Background Document - Danish Institute for Parties and Democracy

WOMEN IN LEADERSHIP POSITIONS AT THE LOCAL LEVEL
For women to make a real difference at the local level not only must they enter the
system but must also be prepared to take on the mantle of political leadership. As
Pant and Farrell (2009) point out “the pedagogy for empowering women politically
for leadership roles aims to enhance the capacity of women leaders to understand,
organise and act upon their needs, priorities, and makes demands upon the system
for better service delivery.”
Drawing on the experience of women being elected through three terms of local
rural and urban elections in India they point out that in the first term women got
elected with no precedence or role models and since governance was new to them
women stepped back, allowing the men to provide guidance including male members
of the family. 7
In the second term however the community was more accepting of women in
leadership roles with women now using the legitimacy of their elected position to address
several critical issues such as children’s education, drinking water facilities, family
planning facilities, hygiene and health, quality of healthcare, roads and electricity
in the village areas. They also took the initiative to bring alcohol abuse and domestic
violence on to the agenda of political campaigns. 8
The third term of women’s participation in rural and urban local bodies in India
saw women leaders become more visible as they became more familiar with the processes
of governance. Despite this change in leadership roles however, women continued
to lack an effective participation base due to gendered identity practices and
institutional inadequacies.
“Provision of quotas for women in local
government has not necessarily created a culture
open to facilitating the participation of women.”
The Indian experience of local elections over the last three decades showed that
while numbers may indicate presence it does not necessarily translate into meaningful
inclusion in the political process as women can be deliberately excluded from the
political process through force or covert strategies.
In this connection a recent study indicates that an increase in female representation
in local government in India appears to have induced a significant rise in documented
crimes against them, but argue that this is driven by greater reporting of the
crimes rather than an increase in the crimes per se. 9 In another significant finding
they point to the fact that large scale membership of women in local councils also affects
crimes against them more than their presence in leadership positions.
However there is little doubt that violence against women in politics particularly
at the level of local politics has been endemic in not just India but other parts of South
Asia as well. In fact within the community and political parties as well there have been
backlashes for women who exercise their decision making power and the resistance
often from upper caste males can range from threats to attempts of bribery, charges of
7 Pant and Farrell (2009).
8 Nambiar and Bandyopadhyay (2004).
9 Iyer et al. (2011).
WOMEN IN POLITICS DANISH INSTITUTE FOR PARTIES AND DEMOCRACY PAGE 31