmatic way in which the higher social groups in Finland regarded the relationship between the sexes at the time. Certainly, there was talk of the ‘natural’ attributes of women, but there was hardly any reference to their having a restricting effect on political activity. Nor was the border between the public and the private particularly emphasized in the discussion about political suffrage for women. On the contrary, it was fairly generally believed that ‘women’s participation in national life would bring to it a new element, the propensity of which for the preservation of public order was not to be doubted on account of the natural character and role of women’ (Valtiopäivät 1897). Women were regarded as already being active in public life, not only at the municipal level but also in many other aspect of public life, as school principals, teachers, journalists, postal officers, and doctors, among other municipal and private functions. From these roles ‘Finnish men cannot hope that Finnish women will regress,’ proclaimed the members of the Diet who supported women’s franchise (Valtiopäivät 1897). Motions to the Diet demanding a separate franchise for women were in accordance with the policy of the middle-class women’s movement. This was because the Finnish Women’s Association and Unioni, the League of Finnish Feminists had close links with the bourgeois parties (Jallinoja 1983). Just how closely the line promoting a separate suffrage for women was connected to the emerging new class division is interestingly illustrated by some of the speeches made in the Diet. For example, in listing the numerous fields in which middle- and upper-class women worked, no mention was made of the appreciably greater work input made by the women belonging to the lower classes. The speeches also began to reveal a rigid opposition between men of the lower social groups and women belonging to the educated class:

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When it happens that the same school and university education is available to a woman as to a man, it appears to us to be much less dangerous to grant her national franchise than that men of a lower educational level who do not have an income anything like sufficient to ensure their economic independence should have this franchise. (Valtiopäivät 1897)

The idea of granting the vote to women of the upper and middle classes in order to muffle the growing political influence of working-class men was also voiced: ‘The granting of national franchise to women is an act demanded not only by justice but also by wisdom. It would bring to our political life an element that would protect society’ (Valtiopäivät 1897). For bourgeois circles, preserving control of political decision-making in the hands of those who were deemed suitable—on the basis of position, education, or wealth—outweighed their reservations about women. The fact that the Finnish Women’s Association committed itself to a view of citizenship based on class distinctions is well illustrated by statements by Alexandra Gripenberg that only upper-class women were entitled to demand political rights (Sulkunen 1987). Following these principles, the feminist organizations continued to promote a class-differentiated form of suffrage right up until November 1905, when the Imperial manifesto obliged them to make an abrupt about-turn in favor of universal and equal suffrage.

Nation and Citizenship The General Strike of 1905 is regarded as a significant turning point in the development of Finland as a nation. Despite their struggles for power, the different party groups achieved unanimity regarding both the goals of the strike and the demands to be presented to Russia. The nationalist frame of reference offers an important perspective on the early granting of the vote to Finnish women. Nation-building and nationalism grew appreciably during the nineteenth century, supported most consciously by the intelligentsia and other upper- and middle-class groups. The strongest line with regard to Russia was taken by the Constitutionalists, made up of Swedish-speaking liberals and a group called the Young Finns. A more moderate attitude toward Russia was adopted by the Old Finns, whose nationalist doctrine was based on securing legal rights for the Finnish language and was rooted in the Finnish-speaking peasant class. The nationalist issue was also commonly discussed within the workers’ movement. In the name of national unity, all of these groups tended to play down rather than emphasizing gender conflict. In debates on citizenship, class differences often assumed a more determining role than sex. A motion to the Diet in 1897 by bourgeois liberals proposed that national suffrage should be based on a specified ability to pay taxes (Valtiopäivät 1897). If women satisfied this tax-paying qualification, they should be granted the same rights as men. They qualified this demand, however, by insisting that this should

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only be the case for non-married women, because married women were considered to be dependent on their husbands. Those who supported universal and equal suffrage were opposed by two notable political scholars. The sternest opposition came from Robert Hermanson, who belonged to the Swedish-speaking political group. Hermanson was a professor who was familiar with modern political theory, and in 1905 and 1906, he was a member of the committee that drafted the parliamentary reform. Hermanson’s arguments were based on ideas about the essential nature of women, believed to be best fulfilled in the private sphere but corrupted on the merciless stage of public politics (Valtiopäivät 1904–1905; Eduskuntauudistuskomitean pöytäkirja 1905). The other opponent was another leading member of the Young Finns party, K.J. Ståhlberg. He was a lawyer and scholar in the field of public law who had extensively studied the problematics of suffrage in an international perspective. He did not oppose female suffrage in principle, but believed that the time was not yet ripe for it in Finland. Ståhlberg defended his view by arguing that women did not have the vote even in ‘more progressive’ countries, and thus, Finland should follow the general Western principle of extending universal suffrage first to men and only then address the question of female franchise. He considered that this was also in the interests of the nascent Finnish nation (Ståhlberg 1895; Valtiopäivät 1904–1905). Arguments based on differences in the essential natures of the sexes were common among those in the middle-class women’s movement. This view did not, however, gain any significant foothold in Finland. Rather, proponents of the principles of natural law intensified with the growth of the socialist workers’ movement (Rajainen 1959; Sulkunen 2006). The views of progressives and conservatives arise were thus reversed on the question of female suffrage. The strongest opponents were the Swedish speakers, who in other questions represented liberal opinions, while the Peasants and the Finnish Party (the Old Finns), who were regarded as conservatives, strongly supported a democratic system of representation. Thus, the Social Democratic Party, which had promoted a radical suffrage reform from the very beginning, gained unexpected allies at a strategically crucial juncture (Sulkunen 2006). This was because the struggle for national unity allowed no distinction to be made between women and men; on the contrary, the contribution of women to the construction of national unity was strongly emphasized, as was their crucial significance in bearing and raising a vigorous Finnish nation. Both the precarious political situation and concern over the fragmentation of national unity thus significantly curtailed gender conflict with regard to the contents of the suffrage reform. Given the emphasis on nationalism, there were also very few comparisons with other countries. In the debates on women’s suffrage in the Diet, no mention was made of women’s suffrage rights in New Zealand and Australia. References to Britain were only made in speeches opposing the right to vote for women. Scant awareness of the international

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debate over suffrage, as well as and abstention from any discussion of the principles concerning gender relations and rights, turned out, paradoxically, to benefit the early granting of suffrage to women in Finland.

Public, Private, and Civil Society Despite these conclusions, it still remains an open question why little attention was paid in the Finnish suffrage debate to gender differences and the division into different spheres of life. One view is that, in addition to favorable political conditions, women’s active role in Finnish cultural life before the suffrage reform also contributed their rapid achievement of the vote. This explains the emphasis on equality between the sexes that was commonly expressed in the Finnish suffrage debate. From this perspective, equal political rights emerged from local social traditions rather than innovative international political thinking. Further supporting this hypothesis is the side-by-side role played by women and men in informal popular movements and formally organized voluntary associations in Finland. In these grassroots settings, new conceptions of citizenship were formulated and adopted. One example can be seen in popular organizing preceded by powerful religious revivalist movements, which were largely led by women in the beginning and played a significant part in creating the social and ideological conditions for the birth of the modern civil society in Finland (Sulkunen 1983, 1999). The fact that women were not only actively involved in, but also spearheaded, the social change that expressed itself in religious revivals indicates the strong position they held in local communities. At the same time, it also demonstrates the fuzziness of gender-based distinctions between public and private spheres, suggesting that the traditional Finnish agrarian culture was even not aware of such a notion. From an international perspective, the composition of the Finnish population was also exceptionally homogeneous, with differences of income between the social classes being relatively small. The nobility constituted only a small proportion of the population, as did the wealthy bourgeoisie. The vast majority of Finns obtained their livelihood from agriculture, in which small farms predominated. Subsistence was often scarce, and survival required the cooperation of both sexes: Women had to take part in heavy labor, not only in the household but also tending cattle and working in the fields with men. These factors also contribute to the fuzziness of the border between the private and public spheres of activity. These agricultural traditions were still strong in the peak years of political mobilization at the start of the twentieth century, when about ninety percent of the Finnish population still lived in the countryside. The majority of industrial workers also inherited the agrarian tradition, and by comparison with other countries, women constituted an exceptionally high proportion of these

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as well. This meant that it was not only in peasant households but also in the families of industrial workers that survival strategies effectively superseded concerns about gendered roles, upholding a relationship between the sexes based on partnership and joint economic responsibility. The prevalence of this partnership outlook and the failure of a gendered division of spheres to take root are also indicated by the copious use of arguments referring to male and female equality in the debate over women’s suffrage. Certainly, the fact that men and women had different work tasks was mentioned, but—apart from a couple of dissenting opinions—this was not regarded as entailing a division of spheres of life determined by essential characteristics of the sexes. On the contrary, it seems that such a way of thinking was foreign to most of the members of the Diet. Notably, in addition to the workers, it was the representatives of the country towns and the peasants who were most strongly in favor of women’s rights. Both the important work and the active social and patriotic contribution of women were emphasized by all these groups. Nor was gender regarded as an impediment to political activity; on the contrary, it was believed that women would occupy an important place in the new parliament, a place that belonged to them naturally as the representatives of one half of the population. Contrary to developments in ‘more developed’ countries, sex had not yet been analyzed into the political category of gender. The relationship between the sexes was characterized by partnership, which bound couples together in a way that admitted of no distinction between the rights of individuals. The border between the public and the private in the modern sense was not recognized, nor were men and women located according to this dichotomy. Consequently, modern demands for democratic rights received strong support from the peasant population, a class that was regarded as conservative in its social views. This, in turn, enabled doctrines based on natural law to be merged with the agrarian conception of partnership between the sexes, to produce an interpretation of equality that was radical even by international standards.

Conclusion In Finland, the battle to overthrow the old system of representation also involved a power struggle within the new one. This struggle was waged within the framework of a party system in the process of modernization, but it was even more intense in extra-parliamentary lobbying activities. Two main approaches emerged to define political citizenship following the breakup of the estate system. One was based on the principle of classical liberalism that made wealth, independence, or some other distinction a condition of citizenship. This view was espoused by members of the upper classes. The other approach aimed at radical democratic rights and defended its view of civil rights with arguments based on natural law. It drew support mainly from the

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working classes and also by many sections of the rural population. The role of gender in both trends was important, but it was delineated differently. The liberal line aligned the sexual border for suffrage along the division between the public and private spheres, although it made some concessions in order to reinforce the division between the classes. The approach based on principles of natural law, on the other hand, strove to include all, irrespective of their class or sex, within the compass of political citizenship. In Finland, debates resulted in an exceptionally intense antagonism between different classes, in which, on the other hand, there was relatively little gender distinction. Democracy came suddenly in a short period of time, when the foreign political situation afforded the opportunity. In principle, all the previously disfranchised groups, irrespective of gender, gained equal political rights. In practice, however, some limitations deriving from liberal doctrine were preserved in the Parliament Act. Interestingly, after the granting of suffrage, views on gender rapidly politicized, the union between principles of natural law and the agrarian partnership outlook weakened, and the kind of divided gender system that had become common in Western countries began to appear as a major factor in the Finnish civil society as well.

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Sulkunen, Irma. 1987. Naisten järjestäytyminen ja kaksijakoinen kansalaisuus. In Kansa liikkeessä, ed. Risto Alapuro, Ilkka Liikanen, Kerstin Smeds, and Henrik Stenius. Helsinki: Kirjayhtymä. Sulkunen, Irma. 1990a. History of the Finnish Temperance Movement: Temperance as a Civic Religion. Lewiston: Edwin Mellen Press. Sulkunen, Irma. 1990b. The Mobilization of Women and the Birth of Civil Society. In The Lady with the Bow: The Story of Finnish Women. Keuruu: Otava. Sulkunen, Irma. 1999. Liisa Eerikintytär ja hurmosliikkeet 1700–1800-luvulla. Helsinki: Hanki ja jää. Sulkunen, Irma. 2006. Suomi naisten äänioikeuden edelläkävijänä. In Naiset eduskunnassa: Suomen eduskunta 100 vuotta, ed. Irma Sulkunen, Maria Lähteenmäki, and Aura Korppi-Tommola. Helsinki: Edita. Valtiopäivät. 1863–1907. Parliamentary Debate Transcripts, Archive of Parliament.

CHAPTER 11

Switzerland: Direct Democracy and Women’s Political Participation Anouk Lloren

Switzerland is known as the last European country to grant women the right to vote at the federal level in 1971. Since then, women’s political participation and descriptive representation have steadily increased. However, their level of political participation is still not on par with men’s. This is particularly true with regard to electoral participation. A key feature of the Swiss political system is the simultaneous presence of elements of direct democracy and representative democracy. Although most political decisions are taken by the parliament (Kriesi 2005), direct democracy has shaped social policies and women’s rights. In fact, direct democracy procedures played an important role in women’s long exclusion from the political sphere. The persisting gender gap in turnout coexists, further, with differences in the policy preferences of female and male voters: Women disproportionately support left-wing policies and political parties. Taken together, the gender gaps in turnout and policy preferences have important consequences for the development of women’s rights, especially in the context of direct democracy. The gender gap in policy preferences also raises the question of whether female legislators represent women’s specific concerns and demands and, if so, whether an increase in women’s descriptive representation would lead to policy changes, especially with regard to the advancement of women’s rights. This chapter starts by recounting the long campaign for women’s suffrage and discusses the role of the institution of direct democracy in women’s late access to full political citizenship. It then addresses the impact of women’s

A. Lloren (*)  Swiss National Science Foundation, Bern, Switzerland © The Author(s) 2019 S. Franceschet et al. (eds.), The Palgrave Handbook of Women’s Political Rights, Gender and Politics, https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-137-59074-9_11

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vote in Switzerland in terms of turnout and voting behavior since 1971. Finally, the chapter concludes by discussing the role of women’s political participation and representation for advancing gender equality policies.

The Long Fight for Women’s Suffrage Although Swiss women only acquired the right to vote and run for office at the federal level in 1971, first wave feminists were already fighting for women’s suffrage in the early twentieth century (Hardmeier 1997; Stämpfli 1994). At this time, the women’s movement adopted what has been called a “small steps” strategy that aimed to ensure women’s social integration at the local level. For instance, women were mainly mobilized around voting rights for school boards and local church ministries (Hardmeier 1997, p. 330). The focus was not on advancing gender equality arguments, namely that women and men were equals and should therefore have equal rights. Rather, activists sought to ensure women’s inclusion in decision-making processes in areas that were traditionally assigned to women. Using utilitarian arguments, they argued that Swiss women could contribute to the development of the welfare state and slow down the process of secularization. Nevertheless, organizations specifically devoted to promoting women’s suffrage emerged at the local and federal levels, respectively, in 1905 and 1907. The First World War (WWI) weakened the women’s movement and pushed the fight for equal political rights into the background. At the end of the WWI, many European countries rewarded women’s war effort by granting them the right to vote (for example, Germany in 1918, the UK in 1918, the Netherlands in 1919, and Austria in 1919). The same did not occur in Switzerland. Although several popular initiatives were launched at the cantonal level1 in Zurich, Geneva, Basel, Neuchatel, and Glaris, all of these proposals were defeated by two-third majorities, in referendums in which only men could vote (Commission fédérale pour les questions féminines 2001). At the same time, in the aftermath of the WWI, a countermovement emerged to fight against women’s enfranchisement (Hardmeier 1997). According to Hardmeier (1997), several features characterize the Swiss suffrage movement between 1890 and 1930. First, suffragists collaborated with the international movement for women’s suffrage. Second, they were not isolated at the national level. They worked closely with other social movements such as the social democratic and abolitionist movements. Nonetheless, the suffrage movement was relatively small compared to other struggles in the interwar period. Finally, a small group of men supported the suffrage movement. Some male suffragists held important political positions in the parliament and government and, as such, acted as informants, strategic advisers, or bridges within social networks. Many of the male activists had family ties as the fathers, brothers, or husbands of female suffragists. These ties to the political elite were an important resource but might also explain why the suffrage movement adopted a “small steps” strategy that did not question nor

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confront the political system and political elites. The connection might also explain why the Swiss suffrage movement adopted a “difference feminism” discourse, highlighting differences and complementarity between men and women rather than gender equality. In the interwar period, the economic crisis and rise of fascism reinforced ideologies promoting traditional gender roles. Over the same period, suffragists shifted their arguments. Instead of arguing that voting was a question of women’s rights, the movement emphasized that full enfranchisement would strengthen democratic institutions and reward women as responsible citizens. At the federal level, social democrats attempted to raise the issue of women’s suffrage in parliament, but without success. After the Second World War, feminists launched several cantonal initiatives to establish women’s suffrage. However, they were all rejected. At the federal level, several debates about women’s voting rights took place in parliament in the late 1940s and early 1950s. Only in 1958 did parliament approve a bill to introduce women’s suffrage. Any constitutional change, however, required a referendum. Therefore, women’s voting rights were first submitted to a popular vote in February 1959. Opponents of the project included the Women’s League Against Women’s Suffrage as well as the right-wing conservative party called Parti des paysans, artisans et bourgeois.2 The two main right-wing parties, the Free Democrats and the Christian Democrats, did not give any voting instructions. Proponents of women’s suffrage included the Action Committee for Women’s Suffrage, which gathered feminists as well as (male) politicians from all partisan stripes, and center-left and left-wing parties, namely the Social Democratic Party, the Union of Independents, and the Workers Party (CFQF 2001; Mesmer 2007; Vögeli 1997). The referendum for women’s enfranchisement at the federal level failed. It was rejected by a majority of male citizens (66.9%) and by all cantons, except Vaud, Neuchatel, and Geneva. Nevertheless, women’s suffrage was progressively introduced at the cantonal level through referendums in Vaud and Neuchatel in 1959, Geneva in 1960, Basel-City in 1966, Basel-Land in 1968, Tessin in 1969, Valais and Zurich in 1970, and finally Aargau, Fribourg, Zoug, Glaris, Solothurn, Luzern, Bern, and Thurgau in 1971. At the federal level, the feminist movement radicalized its claims in the 1960s. Several parliamentary motions demanded the establishment of equal political rights for men and women. The issue became particularly salient with Switzerland’s ratification of the European Convention on Human Rights in 1969 (Ballmer-Cao 1988). Within this context, the debate among the political class revolved around granting full political rights to women or ratifying the European Convention on Human Rights with a provision on women’s suffrage. The Swiss government, known as the Federal Council, took a strong position in favor of women’s suffrage at the national level, but asserted the right of each canton to legislate on the issue at the cantonal and municipal level.

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Ballmer-Cao (1988) analyzed the 1970–1971 parliamentary debates, as well as the media campaign on women’s suffrage, leading to the introduction of women’s voting and eligibility rights at the federal level. Her analysis shows that the lower chamber of the parliament, the National Council, was overwhelmingly in favor of women’s suffrage. Only a small portion of parliamentary debates (5%) raised arguments against women’s enfranchisement. On the other hand, the upper house representing the 26 cantons, the Council of States, was more reluctant to the introduction of women’s suffrage, because some cantons were against the reform. Proponents of women’s suffrage mainly used political arguments to pass the reform rather than justice arguments emphasizing equality between men and women. More precisely, the parliamentary debates revolved around the electoral consequences of women’s suffrage in terms of the political balance of power, in terms of whether women’s voting rights would favor right-wing or left-wing parties. The international consequences of women’s late access to full political rights were, on the other hand, rarely mentioned during the parliamentary debates. The debates also show that women’s suffrage triggered both fear and hope in the political world. The potential breach in the status quo in terms of partisan strength sparked apprehension. But politicians also expected women to positively change the content and the way of doing politics. In particular, many policy-makers believed women would be more interested in social and welfare policies than their men counterparts. After the legislative project was approved by both chambers of Parliament, a referendum was submitted to popular vote on February 7, 1971. Approximately 66% of voters, all male, approved the proposal establishing women’s suffrage. Cantons that did not already allow women to vote were obliged to gradually introduce women’s suffrage at the cantonal and local level. Only the canton of Appenzell Inner-Rhoden refused to grant women full political rights at that time, and it was not until 1990 that the Federal Court ordered the canton to introduce women’s suffrage—twenty years after obtaining this right at the federal level. Researchers have proposed several reasons to explain why Switzerland lagged behind other Western democracies with regard to the introduction of women’s suffrage (CFQF 2001; Ballmer-Cao 2005; Hardmeier 1997; Stämpfli 1994). First, the strategy adopted by first wave feminists has been criticized. In particular, the “small steps” strategy adopted by the suffragist movement was incapable of avoiding the pitfalls of the Swiss political system and overcoming the conservatism of both male political elites and voters. Second, the institutions of direct democracy and federalism can explain women’s late access to voting and eligibility rights. More precisely, the institution of direct democracy, which requires holding a referendum for any constitutional change, clearly hindered women’s access to full political rights since largely conservative Swiss men were the only ones allowed to vote. Third, Switzerland’s federalist system has played a role in the slow progress of change. Cantons have full autonomy with regard to political rights.

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Some municipalities and cantons were strongly opposed to women’s suffrage (e.g., some municipalities in the cantons of Obwald, Solothurn, and Graubünden, or the canton of Appenzell Inner-Rhoden). But researchers also agree that political elites long held conservative views on women’s role in society and therefore delayed the introduction of women’s suffrage. For instance, the parliament was long opposed to granting women voting and eligibility rights or was at best indifferent toward the issue of women’s suffrage. The same is true of the Federal Council. However, direct democracy and federalism can also explain Switzerland’s rapid alignment with international standards and practices concerning women’s political and social rights since 1971 (CFQF 2001; Ballmer-Cao 2005; Giraud and Lucas 2009; Martin 2002). Although the “laissez-faire” strategy adopted by the federal state has been criticized, the political autonomy of cantons is now often viewed as an opportunity for feminist movements to advance women’s rights by implementing social change in liberal cantons. The same is true for the institution of direct democracy. Suffragists largely used the instruments of direct democracy to advance their cause, mobilizing for 136 referendums in favor of women’s suffrage between 1919 and 1984 (Stämpfli 1994). Likewise, direct democracy can be used to bring new issues on the political agenda. For example, feminists and female politicians launched a popular initiative on gender quotas in politics at the federal level in 1995. Since women have entered the parliamentary arena in 1971, the conservatism of elites with regard to gender roles should also be qualified. Indeed, gender equality issues have progressively been put on the political agenda, especially by the female politicians (Lloren 2015b).

A Persistent Gender Gap in Political Participation Examining the impact of women’s suffrage with regard to Swiss women’s voting behavior, a notable trend in Switzerland—in contrast to most postindustrialized democracies—is that there are still gender differences in political behavior, with women participating at lower rates than men in politics. In particular, women have exhibited lower turnout rates than men in federal elections since the 1970s (Fig. 11.1). In the first federal election after the introduction of women’s suffrage in 1971, the gender gap in turnout was about 24%. By the end of the 1980s, the gender gap was still 13%. In the 1990s, the difference in electoral participation between female and male voters seemed to be closing and fell as low as 7% in the 1995 federal election. However, Fig. 11.1 suggests that the decline in the gender gap in the mid1990s was mainly due to a decrease in men’s electoral participation rather than an increase in women’s turnout rates (Senti and Lutz 2008). Gender differences then steadily decreased after the turn of the twenty-first century, with the exception of the 2015 federal election. More precisely, Fig. 11.1 indicates that the gender gap in electoral participation for federal elections was about 14% in 1999, 12% in 2001 and 2007, 5% in 2011, and 7% in 2015.

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80 70 60 50 40 30 20 10 0 1971 1975 1979 1987 1991 1995 1999 2003 2007 2011 2015 Men

Women

Fig. 11.1  Female and male turnout in national elections 1971–2015 (in percent) (Source Lutz 2012; Senti and Lutz 2008)

In addition, the figure shows that women’s electoral participation has remained relatively stable since the introduction of women’s suffrage in 1971. This trend is distinct from other post-industrialized democracies, where female voters have tended to participate at similar or higher rates than male voters over the last two decades (Inglehart and Norris 2003). Several competing explanations have been advanced to explain Swiss women’s lower levels of turnout. First, some scholars argue that the belated introduction of women’s suffrage has had consequences for women’s participation in politics. Since it took 123 years to achieve full enfranchisement for women after Switzerland’s founding in 1848, many argue that women’s late access to full political rights still explains Switzerland’s persistent gender gap in turnout. Using administrative data from the Canton of Geneva, for example, Sciarini et al. (2001) show that the gender gap in turnout is mainly due to older female voters who experienced a time when women had no political rights and did not play an active role in politics. As a result, longer life expectancy among women—combined with this lower propensity to turn out to vote among elderly women—helps account for at least some differences in electoral participation between men and women (Sciarini et al. 2001). However, other studies have found that the oldest generations of Swiss women were in fact more likely to vote than younger cohorts (Stadelmann-Steffen and Koller 2014). Second, socioeconomic and civic resources, such as education, income, and labor force participation, may explain gendered political participation patterns. Although Swiss women have gained greater access to college education

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and the labor force over the past decades, they still experience structural disadvantages related to their greater likelihood of engaging in part-time work and doing the vast majority of household work. As a result, they often hold lower positions in the social structure: “Switzerland is characterized by a ‘(slightly updated) single breadwinner model’” (Stadelmann-Steffen 2011, p. 350), which makes it reasonable to assume that “women still exhibit lower socio-economic resources than men and often depend (partly) on their partner’s income” (Stadelmann-Steffen and Koller 2014, p. 532). Resource effects can play out at both the individual level and household level. As Engeli et al. (2006) show, individual socioeconomic resources such as education and income partly explain why fewer women cast a ballot in the 2003 federal elections, although they note that the impact of these factors was relatively weak. However, socioeconomic resources can also have a negative effect on women’s propensity to vote. For example, a recent study revealed that women who hold high professional positions are actually less likely to vote (Stadelmann-Steffen and Koller 2014). Likewise, women with partners holding high-status occupations are less likely to go to the polls. These results suggest that time inequality between women and men—that is, women’s double burden of paid work outside the home and unpaid domestic work— leaves women less time to be politically active and indirectly discourages them from casting a ballot. Third, political motivations and attitudes might also contribute in explaining Switzerland’s persisting gender gap in electoral participation (Burns et al. 2001). More precisely, scholars have shown that Swiss women’s lower levels of turnout partly result from their lower levels of political interest, politicization, and political knowledge. Boris Wernli (2006) demonstrates that Swiss women tend to vote like their husbands, who disproportionately take up the role of opinion leaders within households: “We observe that one’s electoral choice is mainly related to the partner’s voting behavior rather than the personal characteristics of the respondent” (Wernli 2006, pp. 69–70).3 This implies that women’s voting behavior only moderately differs from their partner’s voting behavior because they tend to align with the views of the head of household. Other scholars observe that women are less likely to identify with a political party or to say they had a political discussion during electoral campaigns (Engeli et al. 2006; Lutz 2012). This is consistent with feminist arguments that women are less interested in politics because the political world does not take their specific interests and concerns into account (Pateman 1983; Sapiro 1998). Direct democracy procedures allow us to empirically investigate this statement since citizens cast a ballot on specific issues, including issues that are often said to appeal to women as a group, such as abortion rights, maternity leave, or gender quota laws. Overall, the pattern for turnout in popular votes does not differ from the pattern observed for federal elections: Either there are no systematic differences in turnout between men and women across issues in referendum votes

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(see e.g., Gfs.bern 2006), or female voters participate less than male voters (Funk and Gathmann 2015). Interestingly, research suggests that female voters are more likely than men to activate more demanding cognitive strategies during the opinion formation process when popular votes focus on policy proposals that reflect women’s specific interests and concerns (Nai and Lloren 2009). However, the overall findings suggest that women are not more likely to take part in ballots when women’s interests are at stake. The gender gap in political participation is also visible with regard to other direct democratic procedures. For instance, Stadelmann-Steffen and Dermont (2016) examine whether participation in citizen’s assemblies at the local level follows gendered patterns. Although low-income voters participate at similar rates as high-income voters in municipal assemblies, their study reveals that women and younger citizens are usually less present in these decision-making instances than men as well as middle- and older-aged citizens.

An Ideological and Partisan Gender Gap Studies on the ideological gender gap have shown that women in postindustrialized democracies are, on average, more left-wing than men, although women’s preferences vary across age groups and education levels (Inglehart and Norris 2003). Likewise, research focusing on Switzerland has shown that female citizens tend to position themselves more to the left than do male citizens. Women also tend to adhere more frequently to post-materialist values such as gender equality or environmental protection, and they are more likely to trust women’s and feminist movements (Bütikofer and Engeli 2010). As a result, women are slightly more likely to vote for left-wing parties. In addition, surveys indicate that gender influences citizens’ preferences toward discrete policies. Broadly speaking, Swiss women are more likely to support social, welfare, and gender equality policies than are Swiss men. Unlike in other Western democracies, findings suggest that these trends cut across different generations of Swiss women. In other words, both younger and older generations of women tend to be more liberal than their male counterparts. With regard to Swiss youth, a recent report highlights that young women tend to hold more progressive views on society than young men, especially on the issue of work/life balance, equal opportunities for Swiss citizens and foreigners, the ban on headscarves, and same-sex civil unions (Beyeler et al. 2015). Direct democracy procedures also enable us to examine women’s voting behavior for concrete policy projects during referendum votes. Findings indicate that the gender gap rarely determines the outcome of popular votes. However, gender continues to affect vote choice (Gfs.bern 2006; Funk and Gathmann 2015). Table 11.1 presents the 10 policy proposals with the largest gender gap from 1981 to 2006. Broadly speaking, women are more likely to vote in favor of environmental protection (a ban on nuclear energy or the introduction

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Table 11.1  Policy proposals with the largest gender gap in voting Project title

Policy domain

Year of vote Gender gap in %

Reduction of tobacco consumption Quotas for an equal representation of women in federal government Change in marital law Avanti—for safe and efficient highways Against racial discrimination Against subsidies for corn production Reduction of alcohol consumption For protection of rivers and lakes For a car-free Sunday per quarter For abandoning nuclear energy For equal rights of the disabled

Health Rights

1993 2000

17.7 17.5

Rights Safety

1985 2004

17.0 −17.0

Rights Agriculture

1994 1994

16.8 15.6

Health Environmental protection Environmental protection Environmental protection Rights

1993 1992 2003 1990 2003

15.5 15.3 14.9 14.7 14.6

Notes Negative numbers imply that women were less supportive of the project than men Source Funk and Gathmann (2015), Gfs.bern (2006)

of a car-free Sunday per month), welfare state policies (against an increase in retirement age), public health proposals (the reduction in tobacco and alcohol consumption), gender equality policies (quotas for women’s representation or civil partnerships for same-sex couples), and the rights of disadvantaged groups such as the disabled. Female voters also tend to be more immigration friendly than their male counterparts (against racial discrimination). On the other hand, women are less likely to vote in favor of proposals expanding military spending. These results hold when controlling for demographic and socioeconomic factors such as age, education, income, or marital status, meaning that women’s specific preferences cut across different groups of women. However, women are far from being a homogeneous group. Studies show that there is no systematic gender gap on votes concerning several policy domains. For instance, the voting choice of Swiss women and men does not differ on education, transportation, or cultural issues (Funk and Gathmann 2015). Moreover, some policy proposals divided female voters across generations, with women above 40 casting more conservative votes than younger cohorts, especially when family and gender equality issues are at stake (Gfs. bern 2006). For example, women as a group were less likely to vote for the pro-choice option in the 2002 popular vote in favor of the legalization of abortion (−7 percentage point difference). Likewise, they were less likely than men to support the establishment of maternity leave in 2004 (−9 percentage point difference), although a majority of female voters (52%) supported the proposal. Surveys on values and preferences, as well as on direct democratic voting behavior, suggest that women and men hold different views on how society should be organized. But are women’s distinct policy concerns and demands

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real, or are they the result of survey reporting bias? In particular, women’s specific set of policy preferences could be due to social desirability biases. Women might conform to traditional gender stereotypes and align their survey answers to social expectations in line with an ethics of care (Gilligan 1982). This would imply that women feel pressured to declare themselves in favor of social and welfare policies, for example, but that in the secrecy of the polling booth, female voters could behave similar to men. A comparison between survey and official approval rates for popular votes, however, suggests that this is not the case and thus that women do appear to hold different policy preferences than men (Funk and Gathmann 2015).

Conclusion The institution of direct democracy enables Swiss citizens to participate directly in lawmaking at the federal, cantonal, and local level.4 At the federal level alone, since 1848 Swiss citizens have been called to the polls 341 times to express their views on multiple policy proposals. At the mercy of male voters, women’s suffrage was refused approximately 130 times at the local, cantonal, and federal levels. Although direct democracy procedures can partly be blamed for women’s late access to full political citizenship in 1971, they can also be viewed as a powerful trigger for social change. Like the suffragist movement, women’s rights activists have used this instrument to put new issues on the political agenda and advance women’s rights. The simultaneous presence of direct democracy and representative democracy also provides a unique opportunity to assess the impact of women as voters since citizens can both directly and indirectly influence policy-making. Since the 1970s, women’s political participation and representation have steadily increased. Switzerland ranks eighth out of 145 countries on the 2015 Global Gender Gap Index, mainly because of its good score on women’s political empowerment (World Economic Forum 2016). But unlike most post-industrialized democracies, women’s turnout rate is still lower than men’s, for both parliamentary elections and popular votes. This persistent gender gap in political participation is accompanied by a clear ideological and partisan gender gap, with female citizens holding more liberal and left-wing preferences than male citizens on a number of important policy issues, such as environmental protection, public health, welfare benefits, and gender equality. Although direct democracy enables citizens to directly take part in policymaking, most political decisions are still taken by the parliament in Switzerland (Kriesi 2005). Whether women legislators share similar views than female voters—and if so, whether they can represent women’s preferences adequately and effectively influence lawmaking—has been subject to debate. In Switzerland, as in other West European countries, research shows that female candidates do hold, on average, more liberal views than their male party colleagues (Lloren and Rosset 2017). However, gender differences vary

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across policy domains, with female candidates being more liberal than their party colleagues on cultural issues but not on economic issues. In addition, the gender gap among political elites is more pronounced on the right of the ideological spectrum. Other researchers suggest that once they are elected, Swiss female legislators are more likely to defend feminist interests than their male party colleagues, but that they only marginally respond to women’s electoral preferences (Lloren 2015a, b).

Notes 1. Cantons are the equivalent of US states. There are 26 cantons in Switzerland. 2. This party is the ancester of the populist right-wing party Union démocratique du centre (UDC). 3. Author’s translation from French. 4. Three types of bills have to undergo direct democracy procedures: First, any constitutional change requires a referendum; second, optional referendums can be launched against a new law if 50,000 signatures are gathered; and third, citizens can propose a constitutional change by launching a popular initiative if 100,000 signatures are collected.

References Ballmer-Cao, T.H. 1988. Le conservatisme politique féminin en Suisse: mythe ou réalité? Genève: Georg Editeur. Ballmer-Cao, T.H. 2005. Switzerland. In Sharing Power. Women, Parliament, Democracy, ed. M. Tremblay and Y. Galligan, 159–170. Burlington: Ashgate. Beyeler, M., S. Bütikofer, and I. Stadelmann-Steffen. 2015. Ma Suisse et moi. Regards des jeunes sur les enjeux politiques et sociaux. Principaux résultats d’une enquête menée auprès des jeunes de 17 ans. Berne: Commission fédérale pour l’enfance et la jeunesse. Bütikofer, S., and I. Engeli. 2010. The Transformation of the Ideological Gender Gap in Switzerland. In Value Change in Switzerland, ed. S. Hug and H. Kriesi, 45–61. Plymouth: Lexington Books. Burns, N., K.L. Schlozman, and S. Verba. 2001. The Private Roots of Public Action. Cambridge: Harvard University Press. Commission fédérale des questions féminines. 2001. Femmes, pouvoir, histoire. Histoire De l’égalité en Suisse de 1848 à 2000. Available at http://www.Frauenkommission. Ch/Geschichte_Chronik_F.Htm. Accessed 8 Oct 2016. Engeli, I., T.H. Ballmer-Cao, and M. Giugni. 2006. Gender Gap and Turnout in the 2003 Federal Elections. Swiss Political Science Review 12 (4): 217–242. Funk, P., and C. Gathmann. 2015. Gender Gaps in Policy Making: Evidence from Direct Democracy. Economic Policy 30 (81): 141–181. Gfs.bern - Forschung für Politik, Kommunikation und Gesellschaft. 2006. Die Entscheidungen von Frauen schützen Umwelt, Service Public und Benachteiligte. Bericht zur Vox-Trend-Berichterstattung für das Jahr 2006. Bern: Gfs.bern. Gilligan, C. 1982. In a Different Voice: Psychological Theory and Women’s Development. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.

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Giraud, O., and B. Lucas. 2009. Le renouveau des régimes de genre en Allemagne et en Suisse: bonjour néo-maternalisme? Cahiers du genre 46 (1): 17–46. Hardmeier, S. 1997. Frühe Frauenstimmrects-Bewegung in der Schweiz (1890–1930). Argumente, Strategien, Netzwerk und Gegenbewegung. Zürich: Chronos. Inglehart, R., and P. Norris. 2003. Rising Tide. Gender Equality and Cultural Change. Oxford: Cambridge University Press. Kriesi, H. 2005. Direct Democratic Choice: The Swiss Experience. Lanham: Lexington Books. Lloren, A. 2015a. Women’s Substantive Representation: Defending Feminist Interests or Women’s Electoral Preferences? Journal of Legislative Studies 21 (2): 144–167. Lloren, A. 2015b. Pour qui luttent les femmes? De la représentation des intérêts des femmes au Parlement suisse. Zürich: Seismo. Lloren, A., and J. Rosset. 2017. Gendered Policy Preferences? Candidates’ Views on Political Issues in a Comparative Perspective. Comparative European Politics 15 (6): 944–968. Lutz, G. 2012. Élections fédérales 2011. Participation et choix électoral. Lausanne: Selects-FORS. Martin, N. 2002. Les politiques sociales suisses en faveur des femmes: quelques explications du tournant des années 90. Revue Suisse de Science Politique 8 (3–4): 61–83. Nai, A., and A. Lloren. 2009. Intérêts spécifiques et formation de l’opinion politique des Suissesses (1999–2005). Swiss Political Science Review 15 (1): 99–132. Mesmer, B. 2007. Staatsbürgerinnen ohne Stimmrecht. Die Politik der schweizerischen Frauenverbände 1914–1971. Zürich: Chronos. Pateman, C. 1983. Feminism and Democracy. In Democratic Theory and Practice, ed. D. Graeme. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Sapiro, V. 1998. When Are Interests Interesting? The Problem of Political Representation of Women. In Feminism and Politics, ed. A. Phillips, pp. 161–192. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Senti, M., and G. Lutz. 2008. Wo die Schere sich öffnet: zur unterschiedlichen Wahlbeteiligung von Frauen und Männern. Frauenfragen/Questions au feminin/Problemi al Femminile 1: 1–6. Stämpfli, R. 1994. Direct Democracy and Women’s Suffrage: Antagonism in Switzerland. In Women and Politics Worldwide, ed. B.J. Nelson and N. Chowdhury, 691– 704. New Haven: Yale University Press. Stadelmann-Steffen, I. 2011. Dimensions of Family Policy and Female Labour Market Participation: Analyzing Group Specific Policy-Effects. Governance 24 (2): 331–357. Stadelmann-Steffen, I., and C. Dermont. 2016. How Exclusive Is Assembly Democracy? Citizens’ Assembly and Ballot Participation Compared. Swiss Political Science Review 22 (1): 95–122. Stadelmann-Steffen, I., and C. Koller. 2014. What Type of Resources? Household Effects and Female Electoral Participation. Swiss Political Science Review 20 (4): 529–549. Sciarini, P., T.H. Ballmer-Cao, and R. Lachat. 2001. Genre, age et participation politique: les elections federales de 1995 dans le canton de Genève. Swiss Political Science Review 7 (3): 81–96.

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Vögeli, Y. 1997. Zwischen Hausrat und Rathaus. Auseinandersetzungen um die politische Gleichberechtigung der Frauen in der Schweiz 1945–1971. Zürich: Chronos. Wernli, B. 2006. Homo- et hétérogamie dans les attitudes et le comportement politique en Suisse. Swiss Political Science Review 12 (1): 33–72. World Economic Forum. 2016. The Global Gender Gap Report. http://reports. weforum.org/global-gendergap-report-2016/.

CHAPTER 12

Canada: Uneven Paths to Suffrage and Women’s Electoral Participation Nancy Janovicek and Melanee Thomas

The time will come, I honestly and firmly believe, when women will be equally represented with men on all government boards and councils. The viewpoint of women is essential. Annie Gale

Annie Gale—the first woman elected to Calgary City Council and to serve as acting mayor in the British Empire—was clearly optimistic about women’s political representation. She was first elected in 1917,1 one year after women in three Canadian provinces—Manitoba, Saskatchewan, and Alberta—won the provincial franchise and the same year as partial franchise was extended to some women in federal elections. This optimism is typical of the hopefulness of Anglo-Saxon middle-class suffragists in Canada in the early twentieth century, as they believed the vote and electing women to government would end opposition to the participation of (some, but certainly not all) women in electoral politics. Though women have made considerable gains over the twentieth and twenty-first centuries, women were not fully franchised in Canada until 1960. No woman has ever led a federal party to an electoral victory, and while several women have done so at the provincial level, they continue to

N. Janovicek (*) · M. Thomas  University of Calgary, Calgary, Canada e-mail: [email protected] M. Thomas e-mail: [email protected] © The Author(s) 2019 S. Franceschet et al. (eds.), The Palgrave Handbook of Women’s Political Rights, Gender and Politics, https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-137-59074-9_12

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face persistent and pernicious sexism despite their position as successful heads of government (CBC News 2016). This chapter outlines the route to full suffrage rights for women in Canada. Though some Canadian women were granted the right to vote provincially as early as 1916, and federally by 1918, several identifiable groups of women were denied the franchise until decades later. Women in Quebec were denied the provincial vote until 1940. Voting rights were explicitly denied to some racial and religious groups, such as Japanese, Chinese, and East Indian Canadians in the early twentieth century, and these legal restrictions were not removed until the late 1940s. And, Indigenous Canadians did not win full franchise rights until the passage of the first federal Bill of Rights in 1960, which instigated changes to the Indian Act. None of these suffrage rights were won because parties and governments were persuaded by arguments about women’s equality or gender-based rights. Instead, the franchise was most likely granted to women when political parties and governments decided that granting women voting rights was strategically advantageous or politically expeditious. This, when combined with structural and institutionalized racism, helps explain why Canadian women gained the vote in such a fractious manner. It also helps explain why, even in 2016, women remain so dramatically underrepresented in Canadian politics: Parties rarely nominate women as candidates at rates close to their demographic weight because they do not perceive it necessary. Instead, it is only when leaders make an explicit commitment to gender equality that Canadians see women more prominently represented in their governments. In the absence of this leadership, women in Canada are and will continue to be politically underrepresented.

Women’s Suffrage in Canada Canadian women were part of an international movement for women’s suffrage led by the International Woman Suffrage Alliance (IWSA), founded in 1902. Canadian suffragists established a national auxiliary of the IWSA in 1904 and were engaged in international conversations with social reformers, labor activists, and suffragists on strategies to extend the vote to women. A central debate was whether the vote ought to be extended to all women, or whether only elite women ought to be enfranchised. The IWSA did not endorse universal suffrage and supported the extension of the vote to women based on the criteria established by nation-states (Forestell and Moynagh 2012). In Canada at that time, voting rights were a privilege for (primarily white) men who owned property or who paid sufficient rent. This extended the vote to propertied men, as well as relatively well-paid, skilled male workers. Demands to expand the franchise by removing property requirements, and thus to include women and disenfranchised marginalized racial groups,

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coincided with the Confederation of the British North American colonies into the Dominion of Canada (1867). Debates about citizenship and voting involved complicated negotiations between the federal government and provincial and territorial politicians. Provinces such as British Columbia argued that voting rights ought to be denied to identifiable populations, such as Indigenous peoples and “undesirable” (non-white) immigrants, based on the relatively large size of Chinese, Japanese, and Sikh communities compared to other parts of Canada. As a result, the 1885 Franchise Act deliberately excluded women, as well as most Indigenous people and Asian immigrants (Campbell, forthcoming; Strong-Boag 2002; Sangster 2018). This explicit discrimination against racialized groups by more established, propertied British subjects and White settlers from preferred nations divided campaigners for women’s suffrage. The movement was diverse, but the dominant voices were middle-class Anglo-Saxon women with ties to the British Empire. French Canadian women organized separately from English-speaking women not only because of language barriers, but also because Anglophones considered the Québécois to be a colonized nation and an inferior “race” (Forestell and Moynagh 2014; see also Siegfried 1907). Imperialism also informed women reformers’ attitudes toward growing immigrant populations, especially when migration patterns changed to include immigrants from Eastern and Southern Europe and East Asia. Indigenous women were rarely considered in discussions about women’s rights. Colonial policies subordinated and segregated Indigenous peoples on reserves; given this, most suffragists, especially those in Eastern Canada, did not encounter Indigenous women, much less consider them in their discussions and activism to expand the franchise. Divisions in the suffrage movement reflect these considerations, with some suffrage activists explicitly advocating that the franchise be given exclusively to white women who owned property, while others argued franchise rights ought to be extended more broadly across ethnicity and economic status. Municipal and Provincial Firsts Though white women were privileged in Canada’s suffrage movement, voting rights were not extended to them easily. They were, however, the first to win voting rights in Canada. Typically, gains came first through municipal and provincial governments. Women’s suffrage campaigns were one component of broader movements for social reform, which offered respectable opportunities for women to engage in public service. However, women involved in campaigns for urban improvement presumed the superiority of the white race, and many social reformers were influenced by the eugenics movement (Bacchi 1983; Valverde 2008). For many suffrage campaigners, the vote was a means to greater political influence for specific women rather than a commitment to equal rights for all women.

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Campaigns for white women’s property rights demonstrate that some women were beginning to advocate for their civil rights. Some colonies, such as New Brunswick, extended property rights to married women as early as 1851 (MacDonald, forthcoming). Ontario and the Prairie provinces followed in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries (Chambers 1997; Cavanaugh 1993). In British Columbia, reforms extending property rights to women were arguably motivated more by settler colonialism in a province that had a majority Indigenous population (Clarkson 2007). Thus, in general, historians agree that the extension of property rights to women did not undermine patriarchal authority in families or extend women’s equality in significant ways. That said, women’s property rights helped secure the first franchises for white women in Canada, as provinces began to introduce legislation that extended the municipal franchise to women who held property in the late nineteenth century. British Columbia was the first province to give propertied women, both married and unmarried, the right to vote in municipal elections in 1873. In 1882, Ontario extended the right to vote on municipal bylaws to widows and spinsters who met the property requirements; two years later, franchise rights were extended to all unmarried women who held requisite property. Manitoba gave women the right to vote in municipal elections in 1887. However, Manitoba then retracted women’s municipal voting rights in 1907; women’s right to vote in Manitoba was not restored until 1916. The right to vote in municipal elections, however, did not mean that women could hold office. It is not known how women’s political engagement at the local level was connected to their demands for representation in municipal politics and at the provincial and federal levels (Cuthbert Brandt et al. 2011; Strong-Boag 2002; Woman Suffrage and Beyond 2016). What is known is that suffragists organized to demand women’s vote at federal and provincial levels around the same time women received the municipal franchise in some parts of Canada. For example, the Toronto Literary Club, founded by Dr. Emily Howard Stowe in 1876, was the first known organization to demand women be given access to federal and provincial electoral politics. In 1883, it had changed its name to the Canadian Woman Suffrage League (Murray 1999). It should be noted, however, that Black abolitionist, journalist, and educator Mary Ann Shadd Cary wrote often about gender and racial equality and universal suffrage in The Provincial Freeman, which she founded in 1853 (Rhodes 1998; Sangster 2018). Suffrage organizations demanding equality in property, profession, and politics were far less appealing than women’s social reform groups who reluctantly advocated for suffrage to increase their political influence. The Women’s Christian Temperance Union reluctantly endorsed suffrage in 1891 (Cook 1995). Women in socialist and labor organizations had tenuous connections to suffrage organizations. Working-class women were more concerned with reforms that would improve working conditions and wages than with suffrage. Workingclass and socialist women who supported suffrage had little in common with the club women who dominated official suffrage organizations. Instead of joining women’s official suffrage organizations, working-class women often worked within the Socialist Democratic Party and labor organizations to

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advocate for the expansion of the franchise. Prominent Vancouver labor leader Helena Gutteridge broke away from the Pioneer Political Equality League, the provincial suffrage organization, so that working-class women could advocate for both women’s suffrage and labor justice (Kealey 1998). The first breakthrough for women’s suffrage occurred in the Western Canadian provinces. Despite removing women’s municipal franchise in 1907, Manitoba was the first province to give women the right to vote in provincial elections and to hold provincial office in January 1916. Saskatchewan followed suit in March, and in April, Alberta passed legislation that gave propertied women formal equality to men in provincial, municipal, and school board electoral politics. These successes were partial, as they did not remove property requirements. Women’s suffrage in the Prairie provinces had strong support from farmers’ organizations and political parties, such as the United Farmers of Alberta. Farm organizations’ support for women’s suffrage has been overstated in the history of the Canadian West. While there may have been some recognition of women’s economic contribution to farm family economies, their endorsement of suffrage was also strategic as these organizations hoped to increase their voting power. For farmwomen, the suffrage campaign was linked to efforts to improve women’s property rights. Farmwomen in the Prairie provinces were denied property rights under the federal Homestead Act, dower protection was denied to them in order to facilitate land speculation. Sarah Carter has suggested that there may also be a link to the removal of dower laws in the Prairie provinces and the possibility that it would have protected the property rights of Indigenous and Métis women (Carter 2019). Once elected to provincial legislatures, women who had been engaged in the suffrage and dower campaigns were notably not successful in bringing about equitable changes to dower legislation (Cavanaugh 1993). Outside Quebec, the other nine Canadian provinces passed legislation extending the right to vote to women by 1925 (see Table 12.1). Each province had an active suffrage campaign that relied as much on governments Table 12.1  First year (some) women eligible to vote in Canada, by province

Jurisdiction

Year

Canada—federal British Columbia Alberta Saskatchewan Manitoba Ontario Quebec New Brunswick Prince Edward Island Nova Scotia Newfoundland and Labrador Yukon Territory

1917 1917 1916 1916 1916 1917 1940 1919 1922 1918 1925 1919

Source “Women’s Suffrage in Canada,” The Canadian Encyclopedia. Available at http://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/suffrage/

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extending the franchise for strategic reasons as they did on commitment to extending suffrage to women. Typically, when women received the franchise, it was because the primary suffrage organization’s political goals aligned with the government of the day. This was also the case for the federal vote. Federal Suffrage The First World War structured suffrage debates at the federal level. In 1917, partial suffrage was extended to women serving as nurses overseas or with male relatives in the military. The exigencies of government informed the decision to extend the franchise to select women. Conservative Prime Minister Robert Borden promised that no men would be conscripted for overseas service, but by 1916, high casualty rates in battle and decreasing voluntary recruitment at home compelled the government to reconsider. Conscription was a divisive issue in Canada, as most French-speaking Canadians, as well as farmers, trade unionists, and pacifists, opposed it. Liberal leader Sir Wilfred Laurier opposed conscription, but Borden convinced independents and some individual Liberal MPs to join the Union Government to pass legislation enabling conscription. The Union government passed two laws. First, The Military Voters Act gave the right to vote to all men and women serving overseas. Second, The Wartime Elections Act gave women with husbands or sons serving overseas the right to vote. This act also disenfranchised conscientious objectors and men who had emigrated from enemy nations since 1902. The achievement of partial suffrage for women at the federal level deepened the racial, ethnic, and class hierarchies informing debates on women’s suffrage. Noted suffragist Nellie McClung, whose son served overseas during WWI, recommended partial franchise to British- and Canadian-born women to Prime Minister Borden during the war; later, she revoked this position in response to Francis Marion Beynon’s opposition. Beynon argued that the partial franchise was a betrayal of the Icelandic, Polish, and Ruthenian women who had fought for the provincial franchise (Forestell and Moynagh 2012). In Quebec, opinion was deeply divided. The predominantly English-speaking Montreal Council of Women supported the Liberal Party’s opposition to conscription and was outspoken in its criticism of the Wartime Elections Act. In their view, the Act offended their commitment to women’s equality. Yet, others supported the Act, arguing that mothers of soldiers deserved voting rights because of the sacrifices their families were making to the war effort (Brookfield 2008). After the war, many women achieved equal voting rights to men in federal elections in 1920 through the Dominion Franchise Act. However, due to provisions in this Act, anyone who was not permitted to vote in provincial elections continued to be unable to vote in federal elections. Thus, because British Columbia did not extend the franchise to Chinese, Japanese, and East Indians until 1948, these citizens were also not permitted to vote in federal elections until 1948. This racially motivated disenfranchisement ended when East Indian activists successfully argued that as British subjects, they should be entitled to full citizenship rights.

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Once women received suffrage rights, they were elected as representatives, albeit in very small numbers. Louise McKinney was the first woman elected to the Alberta Legislature in 1917, and Agnes Macphail was the first woman elected to the federal House of Commons in 1921. Yet, the government argued that women could not be appointed to the Senate because they were not considered “persons” under the law. When Emily Murphy sought an appointment to the Senate in 1921, Prime Minister Arthur Meighen refused, arguing that the Fathers of Confederation would not have considered women to be “qualified persons.” Murphy, a prominent suffragist and the first woman police magistrate in the British Empire, worked with Henrietta Muir Edwards, Nellie McClung, Louise McKinney, and Irene Parlby to challenge this narrow interpretation of the constitution. These women became known as the Famous Five. Initially unsuccessful, the Famous Five appealed to the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council (JCPC) in Britain, the final court of appeal in Canada until 1949. In his judgment, Lord Sankey argued that, “the exclusion of women from all public offices is a relic of days more barbarous than ours” and the constitution should evolve to reflect current values (Sharpe and McMahon 2007, p. 179). Thus, women achieved full legal personhood in Canada in 1929. Women’s Suffrage in Quebec The political context for women in Quebec is unique not only because they felt marginalized in the British-dominated suffrage movement, but also because of the influence of Quebecois national movements and the Catholic Church. Quebec was the last province to pass women’s suffrage legislation in 1940. While many women in Quebec accepted nationalist and Catholic arguments that feminism would undermine French Canadian families, a vocal suffrage campaign countered their argument, belying assumptions that French women were inherently more conservative than their English counterparts. Before 1849, women who owned property in Quebec had the right to vote. New France had been governed by the Custom of Paris, giving French Canadian women dower and property rights unlike their peers in English-speaking Canada. Under English Common Law, married women’s legal rights and obligations were subsumed under her husband; by contrast in Quebec, marriage created a communauté des biens. Property brought into the marriage remained personal assets, and property acquired during the marriage was jointly owned. Single women and widows who owned property could vote. During the 1832 Montreal by-elections, two hundred women went to the hustings, demanding their right to vote. Male political elites were offended by voting women, in part because of outspoken philosophical treatises that demanded the exclusion of women from politics in response to their demands for equal citizenship (Bradbury 2006; Greer 1993). Perhaps inspired by the Montreal women, seven widows in Canada West (now Ontario) cast ballots in the 1844 election. In retaliation, the government passed a law explicitly denying women the vote (Brookfield 2018). In 1849, Quebec’s House

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of Assembly passed a law, removing propertied women’s right to vote. It is likely not a coincidence that this occurred in Quebec a year after the Seneca Falls Convention the United States (Bradbury 2006). During the next two decades, the other British North American colonies passed laws to formally exclude women as they developed their electoral systems (Strong-Boag 2002). Despite an active suffrage movement, Quebec women did not win the provincial franchise until 1940 because of the anti-suffrage Quebecois National Movement, which had strong connections to the Catholic Church leadership. Nationalist leaders depicted feminism as an English Protestant plot to undermine French Canadian values; this intensified the already prevailing notion that women’s participation in politics was unnatural. The nationalist movement championed the protection of the French Canadian family, and editorials in the nationalist newspaper Le Devoir extolled women as the guardians of religion, morals, and the family and warned that feminism was a threat to the family (Mann 2002; Dumont 2012; Baillargeon 2019). Thus, while women in English-speaking provinces had gained property rights and access to education and the professions beginning in the 1870s, French Canadian women, who had once enjoyed greater rights than English-speaking women, were unable to secure these rights because of conservative opposition to women’s independence. Allegiance to faith and nationalism created precarious alliances between Francophone and Anglophone suffragists in Quebec. The Montreal Council of Women of Canada conducted its business in English and occasionally allied with Francophone women to lobby for the vote. Francophone members who also had connections to nationalist and Catholic groups organized autonomously as the Fédération Nationale Saint-Jean-Baptiste (FNSJB). This umbrella organization, under the auspices of the Catholic Church, brought together women working in charitable organizations, labor and professional organizations, and educational groups committed to advancing women’s rights. Church leaders carefully monitored the work of the FNSJB to ensure that the organization worked to only improve women’s lives, but did not advance women’s rights. Despite this church opposition, the FNSJB organized for the vote and in 1922 joined forces with Anglophone women to found the Provincial Suffrage Committee. In the 1920s and 1930s, the committee launched a dozen campaigns to the legislature to make their case for suffrage. In 1938, Quebec feminists changed tactics and lobbied the provincial Liberal Party, then in opposition, to endorse women’s suffrage. Led by Thérèse Casgrain, vice president of the Club des femmes liberals, women agreed to volunteer their labor during the provincial campaign if the party convention agreed to endorse women’s suffrage. The Liberals won the 1940 provincial election, and Premier Adélard Godbout introduced legislation to extend the vote to women. The bill passed in April 1940. Though women in Quebec and elsewhere in Canada struggled for decades to get the vote, no group of Canadian women were denied the franchise for as long as were Indigenous women. It is to their experience we now turn.

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Indigenous Women, Governance, and Women’s Suffrage Canada is a white settler society. Nineteenth-century ideologies about the racial inferiority of Indigenous peoples shaped policy. Nation-building forced the dispossession of Indigenous lands through colonization, treaties negotiated on unequal terms, and the assimilation of Indigenous peoples into capitalist economies and Christian values. Colonialism thus makes it impossible to integrate Indigenous women into narratives of the campaign for women’s suffrage. Indigenous historians argue attaining suffrage is a narrative of declension rather than part of a story about the uneven struggle to attain political rights and equality (Leddy, forthcoming). Under Indian policy, enfranchisement determined successful assimilation. The Gradual Civilization Act, a colonial policy introduced in 1857, encouraged debt-free and educated First Nations men of “good moral character” to apply for private land. Land ownership was a prerequisite for voting, and this policy was introduced to encourage Indigenous people to take out individual property, thus undermining collective land rights. Men who chose to enfranchise were expected to relinquish their treaty rights. The Gradual Enfranchisement Act followed in 1869 and extended colonial policies that encouraged Indigenous men to abandon treaty rights in favor of “full citizenship.” If men chose to enfranchise, their wives and families were automatically removed from the Indian Registry. These assimilationist policies were amalgamated into the Indian Act in 1876 (Miller 2000). The Gradual Enfranchisement Act formalized women’s dependence on male-led families by introducing gender-based restrictions on status, policies that were reinforced in the 1876 Indian Act. Section 12 (1)(b) of the Indian Act removed Indigenous women who married non-Aboriginal men or First Nations men without status from the Indian Registry, yet white women became “status Indians” when they married a man who had status. This policy remained in place until 1985, despite decades-long campaigns from individual women and grassroots women’s groups to reinstate women who had lost their status through marriage (Silman 1987). This gender discrimination in the Indian Act meant that Indigenous women had different voting rights after the extension of the federal franchise to all women in 1919. Women who had lost their treaty status by marriage were involuntarily enfranchised at that time. After the Second World War, a parliamentary committee recommended that the franchise be extended to First Nations peoples in recognition of the service of many Indigenous men during the war. It was not until 1960 that all First Nations people had the right to vote without being stripped of their treaty status or Indigenous identity by the state. Historically, the provinces insisted that Indigenous people were under federal jurisdiction and therefore not provincial citizens. Provincial franchise rights were first extended to First Nations living on reservations in British

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Columbia in 1949. Quebec was the last province to allow Indigenous people to vote in provincial elections in 1969. The federal franchise was not the only electoral policy the Canadian government employed to assimilate Indigenous peoples. The Canadian state undermined and removed Indigenous forms of governance, replacing them with elected bands and councils that had similar powers as municipal governments. This resulted in the destruction of traditional kinship governance that recognized women’s leadership roles (Miller 2000). Perhaps ironically, Indigenous women enjoyed the right to vote in band politics in 1951, almost a decade earlier than they could participate in federal politics. Ojibwe leader Elsie Marie Knott, member of the Curve Lake First Nation, was the first woman elected as Chief in 1952. Today, women play active roles in community politics. Yet they are still underrepresented in Indigenous governance (Voyageur 2008).

Women’s Electoral Participation Post-suffrage How did women’s enfranchisement affect Canadian elections? Prior to 1965 and the launch of the Canadian Election Studies (CES), reliable data do not exist to identify how women’s electoral participation, partisan affiliation, and vote choice varied from men’s. Yet, research reliably shows that Canadian women’s electoral participation is considerably different from men’s and has been for quite some time. With respect to voter turnout, research from the USA suggests that after suffrage, women were on average less likely to vote than were men. This has changed over time, as more women were extended the franchise and as it became normalized for women to vote. Now, the generalization is that women are consistently more likely to vote than are men, though this effect is rather small (between two to four percentage points, see Elections Canada 2016). Canadians’ motivations for voting also appear to be structured by gender, as women are more likely than men to report voting out of a sense of duty, while men are more likely than women to indicate they vote because they are interested in politics (Blais 2000). Gender also structures which parties and candidates Canadians vote for. There is limited information on women’s partisan preferences prior to 1965, though what does exist suggests that women’s votes did not change the partisan balance of Canadian federal elections very much. The changes that do appear are found only in some provinces (i.e., Ontario) and show a slight advantage for the Liberal Party (Morgan-Collins 2016). More recent data consistently show considerable gender gaps in vote choice. In the 1960s and 1970s, women were considerably less likely than men to support the New Democratic Party (NDP), a left-leaning party with strong ties to the labor movement; however, by the 1980s, women were as likely as men to vote NDP. Similarly, between the 1960s and early 1990s, women appear more

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likely than men to vote for the Liberals. Women’s willingness to vote for more right-leaning parties appears to be mixed: Women were more likely than men to vote for the Progressive Conservatives (PCs) in the 1960s and the 1990s, but not in the 1980s.2 And, women are consistently less likely than men to vote for newer parties on the ideological right, such as the Reform Party or the merged Conservative Party of Canada (CPC). Thus, it seems Canada first exhibited a traditional gender gap, with women more to the right than men, before undergoing a period of gender realignment. Now, Canada has a modern gender gap, where women are on average more likely to support a party on the political left than are men. This is because women typically prioritize different issues and hold different values and beliefs than do men (Gidengil et al. 2004, 2012, 2013). There is also some evidence to show that in Canada’s most recent federal election, women evaluate party leaders differently than do men (O’Neill and Thomas 2016). Given this, it is fair to conclude that gender is an enduring feature or cleavage of the Canadian electoral landscape. With the right to vote also comes the right to stand for election, though very few women (just four) chose to exercise this right in 1921. Between 1921 and 1972, between zero and five women were elected as Members of Parliament (MPs) at each federal election. This increased considerably in 1974, where nine women were elected; following this, the number of women elected as MPs increased steadily until 2000. Then, between 2000 and 2008, the number of women elected stalled, before increasing marginally in the 2011 and 2015 elections (Parliament of Canada 2017). Currently, women comprise 26 percent of MPs and roughly one-third of the Indigenous and visible minority MPs. Between 9 and 37% of representatives in provincial and territorial governments are women (calculated from Parliament of Canada 2016), and women comprise a mere 16% of mayors (Federation of Canadian Municipalities 2016). In general, then, women’s presence in electoral office in Canada has increased over time, certainly, but often at a glacial pace. This is due, at least in part, to two factors: First, an absolute majority of nominated candidates for public office are men. Second, political parties at the federal level appear to consistently nominate women in seats they cannot win; men, by contrast, are more likely to be nominated in a safe seat. This is also the case in some, but not all Canadian provinces (Thomas and Bodet 2013, 2016). The crucial factor appears to be whether a party leader demands that their party nominate women at the same rate as men. Without this leadership, women are consistently less likely than men to be nominated as candidates for public office. And, contrary to popular belief, and despite the absence of formal party systems in the overwhelming majority of Canadian cities, there is little evidence to suggest that local electoral politics present fewer barriers to women than do provincial or federal politics (Gidengil and Vengroff 1997).

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Canada has only had one woman serve as prime minister, Kim Campbell, who achieved the post after winning the Conservative party leadership. Her party suffered a stunning electoral defeat in the subsequent parliamentary elections in 1993. No woman has ever led a federal political party to victory in federal elections. The situation is somewhat different in the provinces, where eight women have served as premiers. Of these, three did so by taking over parties that were in crisis or decline, and the others, even though their parties might have been in a stronger position, often found themselves leading governments in precarious, unstable positions (Thomas 2018). Despite the overwhelming dominance of male party leaders at both the federal and provincial level, Canada has seen a relatively high number of female party leaders compared to other countries (21 between 1980 and 2005; see O’Neill and Stewart 2009). Women are more likely than men to lead small, electorally uncompetitive parties, and parties led by men have typically had more electoral success. Recent developments provide some optimism for women’s electoral participation. First, as noted above, women are more likely than men to vote in most elections in Canada. In 2015, approximately 68% of women voted in the federal election, compared to 64% of men (Elections Canada 2016). Indigenous voter turnout increased dramatically in 2015 as well, though there is little evidence to show that Indigenous women vote at a higher rate than Indigenous men (Fournier and Loewen 2011). Second, Canadian voters are as willing to vote for women candidates as they are to vote for men (Goodyear-Grant 2010). Third, once elected, women parliamentarians in Canada can and do advocate for women’s rights and gender-based policy initiatives, despite working within a system rigidly defined by party discipline (Tremblay 1998). Fourth, both the Government of Canada and the Governments of Alberta and British Columbia had parity cabinets in 2017, with women holding 50% of the ministerial posts. Women’s growing presence in cabinet is helping to normalize the idea that gender merits explicit representation in Canadian politics, though resistance to this parity representation persists (Franceschet et al. 2015). Yet grounds for pessimism remain. When women Members of Parliament (MPs) came forward with allegations of misconduct against them by their male peers, it became clear that the House of Commons had no mechanism to address this kind of peer-to-peer (sexual) harassment (Ditchburn 2014). Three women who led provincial governments—the Premiers of British Columbia (Christy Clark), Alberta (Rachel Notley), and Ontario (Kathleen Wynne)—candidly report that it is common for some men to ignore them in meetings and instead only address other men in the room. This can easily be taken as obvious discomfort with a woman acting as a head of governments (CBC News 2016). The Internet and social media facilitate the sexual harassment of female party leaders during election campaigns (Kavanaugh 2016), and it is not uncommon for elected women to receive legitimate death threats (Boyd 2016). Research into these phenomena is in its nascence, but preliminary conclusions suggest this hostility toward women in politics eclipses the negative communication received by their male peers.

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In sum, the fight for women’s voting rights in Canada was long, fractured, and structured by many factors outside of gender-based rights or support for women’s equality. Women in Canada have had suffrage rights for nearly 60 years, and women have certainly made considerable gains in political participation and representation. Yet, as noted above, there are multiple areas where Canadian women’s political equality lags men’s. As a result, women continue to be one of the most politically underrepresented identifiable groups in Canadian politics.

Notes 1. Gale campaigned as an independent because she believed that she could advocate more effectively for women’s issues if she was not restricted by political party priorities. She had broad support and won two terms, serving as Alderman from 1917–1923 (Lishman 1985). 2. This might be because, in the 1980s, the federal PCs were advocating for women-friendly policies, such as a national childcare program, and women were promoted to important cabinet positions, such as Defense and Justice, for the first time under a PC government in the late 1980s and early 1990s.

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CBC News. 2016. Clinton Nomination a ‘Good Start,’ but Politics Still Rife with Sexism, Canada’s Female Premiers Say. http://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/ the-national-women-premiers-wynne-notley-clark-1.3691954. Chambers, L. 1997. Married Women and Property Law in Victorian Ontario. Toronto: UTP Press. Clarkson, C. 2007. Domestic Reforms Political Visions and Family Regulation in British Columbia, 1862–1940. Vancouver: UBC Press. Cook, S. 1995. Through Sunshine and Shadow: The Woman’s Christian Temperance Union, Evangelicalism, and Reform in Ontario, 1874–1930. Montreal and Kingston: McGill-Queen’s University Press. Cuthbert Brandt, G., N. Black, P. Bourne, and M. Fahrni. 2011. Canadian Women: A History, 3rd ed. Toronto: Nelson Education. Ditchburn, J. 2014. Liberals Seek Fair Process for MP Harassment Allegations. CBC News. http://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/liberals-seek-fair-process-for-mpharassment-allegations-1.2834944. Dumont, M. 2012. Feminism À La Québecoise, trans. N. Kennedy. Ottawa: Feminist History Society. Elections Canada. 2016. Voter Turnout by Sex and Age. http://www.elections.ca/ content.aspx?section=res&dir=rec/eval/pes2015/vtsa&document=table2& lang=e. Federation of Canadian Municipalities. 2016. http://www.fcm.ca/home/programs/ women-in-local-government.htm. Forestell, N.M., and M. Moynagh (eds.). 2012. Documenting First Wave Feminisms: Volume I Transnational Collaborations and Crosscurrents. Toronto: University of Toronto Press. ———. (eds.). 2014. Documenting First Wave Feminisms: Volume II: Canada— National and Transnational Contexts. Toronto: University of Toronto Press. Fournier, P., and Loewen, P. 2011. Aboriginal Electoral Participation in Canada. Elections Canada. http://www.elections.ca/res/rec/part/abel/AEP_en.pdf. Franceschet, S., K. Beckwith, and C. Annesley. 2015. Why Are We Still Debating Diversity Versus Merit in 2015? Federation for the Humanities and Social Sciences, Blog. http://www.ideas-idees.ca/blog/why-are-we-still-debating-diversity-versusmerit-2015. Gidengil, E., A. Blais, N. Nevitte, and R. Nadeau. 2004. Citizens. Vancouver: UBC Press. Gigengil, E., J. Everitt, A. Blais, P. Fournier, and N. Nevitte. 2013. Explaining the Modern Gender Gap. In Mind the Gaps: Canadian Perspectives on Gender and Politics, ed. R. Lexier and T. Small. Halifax: Fernwood Publishing. Gidengil, E., N. Nevitte, A. Blais, J. Everitt, and P. Fournier. 2012. Dominance and Decline: Making Sense of Recent Canadian Elections. Toronto: University of Toronto press. Gidengil, E., and R. Vengroff. 1997. Representative Bureaucracy, Tokenism and the Class Ceiling: The Case of Women in Quebec Municipal Administration. Canadian Public Administration 40: 457–480. Greer, A. 1993. The Patriots and the People: The Rebellion of 1837 in Rural Lower Canada. Toronto: University of Toronto Press. Goodyear-Grant, E. 2010. Who Voters for Women Candidates and Why? Evidence from Recent Canadian Elections. In Voting Behaviour in Canada, ed. C.D. Anderson and L. Stephenson. Vancouver: UBC Press.

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Kavanaugh, S. 2016. Manitoba’s Ex-Liberal Leader Target of Lewd Photos, Offers of Sex During Election. CBC News. http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/manitoba/ bokhari-liberal-manitoba-election-sexual-harrassment-1.3859093. Kealey, L. 1998. Enlisting Women for the Cause: Women, Labour, and the Left in Canada, 1890–1920. Toronto: University of Toronto Press. Leddy, L. Forthcoming. Working Tirelessly for Change: Indigenous Women and the Vote in Canada. Vancouver: UBC Press. Lishman, J. 1985. Alderman Mrs. Annie Gale. Vancouver: S. Graham. MacDonald, H. Forthcoming. We Shall Persist: Women and the Vote in the Atlantic Provinces. Vancouver: UBC Press. Mann, S. 2002. The Dream of Nation: A Social and Intellectual History of Quebec. Montreal and Kingston: McGill-Queen’s University Press. Miller, J.R. 2000. Skyscrapers Hide the Heavens: A History of Indian-White Relations in Canada, 3rd rev. ed. Toronto: University of Toronto Press. Morgan-Collins, M. 2016. Women at the Polls: Examination of Women’s Early Voting Behaviour. Doctoral Dissertation, London School of Economics. Murray, H. 2002. Great Works and Good Works: The Toronto Women’s Literary Club, 1877–1883. Historical Studies in Education 11 (1) (1999): 75–95. O’Neill, B., and D.K. Stewart. 2009. Gender and Political Party Leadership in Canada. Party Politics 15: 737–757. O’Neill, B., and M. Thomas. 2016. Because It’s 2015: Gender and the 2015 Election. In The Canadian Federal Election of 2015, ed. J. Pammett and C. Dornan. Toronto: Dundurn Press. Parliament of Canada. 2016. Women in the Provincial and Territorial legislatures. http://www.lop.parl.gc.ca/ParlInfo/compilations/provinceterritory/Women. aspx?Province=edad4077-a735-48ad-982e-1dcad72f51b6&Current=True. Parliament of Canada. 2017. Women Candidates in General Elections: 1921 to Date. http://www.lop.parl.gc.ca/About/Parliament/FederalRidingsHistory/hfer. asp?Language=E&Search=WomenElection&srt=ASC. Rhodes, J. 1998. Mary Ann Shadd Cary: The Black Free Press and Protest in the Nineteenth Century. Bloomington: Indiana University Press. Sangster, J. 2018. One Hundred Years of Struggle: The History of Women and the Vote in Canada. Vancouver: UBC Press. Sharpe, R.J., and P.I. McMahon. 2007. The Persons Case: The Origins and Legacy of the Fight for Legal Personhood. Toronto: University of Toronto Press. Siegfried, A. 1907. The Race Question in Canada. London: Eveleigh Nash. Silman, J. 1987. Enough Is Enough: Aboriginal Women Speak Out. Toronto: Women’s Press. Strong-Boag, V. 2002. “The Citizenship Debates”: The 1885 Franchise Act. In Contesting Canadian Citizenship: Historical Readings, ed. R. Adamoski, D.E. Chunn, and R. Menzies, 69–94. Peterborough: Broadview Press. Tremblay, M. 1998. Do Female MPs Substantively Represent Women? A Study of Legislative Behaviour in Canada’s 35th Parliament. Canadian Journal of Political Science 31: 435–465. Thomas, M. 2018. In Crisis or Decline? Selecting Women to Lead Provincial Parties in Government. Canadian Journal of Political Science 51 (2): 379–403. Thomas, M., and M.A. Bodet. 2013. Sacrificial Lambs, Women Candidates, and District Competitiveness in Canada. Electoral Studies 32: 153–166.

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Thomas, M., and M.A. Bodet. 2016. Subnational Sacrificial Lambs: Gender and District Competitiveness in the Canadian Provinces. Paper Presented at the State of Democratic Citizenship in Canada conference, September 23–24, Montreal, 2016. Valverde, M. 2008. The Age of Light, Soap, and Water: Moral Reform in English Canada, 1885–1925. Toronto: University of Toronto Press. Voyageur, C. 2008. Firekeepers of the Twenty-First Century: First Nations Women Chiefs. Montreal: McGill-Queen’s University Press. Woman Suffrage and Beyond. 2016. Timeline. http://womensuffrage.org/, http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/calgary/rachel-notley-death-threats-1.3363938, http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/edmonton/man-charged-with-threats-aftercall-to-alberta-environment-minister-1.3525534, http://www.metronews.ca/news/edmonton/2016/11/16/alberta-women-politics-insults-threats-harassment.html, http://www.metronews.ca/news/edmonton/2016/11/17/2016-alberta-politics-women-face-abuse.html.

CHAPTER 13

Afghanistan: Uphill Challenges for Women’s Political Rights Andrea Fleschenberg

Afghan women’s trajectory of suffrage and subsequent political participation has been and continues to be an uphill battle, a dangerous one marked by highly precarious gains in an extremely volatile sociocultural and political context. It has been marked by fluidity of rules, fragile-cum-contested, hybrid institutions and decades-long legacies of public silencing, marginalisation or outright misogynist systemic exclusion along with high levels of sociocultural and political conflict intensity. Gender has been and continues to be one key site of ideological contestation and sociocultural cleavages among key power holders as well as society at large. In addition, women’s political activism takes place within a framework of shifting (inter-)national priorities, making gender a frequent bargaining chip in political negotiations and power arrangements. Are there any signs of sustainably consolidating women’s This chapter is based on a series of more comprehensive studies I have been carrying out in Afghanistan since 2007 with the support of Heinrich Böll Stiftung Afghanistan Office (see Fleschenberg 2009, 2012). This writing relies on the research paper titled ‘It’s not charity, it’s a seat of power—Moving beyond symbolic representation in Afghanistan’s transition politics’ (hbs 2016). I would like to thank, for the third time now (hopefully not the last), the wonderful team in Kabul, in particular Marion Müller, Zia Moballegh, Abdullah Athayi, Neelab Hakim, Afghan Gul and Nadeem, as well as both research assistants, Mateeullah Tareen and Masooda Saifi, who accompanied me during the field research and data analysis process in Kabul and Islamabad and without whom this research would not have been possible.

A. Fleschenberg (*)  Cologne, Germany © The Author(s) 2019 S. Franceschet et al. (eds.), The Palgrave Handbook of Women’s Political Rights, Gender and Politics, https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-137-59074-9_13

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political participation as voters, candidates, parliamentarians and civil society activists or are we witnessing a transition backwards, a chronic precariousness as all gains are ‘at the mercy of uncivil society’ (Azerbaijani-Moghadam 2007, p. 134) and thus reversible or ultimately insignificant? It is beyond the scope of this case study to elaborate the historical, sociocultural, economic and political intricacies and complexities of Afghan women’s experience—at the discursive as well as practical level—of suffrage and subsequent political participation. Consequently, I focus on post-2001 developments in this regard: first, I briefly outline key parameters of suffrage; next, I address on experiences surrounding women’s experiences as national parliamentarians in the second Wolesi Jirga and before the upcoming third parliamentary elections since the beginning of the 2001 international intervention in Afghanistan.

Mapping Afghanistan’s Electoral System Afghanistan follows a rarely employed majoritarian electoral system, Single Non-Transferable Vote (SNTV), in which voters can cast one ballot in province-based multi-member constituencies and where political parties so far don’t play a key role in parliamentary politics and societal interest aggregation. It has a bicameral parliamentary system, composed of the Wolesi Jirga (House of the People/Lower House, 249 seats) and the Meshrano Jirga (House of the Elders/Upper House, 102 seats) and predominantly ‘independent’ electoral candidates and legislators. Quotas exist for two marginalised groups, women and Kuchi nomads. According to Article 83 of the 2004 Constitution and Articles 20 and 23 of the 2010 Electoral Law, at least 68 Wolesi Jirga seats are reserved for women. Of these, three are assigned to Kuchi female representatives (a nomadic community). These reserved seats shall not remain vacant (i.e. in case of an insufficient number of candidates) or be regarded as a glass ceiling (i.e. as a maximum number), because Article 23 of the 2010 Electoral Law stipulates that the remaining seats of the respective multi-member constituency are decided according to SNTV rules, regardless of a candidate’s gender. This means the number of women parliamentarians is not determined by the number of reserved seats. In the 2010 parliamentary elections, 69 women candidates were successful and joined the Wolesi Jirga. In the Meshrano Jirga, two-thirds of its members are indirectly elected by the country’s 34 provincial councils and one-third are appointed by the President with a gender parity clause applying for presidential nominees, according to Article 84 of the 2004 Constitution. The revised 2010 Electoral Law stipulates in Article 30 that at least 20% of the seats in provincial councils shall go to women. The remainder of the seats follows SNTV rules, again regardless of a successful candidate’s gender, but is nevertheless a reduction from the previously codified 25%.1

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Widespread electoral fraud, along with disputes about electoral rules in 2010 and 2014 elections, has led to an understanding among President Ghani and CEO Abdullah that no further elections shall be held without a substantive review of previous election issues and subsequent electoral reforms. Consequently, a Special Electoral Reform Commission was set up in mid-July 2015. Ten of its short-term recommendations were endorsed by the presidential decree of 6 September 2015, including a unanimous declaration that the SNTV system is ‘outdated’ and needs to be overhauled in order to strengthen political parties, accountability, sociopolitical stability and fair representation. Interesting are the gender-specific recommendations: (i) 25% of reserved seats for women in provincial and district councils and (ii) voter registration processes to be made women-friendly, including the waver of specific identification documents, distribution of and access to polling stations. The present set of recommendations of 65 seats for female independent candidates and three reserved seats for Kuchi women representatives appears to uphold the current constitutional provision in place.2 Previous surveys by electoral and women’s rights watchdogs have outlined a widespread support among stakeholders for the perpetuation of gender quotas at various levels of the polity (e.g. FEFA 2013, 2015). A 2015 survey with 125 out of 249 members of the Wolesi Jirga found that 42% of all parliamentarians (and 55.8% of women MPs) surveyed agreed that ‘conditions for candidacy must change for women candidates, given the social and economic barriers’, like traditional mindsets and practices, non-refundable candidate deposit fees and/or copies of voters’ registration cards as supporting candidacy files (FEFA 2015, p. 4). However, a majority of 58% (out of which 83% were male MPs) contended that there should be no positive discrimination to mitigate gender-specific vulnerabilities and disadvantages of female candidates. One of the leading women’s rights networks, Afghan Women’s Network (AWN) conducted a survey in 2014 with a sample size of nearly 500 respondents from 18 provinces on women’s political participation. These respondents comprised members of the business community, those from judicial, academic and medical sectors, religious leaders and common citizens; 68% of women and 60% of men surveyed considered quotas to be an important necessity. Equally, 63% of female respondents perceived women to be culturally accepted when participating in political, judicial and trade-related public affairs, while 47% of male respondents held an opposite view (Karlidag 2014, pp. 3, 15–16).

Mapping Afghan Women’s Suffrage Trajectory It was only in 1959 that women received the right to appear in public without a veil, and it took until 1964 for women to secure their voting rights (Kreile 2005, p. 109), so that a nearly impermeable gender-segregated public–private divide, prevailing for decades (if not centuries), was substantially

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contested. ‘[A]lthough women made up 15% of the Loya Jirga [traditionally held, male-dominated or male-only grand councils] in 1977, until 2002 none had actually participated’ (Nordlund 2004, p. 7). In contrast, since the overthrow of the Taliban in 2001, the First and Second Transformation Decades are marked by several steps towards democratisation, including the break-up of pervasive glass ceilings and glass walls surrounding Afghan women, slowly changing the face of Afghan politics. However, women’s rights remain a contested issue, perceived by some as alien or top-down domination (Hancock and Nemat 2011; Kabeer et al. 2011). Marred by lack of intervention capacities and political will by current state institutions, increased insecurity along with systematic threat campaigns, accusations and attacks, women have participated in all post-2011 key decision-making forums/bodies, (sub-)national elections as voters and candidates and served in ministerial capacity as well as governors. Since 2003, more than 30,000 women participated in community development councils and more than 60,000 in gender-segregated village councils as voters and candidates in a series of elections. This is despite deteriorating conditions and apart from being members in provincial- and national-level peace councils. In the 2002 Emergency Loya Jirga, ten percent of the 1600 seats were reserved for women, who participated in higher numbers, increasing their proportional share to twelve percent or some 200 female delegates (HRW 2005, p. 8). Their number went up to one-third in the Constitutional Loya Jirga convened thereafter to draft the new constitution (Abirafeh 2005, p. 7). During the 2005 parliamentary and provincial council elections, 8.2% of all provincial council candidates (247 out of a total of 3025) and 12.8% of all parliamentary candidates (335 out of a total of 2775 candidates) were women as were 41% of voters (or 2.6 million), a significant achievement given the current misogynist record of political participation (IEC 2010, p. 25). The second round of elections was carried out in 2009 and 2010. The presidential race saw two female candidates (4.9%) running and nearly eleven percent of provincial council candidates were female, a significant increase from 247 to 328 women contesting elections at the provincial level. However, the percentage of female voters slightly decreased to 38.8% due to intimidations, prohibitions, threats and violence during the elections. For the parliamentary elections of 2010, 406 out of 2577 candidates (amounting to 15.8%) were women—again a slight increase from the previous 335 in 2005—while the number of female voters slightly decreased to 39.1%, similarly to 2009. In the second Wolesi Jirga, 69 out of 249 parliamentarians are women, surpassing the quota requirement of 68 (or 27.3%) (NDI 2010, p. 32). Moreover, 28 out of 102 Meshrano Jirga members and 120 out of 420 provincial council members are women. Over the years, women managed to make inroads in terms of representation in a number of public arenas other than politics, for example in commerce, medicine, higher education, agriculture, law or media. In the

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judicial branch, women represent 5.4% of the country’s judges and 9.4% of prosecutors; 22% of civil servants are women. However, leadership positions are scarce, be it in parliament, government or the judiciary. Patriarchal attitudes and discriminatory mindsets within society and among decision-makers and power brokers along with insecurity, intimidation and repeated violent attacks on women remain powerful obstacles to women’s substantive representation and public participation. In the following, linked to questions of substantive representation and political citizenship, I will review3 experiences of women parliamentarians regarding (i) constituency, (ii) political performance, (iii) challenges/obstacles, along with (iv) debates on electoral reforms and the quota design, made since the 2010 elections in the second Wolesi Jirga (Table 13.1).4

‘I Am a Voice, Their Voice, of Those Who Are not Loud’5: The Issue of Constituency Constituency-building has been identified as a key feature of women’s sustainable political mainstreaming, rendering quotas, ultimately, a temporary (and not a permanent) feature of positive discrimination to address systemic political inequalities. There are a number of structural limitations to constituency-building. Key issues are influential ethnolinguistic identity politics and close-knit electoral communities, whose members will only vote for a candidate of their kind and no one else, because ‘even if you are [a] superwoman or [a] superman, they will never’6 accept an outside candidate. Secondly, in highly fraudulent elections, goons and guns circumvent a level playing field; in particular, progressive, pro-democracy candidates and performance-based track records of candidates fail to decisively matter. Consequently, this means that is not as decisive if women (quota) politicians manage to build their own Table 13.1  Percentage of women voters and candidates in post-2001 elections Election 2004 (Presidential) 2005 (Provincial Councils) 2005 (Parliamentary) 2009 (Presidential) 2009 (Provincial Councils) 2010 (Parliamentary) 2014 (Provincial Councils) 2014 (Presidential) Source IEC (2010, 2014)

Percentage of women voters (%)

No. of total candidates No. of women candidates

37 41

18 3025

1 247

41 38.8

2775 39 3196

335 2 328

39.1 36 (1st round) 38 (2nd round)

2577 2713

406 308

11

0

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constituencies, but rather that if they find a suitable political environment in which their own political capacities and performance parameters do play a role, or if so-called political mafias and violent power brokers can manipulate the electoral pool of candidates and electoral success, to ensure their proxies to be voted into power.7 Thirdly, Afghan politics is still marked by conflict features and legacies of previous political regimes, amounting to influential conservative power brokers and former conflict actors shaping voters’ preferences. Change agents like a number of outspoken women parliamentarians thus pose a significant threat to such traditional stakeholders who have no interest in altering the system (i.e. for them,) losing power and privilege or facing prosecution. This can lead to verbal and physical threats and attacks as well as blocking of crucial legislative initiatives from such conservative power brokers. Fourthly, some outline that constituency-building can also be marked by gendered connotations of leadership and representation, as not all communities equally accept and endorse women politicians as their national representative, regardless of previous constituency work either as a social worker, provincial council member, parliamentarian and so on.8 Key issues of sustainable constituency-building for re-election bids repeatedly pointed out by a number of women parliamentarians interviewed include: • fraud and vote-buying by competitors in an uneven level political playing field; enabled or exacerbated by a • structural lack of resources of women candidates—be it financial/ economic or sociocultural capital along with • mobility issues due to reasons of political instability, outright insecurity and conflict, as well as sociocultural constraints imposed by family and/ or community members, political power brokers and/or religious stakeholders, among others.9

‘I Just Changed the Public Perception’10: Women’s Political Performance There seems to be no controversy that women’s presence has had an impact, changed the rules of the game and traditions to a certain extent despite conflict legacies and a politicised, volatile environment. Performance assessments, based on opinions gathered from the interview partners and those from the FGD discussions (comprising of those involved in parliamentary watchdog, electoral or women’s advocacy efforts, such as under the umbrella of the AWN), ranged from ‘zero, zero, zero’, ‘50/50 performance rate’ to ‘good achievements’ in terms of legislation, government oversight, level of overall activity and constituency work, along with participating in parliamentary and public debates, respectively. Qualifying the above and as outlined in previous studies, a smaller number of about 10–25 women MPs (out of the current 69) were always assessed in terms of good, transformative and/or outstanding performance, of bringing

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change, understanding politics and contributing on an equal footing. This led AWN director and women’s activist Hasina Safi to question women’s performance in parliamentary and public debates stating that ‘they were just some faces; some very limited faces which we could see everywhere’.11 However, women’s activist and (currently) presidential advisor Nargis Nehan problematises female parliamentarians’ gender-related substantive representation as being vested, interest-driven for many, who rather follow personal agendas.12 In the overall context, perceived obstacles to performance in Afghanistan comprise of an alleged visible lack of capacity in law-making, lack of awareness and understanding of adequate levels of policy-related knowledge, influence and even direct interference from religious clergy in parliamentary proceedings and debates, political mafias and their interests in the weak functioning of Parliament as an institution to further their own corrupt, illicit and/or patronage-driven interests. A frequent concern was the overall level of corruption within the political system, Parliament being no exception to the rule—be it in terms of allegations that cabinet nominees buy votes to secure their endorsement (including claims of male MPs that a number of female colleagues benefit heavily in this process, hinting towards a perceived weaker power status and capacity), chairs of parliamentary committees being paid for and mounting to money-making positions (e.g. in public tenders), and other forms of misuse of authority, leading to a failure in oversight and policy-making.13 Last, but not the least, lack of unity, caucusing and networking among women parliamentarians to operate as a joint force on women-specific issues, seems to have led to infighting among women MPs themselves, increased levels of tokenism along with individual-based and/or ad hoc networking. This also appears to have tarnished public perceptions and expectations of due diligence in terms of gender-specific representation as quota politicians.14 A negative consequence is a lack of legislative strength to counter misogynist legislation and policy measures curtailing women’s rights and post-2001 achievements as in the case of the provincial councils’ quota revisions, Marriage Law, Shia Family Law or the EVAW Law, where it took a national and international outcry-cum-lobbying pressure on President Karzai and other key stakeholders to revert or mitigate decisions passed in the Parliament. Given the presence and influence of conservative power brokers within and outside of parliament, government and bureaucracy, women parliamentarians need to strategically network across institutions and arenas.

‘We Are Between the Future and the Past’15: Challenges and Obstacles On our first day in Kabul, we interviewed two women parliamentarians— one had survived an attack on her life a couple of months ago and the other was probably the most heavily guarded female legislator I interviewed

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in Afghanistan since 2007. ‘I am the nation’s mother, I am Afghanistan’s mother’,16 the latter claimed, while outlining the heavy price she pays for trying to solve the problems of her community, the Kuchi community. She is of the opinion that as senator, she doesn’t face any particular problems; nevertheless, her interview was dominated by observations about the hostilities, fightings and killings she has to address and mediate in her political work, about how the Taliban are one of her key obstacles apart from generally high levels of sociopolitical violence, injustice and enemies made when trying to represent people’s issues and needs. Fearing for her own life, in the wake of the threats she receives and placed under permanent police protection, she is adamant to serve again. One of her police guards interjected at one point during the interview stating ‘she will not be left alive. They will kill her’, in case of failing to secure another mandate. In that regard, and being a nominated Meshrano Jirga member, Farida Kochi, confident and assertive, is not that concerned about the issue of constituency-building, but is rather wary of insurgents and corrupt stakeholders: ‘If I am not nominated, I would like death for myself (…). (…) I have no other option but to do something to myself. (…) They might vote for me again, but the Taliban will not let them vote for me. (…) The other women like me, who do not do corruption, cannot make it to the Wolesi Jirga’.17 The other woman politician had survived an assassination attempt in November 2014. Undeterred by threats and attempts on her life, Shukria Barakzai shared her sense of determination, which was also visible among a number of other women parliamentarians, who are adamant to defend the post-2001 gender achievements during the post-2014 Second Transformation Decade: ‘So and we are like the red line, we are here to make them stop, to do [no more] victimising [… of] the rights of Afghans and particularly women. (…) Being the red line, we need to be. I shouldn’t let anyone […] cross the line’.18 Such gender-specific, often threatening or even violent contestations in previous election rounds have been observed, documented and highlighted by electoral watchdog activists, such as Naeem Asghari from FEFA: ‘They don’t want […] women’s existence in [the] parliament so [that] they can have the seats [for themselves]. (…) They intimidated their family, and another thing: when women wanted to campaign, they did some fighting and didn’t let them do [the] campaign[ing] around the area and that’s why that candidate couldn’t go [to] that area and late [at] night, they threatened them from outside of their house’.19 Civil society activists similarly identified security as one of the key challenges. This holds true in the public arena, given the existence of numerous violent actors and powerful political players, who reject women’s political presence and refuse to take them as serious political actors (or ultimately do, thus identifying them as targets). Secondly, it also holds true, given the lack of government and societal support for the outspoken, publicly visible

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women, as well as, for the institutionalisation of gender mainstreaming/ women’s machineries, which remain precarious, limited and highly dependent on international funding and pressure-cum-intervention: ‘we have to risk as women to bring changes in women’s life, in gender issues. We have to take risks and go to the streets and risk our lives to bring the change’.20 Many are deeply concerned and disturbed by an apparently increasing shrinking space for civil society activism and for raising women’s concerns.21 In the light of the September 2015 events in Kunduz, and the Taliban takeover, where deliberate attacks and virtue policing efforts were under way against the city’s women’s radio station, a girls college and the women shelter run by Women for Afghan Women, as well as the threats and attacks against Tolo TV and 1TV, those alerting and warning the wider (inter-)national public, are some of the stark realities that elucidate genuine concerns of politically active women. These events should also be seen in the light of the years’ long deliberate campaign of insurgent attacks against publicly outstanding women serving in different sectors and capacities, such as the Ministry of Women’s Affairs (and its provincial departments), security forces, media or civil society organisations. The majority of women parliamentarians narrate frequent experiences of hegemonic patriarchal institutional practices or outright misogyny and/ or ideological challenges from formal and informal political institutions, often powerfully manifested and legitimised under the garb of religion and declared indigenous, Afghan values—in contrast to alleged ‘foreign’, ‘alien’ or ‘Western’ values imposed by intervention actors or Afghans understood to be marked by Westoxification.22 Many perceive Afghan politics as male-dominated, based on regional ethnolinguistic politics-cum-networks and outright traditional, despite inroads made by women parliamentarians. In addition, the post-2014 withdrawal of international forces and the decrease in civilian commitment, along with international media attention, are interpreted by a significant number of stakeholders and traditional power brokers as a potential turning point or lowering of thresholds of value-based commitments made vis-a-vis calls for a political conflict solution. Consequently, this leads to increasing perceptions of women’s rights and quota achievements as being jeopardised or becoming bargaining chips, along with repeated experiences of threats against and actual attacks on publicly visible, outspoken and active quota politicians, in what appears to be a deliberate campaign against empowered and publicly active women across different sectors like politics, ministerial bureaucracy and security forces.23 A crucial dimension of political participation is voice, being acknowledged as/to be listened to, to being included in political deliberations, decisionand policy-making processes beyond one’s symbolic presence and rhetorics of gender equality and women’s rights. What women parliamentarians often describe gives the expression ‘raising one’s voice’ a new dimension—of having to shout not be silenced, not to be overheard, of being recognised

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apart from addressing and representing the interests, problems and needs of women as prime constituency group: ‘(…) We really shout our problem, but the government doesn’t want to hear us and they can’t solve that problem […] raised in parliament. [They] didn’t hear what we are just saying and are not working. There aren’t any people that […] hear’.24 This is not only the case in daily interactions as a member of parliament, but also when it comes to passing laws which are concerned with women’s needs and rights. One case in point is the very brief parliamentary debate on the EVAW Law.25 Challenging experiences described above are exacerbated by an overall political environment which is problematic for male and female parliamentarians alike. Systemic obstacles and challenges of parliamentary work highlighted were, among others: (i) a criminalisation of politics due to corruption and manipulations in electoral and parliamentary politics; (ii) disconnect, lack of cooperation and patronage politics among political institutions and a subsequent experience of unresponsiveness from the government and the bureaucracy; (iii) ineffective capacity-building programmes for MPs; (iv) a complex conflict legacy of mistrust, identity politics and subsequent fragile social fabric; (v) the monetisation of politics and ‘projectification’ of public and private lives due to the international intervention funding and operational dynamics, leading to a rentier mentality, fraud and corruption combined with perils in constituency-building.26 Given the prevalent pattern of sociocultural inequality, manifested in gender roles prescriptions and practices, such systemic and institutional constraints translate in the political arena in divergent asymmetries and vulnerabilities. Subsequently, the scale of men’s autonomy and capacity to negotiate and navigate such a political environment appears to be significantly higher than that of women. This might be due to predominantly androcentric political support systems and access to resources, cultural norms for agency and mobility, along with gender-specific requirements of protection in an overall insecure and volatile environment—termed by MP Farmhand Naderi, along with other MPs and analysts interviewed, as ‘the vulnerability of the women in […] politics’.27

Conclusion: ‘We Have a Very Big Problem with the System’28 Achievements and failures in women’s political participation and gender policies are often marked by high levels of international interventionism, orientalist sensationalism and periodic international media hypes, with very short attention spans and narrow foci, albeit much needed continued international support for the furthering of a democratic space and institution-building in Afghanistan during the Second Transformation Decade. Like women in politics: if there is no international community, do you think others will believe in engaging women in real politics? The politics [is] of a kind of traditional or tribal politics in Afghanistan and unfortunately women are not

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there at the tribal or traditional political activities. The only politics that women can engage in is the democratic one, I think, and the democratic governments. If there is no international community, it is difficult for women to go for the provincial councils even.29

Examples are the Shia Family Law, the EVAW Law, the debate about women’s shelters or the mob killing of Farkhunda Malikzada. Women’s activist and presidential advisor Nargis Nehan, therefore, criticises the lack of support for women’s rights defenders by the National Unity Government and international partners, despite the visible overall ‘rapid decline in terms of women’s role’, be it with perceived weak female cabinet members selected, a limited role of women in the peace negotiation process and its institutions, such as, the High Peace Council along with its provincial branches or, potentially, quotas being up for revision.30 In line with this assessment, it doesn’t seem to come as a surprise that little or less attention was given to the decrease in provincial council reserved seats provisions from 25 to 20% under the Karzai administration, which, in response, however, resulted in an interesting subsequent discursive tactic by women activists and politicians alike. ‘We have to change the system’ was a call uttered by a number of politicians, activists and analysts interviewed. Women activists, human rights activists and a significant number of women parliamentarians engage in a rights-based discourse when it comes to the necessity and retention period of gender quotas in Afghan (sub-)national politics: ‘So our opportunities are not equal, our challenges are not equal. We face a lot of challenges with fewer opportunities. [Un]til the time we go to equal competition, we need [the] quota for Afghanistan[’s] women’.31 A key argument is that the sociopolitical realities are such that women cannot compete on an equal footing with male contenders, and that an historic jump is needed to change the rules of the game, to allow for space and a psychological boost for change to happen, as well as to serve as a pressure tool vis-a-vis policy-makers. (…) It was giving a message to the women that we are there. So even young girls were looking to a future that “I am going to be there”, (…). This is a sort of dream for all girls, particularly the young generation that “I can be there”, (…). That is psychologically very positive. I think it’s also psychologically for men who are against women, was also something to show that they have the capacity, that they are there, they can speak, they can work, they can judge, they can analyse, they can reason for this.32

Reasons are conservative gender roles prescriptions in terms of leadership quality, mobility, voice and agency, along with disparities in resources and the deteriorating security situation. Beyond the urban spaces of Afghanistan’s politics in which many parliamentarians predominantly operate, mostly due to security and subsequent mobility restrictions, one needs to be reminded

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that Afghanistan’s population predominantly resides in rural areas, with very different everyday politics and realities, including the interaction with state institutions or insurgents, access to basic service delivery and infrastructure, to name a few.33 Is symbolic participation an important sign and an achievement in itself? Has there been an impact on the societal level, that is creating a space for and motivation among women to participate in politics through a norm diffusion process? Some would argue in favour, in particular when looking at the younger generation, comprising the majority of Afghanistan’s female populace, and the lessons drawn from the 2010 elections, in terms of constituency-building. Concluding with the words of women’s activist-cum-presidential advisor Nargis Nehan: They see that in order to become a parliamentarian, you don’t have to belong to a political family, you don’t have to have resources, you don’t have to be like these groups. You (…) actually can run [by] yoursel[f]. All actually you have to do is, like, to make sure that [you] identify your constituencies and then begin to work on your constituencies.34

Notes







1. h ttp://www.quotaproject.org/uid/countryview.cfm?country=4#sources (accessed 27 Oct 2015). 2. Points 1 and 9 as outlined in Islamic Republic of Afghanistan (2015); see also UNDP/UNAMA (2015). 3. The findings result from a series of interviews and focus group discussions conducted in 2015 in Kabul, Brussels and Islamabad with acting and former female and male parliamentarians, political party leaders, chairs of parliamentary commissions, bureaucrats, women’s activists, political analysts and those working in electoral watchdog organisations. Detailed information on theoretical-cum-methodological considerations can be found in Fleschenberg (2016); further information on parliamentary politics and gendered transition politics and perceptions thereof has been outlined in my previous works in far greater detail. See Fleschenberg (2009, 2012) for example. 4. Parliamentary elections are pending since summer 2015 due to debates on electoral reform measures among members of the National Unity Government headed by President Ashraf Ghani and CEO Abdullah. 5. Interview with MP Shukria Barakzai, Kabul, April 2015. 6. Interview with MP Shinkai Karokhail, Kabul, April 2015. 7. Ibid. 8. Interviews with parliamentarians, election analysts and civil society representatives, Kabul, April 2015. In the words of MP Shinkai Karokhail: ‘And these people are very conservative. I am a threat because I will never ever support what they want’. 9. Working at one of the leading Afghan electoral watchdogs, FEFA, women’s activist Wazhma Azizi, among others, highlighted that ‘mosque[s] do not let

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women get out from their home, meet’, that women at the district level don’t have enough access to other women or need the support of family members to access voters, to campaign on their behalf, be it due to sociocultural constraints or the prevailing overall insecurity (interview conducted in Kabul, April 2015). 10. Interview with MP Shinkai Karokhail, Kabul, April 2015. 11. Interview conducted in Kabul, April 2015. 12. Nevertheless, she contends that despite women MPs not meeting expectations, they have made a difference in terms of changing traditions by demonstrating male colleagues that women are equal as politicians, as parliamentarians (interview conducted in Kabul, April 2015). 13. Interviews conducted with parliamentarians and representatives of parliamentary watchdogs, Kabul, April 2015. 14. See Fleschenberg (2009, 2012); reconfirmed in interviews conducted in Kabul, April 2015. 15. Interview with MP Farkhunda Zahra Naderi, Kabul, April 2015. 16. Interview with Senator Farida Kochi, Kabul, April 2015. 17. Ibid. 18. Interview with MP Shukria Barakzai, Kabul, April 2015. 19. Interview conducted in Kabul, April 2015. 20. Interview with former MP, civil society activist and member of the Special Electoral Reform Commission Sabrina Saqeb, Kabul, April 2015. 21. Interviews conducted with civil society activists such as Nargis Nehan, Soraya Parlika, Hasina Safi, Wazhma Azizi, Aziz Rafiee as well as focus group discussions at AWN and at HBS, Kabul, April 2015. 22. Former MP Sabrina Saqeb, member of the Special Electoral Reform Commission, works with the think tank Research Institute for Women, Peace and Security, and faces this tagging as Westerner when working on women’s issues such as political participation, peace and security (interview conducted in Kabul, April 2015). 23. See also Fleschenberg (2012) in more detail. The attack against outspoken and active women working either in Parliament, the police or for the Department of Women’s Affairs has continued as have attacks against women and girls on a more endemic level of violence against women, with the mob killing of Farkhunda Malikzada being the last prominent case, but not the only one as a number of media reports reviewed for the period of 2014 to mid-2015 indicate. 24. Interview with MP Shireen Mohseni, Kabul, April 2015. 25. In her interview (conducted in Kabul in April 2015), MP Raihana Azad portrays a nexus of mujahideen-turned-parliamentarians and their gender conservatism with the attempt to abolish the EVAW Law upon its reintroduction to the Wolesi Jirga, the decrease in provincial council quota provisions along with prominent cases of violence against women such as the mob killing of Farkhunda Malikzada, among others, with an overall misogynist and androcentric environment towards women politicians: ‘They really try to kick us out of the system (…) [as] they think that Islam is at risk, that’s why they don’t want us’. 26. Compiled from interviews, informal conversations and discussions with political and societal stakeholders in Kabul, April 2015.

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27.  Interview with MP Farkhunda Zahra Naderi, among others, conducted in Kabul, April 2015. 28. Interview with MP Shireen Mohseni, Kabul, April 2015. 29. Interview with Naeem Ayoubzada, electoral watchdog activist and director of TEFA, conducted in Kabul, April 2015. 30.  Interview with women’s activist and currently presidential advisor Nargis Nehan, Kabul, April 2015. 31. Interview with MP Shah Gul Razaee, Brussels, November 2015, seconded by MP Zakia Sangin, Kabul, April 2015. 32. Interview with civil society activist and director of ACSF, Aziz Rafiee, Kabul, April 2015. 33. Former MP, civil society activist and member of the Special Electoral Reform Commission Sabrina Saqeb and civil society activist Mina Khashei stressed the importance of considering rural areas, which both portray as very backward and misogynist in terms of women’s rights and socioeconomic as well as political status ascriptions—‘till know they didn’t think of women as a human. They don’t know that women and men are equal (…)’, as claimed by Khashei (both interviewed in Kabul, April 2015). 34. Interview with Nargis Nehan, Kabul, April 2015.

References Abirafeh, L. 2005. Lessons from Gender-Focused International Aid in Post-conflict Afghanistan…Learned? Series: Gender in International Cooperation 7. Bonn: Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung. http://library.fes.de/pdf-files/iez/02978.pdf. Accessed 10 July 2017. Azerbaijani-Moghadam, S. 2007. On Living with Negative Peace and a Half-Built State: Gender and Human Rights. International Peacekeeping 14 (1): 127–142. Fleschenberg, A. 2009. Afghanistan’s Parliament in the Making: Gendered Understandings and Practices of Politics in a Transitional Country. Berlin: Heinrich Böll Foundation and UNIFEM. Fleschenberg, A. 2012. Afghanistan’s Transition in the Making: Perceptions and Policy Strategies of Women Parliamentarians, Publication Series on Democracy, vol. 31. Berlin: Heinrich Böll Foundation. Fleschenberg, A. 2016. ‘It Is Not Charity, It Is a Chair of Power’—Moving Beyond Symbolic Representation in Afghanistan’s Transition Politics? Publication Series on Reviewing Gender Quotas in Afghanistan and Pakistan. Kabul and Islamabad: Heinrich Böll Foundation. https://af.boell.org/sites/default/files/it_is_not_charity_research_eng.pdf. Accessed 10 July 2017. Free and Fair Election Forum Afghanistan. 2013. Survey with Members of Wolesi Jirga on Election Laws. http://www.fefa.org.af/index.php/report/100-surveywith-members-of-wolesi-jirga-on-elections-law. Accessed 27 Oct 2015. Free and Fair Election Forum Afghanistan. 2015. Parliament’s Perception on Electoral Reform, Kabul. http://www.fefa.org.af/index.php/parliament-monitoring/248-parliament-s-perception-on-electoral-reforms-2015. Accessed 27 Oct 2015. Hancock, L., and O. A. Nemat. 2011. A Place at the Table: Safeguarding Women’s Rights in Afghanistan. Oxford: Oxfam International. https://www.oxfam.org/

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sites/www.oxfam.org/files/file_attachments/bp153-womens-rights-afghanistan-03102011-en_4.pdf. Accessed 10 July 2017. Human Rights Watch. 2005. Campaigning Against Fear: Women’s Participation in Afghanistan’s 2005 Elections. http://pantheon.hrw.org/legacy/backgrounder/ wrd/afghanistan0805/afghanistan081705.pdf. Accessed 10 July 2017. Independent Election Commission. 2010. Getting the Grade? Lessons Learnt on Women’s Participation in the 2010 Afghan Parliamentary Election. Kabul: Independent Election Commission Gender Unit. http://www.iec.org.af/pdf/gender/ll_gender_workshop.pdf. Accessed 10 July 2017. Independent Election Commission. 2014. http://www.iec.org.af/. Accessed 27 Oct 2015. Islamic Republic of Afghanistan. 2015. Special Electoral Reform Commission (2015): Summary of SERC Reform Recommendations I (Kabul, Unofficial Translation, Unpublished). Kabeer, N., A. Khan, and N. Adelparvar. 2011. Afghan Values or Women’s Rights?: Gendered Narratives About Continuity and Change in Urban Afghanistan. IDS Working Paper No. 387, (London: Institute of Development Studies). Karlidag, M. 2014. Women’s Political Participation: Considerations on Women’s Inclusion and Empowerment. Kabul: Afghan Women’s Network. Kreile, R. 2005. Befreiung durch Krieg? Frauenrechte in Afghanistan zwischen Weltordnungspolitik und Identitätspolitik [Liberation by War? Women’s Rights in Afghanistan Between World Order Politics and Identity Politics]. Internationale Politik und Gesellschaft 1: 102–120. National Democratic Institute. 2010. The 2009 Presidential and Provincial Elections in Afghanistan. http://www.ndi.org/files/Elections_in_Afghanistan_2009.pdf. Accessed 10 July 2017. Nordlund, A. T. 2004. Demands for Electoral Gender Quotas in Afghanistan and Iraq. Working Paper Series 2004/2, The Research Program on Gender Quotas. http:// www.statsvet.su.se/quotas/a_nordlund_wps_2004_2.pdf. Accessed 25 Sept 2007. quotaProject. n.d. Country Profile Afghanistan. http://www.quotaproject.org/uid/ countryview.cfm?country=4#sources. Accessed 27 Oct 2015. UNDP/UNAMA. 2015. Briefing Powerpoint Presentation: Afghanistan’s Special Electoral Commission (Kabul, Unpublished).

CHAPTER 14

Kuwait: Why Did Women’s Suffrage Take So Long? Meriem Aissa

The status of women in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region has garnered the attention of the public, journalists, and scholars, especially in the aftermath of the terrorist attacks that took place on 11 September 2001. While it is true that women in the MENA region have multiple barriers that they share, single-country case studies can illuminate additional contextual factors affecting women’s status. This chapter asks: Why did women in Kuwait not win the right to vote until 16 May 2005? This is an interesting question not only because Kuwaiti women won the right to vote much later than their counterparts in other regions of the world, but also because they won the right to vote much later than their counterparts in other Arab countries. For example, women won the right to vote in Syria in 1949, Lebanon in 1952, Egypt in 1956, Tunisia in 1959, and Algeria in 1962. I will argue that providing an explanation as to why it took so long for Kuwaiti women to win the right to vote requires an understanding of the state-building process and state-society relations in Kuwait in the aftermath of independence. The rest of this chapter is organized as follows. The first part of the chapter will discuss the campaign for women’s suffrage and the main actors that supported or opposed women’s right to vote and stand for elected office. The second part of the chapter will conduct a statistical analysis of survey data published by the Arab Barometer to explain the individual-level determinants of women’s propensity to vote. The conclusion will discuss the implications of the findings and avenues for future research on gender and politics in the MENA region. M. Aissa (*)  Rutgers University, New Jersey, USA e-mail: [email protected] © The Author(s) 2019 S. Franceschet et al. (eds.), The Palgrave Handbook of Women’s Political Rights, Gender and Politics, https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-137-59074-9_14

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Women’s Suffrage: Debates and Key Actors In Women in Kuwait: The Politics of Gender, Haya al-Mughni (2001) argues that Kuwaiti women do not lack agency. Focusing on upper-class Kuwaiti women and their organizations, she finds, rather, that “their loyalties are primarily to their families and kin, and that they act in ways which actually reinforce rather than challenge female subordination” (p. 14). Before the discovery of oil, Kuwaiti women faced extreme restrictions on their ability to interact with the outside world. Like their counterparts in other Arab countries, families in Kuwait placed great emphasis on preventing women from interacting with men and if a woman was seen or accused of interacting with a non-relative, she would be killed by a male member of her family. In the aftermath of the discovery of oil, upper-class women and progressive men began to challenge the cultural barriers that were placed on women. Educated men from affluent families emphasized the need for Kuwaiti society to transition “from what they saw as a state of rajiya (backwardness) to a state of nahda (progress) and civilization” (al-Mughni 2001, p. 53). However, as al-Mughni points out, these Kuwaiti men did not advocate for women’s right to vote, but instead focused on the importance of education for women and the removal of the abbaya (a robe-like dress). Moreover, upperclass women were also interested in expanding women’s access to education, the removal of the abbaya, and employment opportunities. Women’s right to vote was thus not a priority for either Kuwaiti men or women. The ruling family responded to these demands, but women were recruited to work in jobs “which are most suited to the nature of women” (qtd. in al-Mughni 2001, p. 63). What role did women’s organizations play in women’s suffrage? A comparison of women’s organizations in Kuwait reveals that their leaders varied in terms of their priorities (al-Mughni 2011; Rizzo 2005). Molyneux (2010) distinguishes between women’s “strategic interests,” which seek to challenge patriarchy by focusing on longer-term transformations like abolition of the sexual division of labor, removal of institutionalized forms of discrimination, and greater freedom of choice over childbearing, and women’s “practical interests,” which are usually a response to an immediate perceived need, like access to food and shelter. The first women’s organizations established in Kuwait, the Women’s Cultural and Social Society (WCSS) and the Arab Women’s Development Society (AWDS), differed in this respect. The WCSS was created by affluent women who invested their time and resources into charity work to help poor women but did not pressure the state to grant women the right to vote. A third women’s organization, the Islamic Care Society (ICS), adopted a similar emphasis, involving middle-class women and seeking to reinforce traditional roles. Created by the ruling family and led by one of its members, Sheikha Latifa, the ICS sought to present an alternative to other Islamist women’s organizations that were influenced by the Muslim Brotherhood (al-Mughni 2001).

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In contrast to the WCSS and ICS, which emphasized practical interests, the AWDS focused on both strategic and practical interests. In addition to developing contact with poor women, the AWDS placed the issue of women’s suffrage on the public agenda starting in the early 1970s. The AWDS defended women’s suffrage by noting that the electoral law that was passed in 1963 violated the constitution’s protection of universal suffrage. During this time, the AWDS had formed transnational ties to other women’s organizations in the region. Despite the fact that the AWDS placed the issue of women’s suffrage on the public agenda, women’s organizations did not otherwise seek to challenge socially constructed gender norms (al-Mughni 2001). Rather than framing their demands for their political rights in a manner that criticized Kuwait for being backward, they chose to focus on the fact that the electoral law violated the constitution. In response, opponents of women’s suffrage in the National Assembly used verses from the Quran and hadith to defend the status quo. For example, one particular deputy said, “Should men be subordinate to women or women be subservient to men? I am asking you, does Islam allow this?” (qtd. in al-Mughni 2001, p. 85). However, what is interesting about religious forces in the MENA region is that they may either support or oppose women’s inclusion in the political arena based on their strategic goals, adjusting their justifying religious rhetoric accordingly (Ben Shitrit 2016). What role did the ruling family play in the debate on women’s suffrage? An analysis of the role of the Kuwaiti ruling family reveals that it is not necessary for authoritarian regimes to employ political parties to divide and co-opt the opposition. Through its interference in civil society, the ruling family was able to divide women’s organizations. However, it is important to refrain from treating ruling families in Kuwait and in other countries in the Gulf Cooperation Council as monolithic. For example, Al-Sabah (2013) points out that women within the ruling family expressed their support for women’s suffrage publicly. This point adds to the puzzle. If women within the ruling family supported women’s suffrage, why did it take until 1999 for the Emir to issue a decree that would give women the right to vote if approved by the National Assembly? In order to understand why this decree was issued in 1999 and not earlier, it is important to first understand the relationship between the ruling family and opposition forces. Yom (2011) argues that the impact of oil on state-society relations depends on whether or not a strong opposition existed prior to the discovery of oil. In contrast to other oil-rich regimes that employ repression, the state in Kuwait has given opposition groups the space to voice their ideas and beliefs. Kuwait thus illustrates that political liberalization does not necessarily lead to an expansion of women’s rights. As early as 1938, one of the first concessions made to the merchants in order to deter them from revolting against the regime was the creation of the Majlis al-Umma al-Tashri’i (al-Mughni 2001). As Caraway (2004) points out, democratization is an ongoing process through which groups that were once excluded gain

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political rights. In the case of Kuwait, the ruling family’s decision to expand the political rights of tribal groups and weaken the representation of Shi’is in the National Assembly allowed Islamists and tribal groups to forge an alliance that served, in turn, as a major obstacle to women’s suffrage (Al-Sabah 2013). Public attitudes toward women’s rights shed further light on the factors contributing to women’s delayed suffrage in Kuwait. Rizzo et al. (2002) surveyed a representative sample of 1500 Kuwaiti citizens in 1994 to understand attitudes toward women’s rights. They hypothesize that those following orthodox Islamic beliefs should support the inclusion of women in politics, because the “early teachings of Muhammad and the Quran (Chapter 2, verse 187) stated that both sexes were equal under Allah and thus should be treated with justice and respect” (p. 647). In contrast, the authors hypothesize that religiosity might decrease support for women’s political rights due to the adoption of practices reinforcing traditional gender roles. In addition to finding support for these hypotheses, they observe that older Shia women and younger Shia men are more supportive of women’s rights. This finding illustrates that by weakening the power of Shi’is, the ruling family excluded from power a group that could have been influential in the debates on women’s suffrage in the National Assembly. Scholars have provided different explanations as to why the National Assembly granted women the right to vote on 16 May 2005. Based on interviews conducted in Kuwait, Shultziner and Tétreault (2011) reveal that the ruling family used monetary incentives to dissuade opponents of women’s rights from voting against the bill. Yetiv (2002) argues that understanding Kuwait’s democratization process requires a focus on pressure placed by the USA on the Emir. However, as Al-Sabah (2013) points out, this pressure had been placed on the ruling family immediately after the liberation of Kuwait from Iraqi occupation. This illustrates that international factors may not be sufficient in contexts where domestic groups are so influential. Moreover, it is important to acknowledge that women’s organizations changed how they framed their demands. As Tétreault, Meyer, and Rizzo observe: “By 2004, Kuwaiti women had stopped arguing that they had earned political rights and increasingly spoke in the language of entitlement. As the tee shirts worn by pro-women’s rights demonstrators proclaimed, ‘Women are Kuwaitis, too’” (2009, p. 231).

Women’s Participation in Elections Surveys conducted in Kuwait permit closer examination of the individuallevel factors that explain women’s propensity to vote once they gained suffrage. These hypotheses are derived from studies seeking to explain the determinants of voting in electoral authoritarian regimes. The literature on voter turnout in Arab countries has found that citizens vote for candidates with access to resources and the willingness to deliver those resources to ordinary citizens (e.g., Koehler 2008; Lust-Okar 2006). These scholars argue that

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due to the fact that ordinary citizens are cognizant of the negligible role that the legislature plays in the policy-making process, they either abstain from voting or they turn out to vote in order to exchange their support for access to state resources. What is missing from the literature on clientelism in electoral authoritarian states is a focus on gendered patron-client relations. There are a few exceptions. For example, Blaydes and El Tarouty (2009) find that in the case of Egypt, the ruling party targets women from a lower socioeconomic status to buy their votes, whereas the Muslim Brotherhood recruits women for strategic purposes. The turnout of Islamist women on Election Day and their challenge to state-sponsored violence, for example, encourages Islamist men to turn out to vote. Analyzing the gendered aspects of clientelism in Algeria and Morocco, Benstead (2016) argues that because women citizens are excluded from networks that enable men to benefit from clientelism, the presence of women in the legislature has a positive impact on women’s access to services that they otherwise would not have access to. These various patterns suggest two initial hypotheses regarding gender, voting, and clientelism: H1a: Women are more likely to vote if they have had past experience with patron-client relations. H1b: Men are more likely to vote if they have had past experience with patron-client relations.

De Miguel et al. (2015) point out voter turnout in electoral authoritarian regimes presents a puzzle since these elections are neither free nor fair. Their findings suggest that citizens in these types of regimes turn out to vote due to patron-client relations. Citizens who use government wasta (connections and/or influence to get things done) are significantly more likely to turn out to vote, an effect that is—interestingly—stronger for the rich than for the poor. The authors also find that individuals who are satisfied with the government’s handling of the country’s economy are more likely to vote than individuals who are dissatisfied with the economic situation, suggesting two additional hypotheses. H2a:  Women are more likely to vote when they are satisfied with the government’s handling of the economy. H2b:  Men are more likely to vote when they are satisfied with the government’s handling of the economy.

Methodology These hypotheses are tested using survey data from the Arab Barometer Wave III. Survey data was collected in Kuwait in the period from 10 February 2014 to 14 March 2014. Interviews were conducted with 1021 Kuwaiti citizens, and random sampling techniques were used. Since Kuwait was not included in other waves of the Arab Barometer, it is not possible to compare the results

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with other time periods. Still, analyzing this particular survey is useful since the parliamentary elections were held less than a year before data collection. Dependent Variable The following question was used to operationalize the dependent variable: Did you vote in the last parliamentary elections that were held on 23 July 2013? 1. Yes; 2. No.

The dependent variable was created by recoding the survey question so that it takes the value of 1 if the respondent said that she voted and the value of 0 if she said that she did not vote. Independent Variables Following de Miguel et al. (2015), the main independent variables explored here are experience with patron-client relations and evaluation of the government’s handling of the economy. In order to operationalize the former, the following survey question was used: Some people say that nowadays it is impossible to obtain a job without connections, while others say that jobs are only available to qualified candidates. Based on a recent experience (or experiences) you are personally aware of; do you think that …? 1. Obtaining an employment through connections is extremely widespread; 2. Employment is sometimes obtained through connections; 3. Employment is obtained without connections; 4. I do not know of any relevant experiences.

This independent variable takes the value of 1 if the respondent said that she believes that wasta is either common or is at least sometimes important, and it takes the value of 0 if the respondent said that she believes that wasta is not common. In order to operationalize the other independent variable, the following survey question was used: How would you evaluate the current government’s performance on creating employment opportunities? 1. Very Good; 2. Good; 3. Bad; 4. Very Bad; 5. This is not the government’s responsibility.

This independent variable takes the value of 1 if the respondent said that the government is doing a very good or good job in creating jobs, and it takes the value of 0 if the respondent either said that the government is doing a bad or very bad job or that it is not the government’s responsibility to create jobs.

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Control Variables Following de Miguel et al. (2015), the analysis controls for the possibility that ordinary citizens may turn out to vote in Arab countries in order to express their support for the Muslim Brotherhood. The following question was used to control for this variable: I would like you to tell me to what extent you trust the Muslim Brotherhood:I trust it to a great extent; 2. I trust it to a medium extent; 3. I trust it to a limited extent; 4. I absolutely do not trust it. 1. I trust it to a great extent; 2. I trust it to a medium extent; 3. I trust it to a limited extent; 4. I absolutely do not trust it.

This control variable takes the value of 1 if the respondent indicated that either trusts the Muslim Brotherhood to a great or medium extent, and it takes the value of 0 if she indicated that she trusts it to a limited extent or does not trust it at all. Following previous work (e.g., Desposato and Norrander 2009) on the determinants of women’s political participation, variables were created to control for age, education, marital status, religiosity, and employment status. Results Since the dependent variable is categorical, a logistic regression was run and marginal effects were used to interpret the results (Long and Freese 2014). Table 14.1 presents the results. Among female respondents, the coefficient for the variable created to measure the impact of patronage on voting is positive and statistically significant. On average, having had experience with wasta increases the probability of voting by about 0.130 (p