Background Document - Danish Institute for Parties and Democracy

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new Constitution, affirmed that, “we are working hard to write a Constitution that will protect the dignity of all citizens, especially in the chapter on women’s rights. We are also working to ensure the right of women to work and representation in important positions in the state” 3 . Political transitions to democracy are strengthened when genuine participation and representation of women is included on the list of priorities for countries in transition. Too often, this is generally seen as a luxury to be left aside until the other important democratic values and objectives have been achieved. All kinds of women’s participation and representation in transitional politics contain battles over rights, recognition, participation and redistribution of power. The intensity of each battle is determined by the extent to which consider themselves excluded and are conscious of the degree to which the critical decisions are made by men only. These battles are a manifestation of the many deeply entrenched obstacles (both formal and informal/traditional) to women’s political, socio-cultural and economic advancement of women across the world. In many parts of the world, these battles and issues are varied and complex and the challenges for women are enormous. While the participation of women in revolutionary uprisings in the Arab Spring provided opportunities for the active presence of women, women are still battling for equality on all fronts and an uphill climb still looms. UNEQUAL POWER RELATIONS Evidence abounds to attest that the continued marginalisation of women in decision making processes in transition countries is in fact part of the broader gender discrimination and the resulting inequalities that span the world from developed countries such as the Gulf States to low income countries in Sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia. The unequal power relations that impede the effective inclusion of women in transition countries operate at many levels of society, from the most personal to the highly public. In some countries the inequalities are clearly blatant in the legal frameworks, such as constitutions, laws and policies. Across the world, the attitudes about the superiority of men and inferiority of women at the household and family level are still very common. Within each region and within countries the magnitude of the attitudes differ reflecting factors such as culture and religion, the rural-urban divide, the political and legal system. Due to patriarchal notions of power, traditional practices and religious interpretations, men are still widely considered the ‘head of the household’ with superior status and decisionmaking authority and often greater rights and freedoms. “ Participation and representation of women is too often seen as a luxury.” The implications of family and household hierarchies and stereotyped roles for men and women are many, including diminished access of women to economic and political participation and violence against women. Transformed relations between men and women’s at the household and family level is critical to their full participation in and contribution in transition processes and outcomes in all spheres of society and it will benefit men as well as women. Periods of transition provide opportunities to create democratic societies by establishing principles of non-discrimination and gender equality if the different needs and priorities for women and men are taken into account during the transitional phases. 3 http://www.ikhwanweb.com/article.php?id=30211 WOMEN IN POLITICS DANISH INSTITUTE FOR PARTIES AND DEMOCRACY PAGE 40
INSTITUTIONALISED MALE DOMINANCE AND PRIVILEGE Everywhere in the world, it is evident that political transitions are gendered and their outcomes ultimately reflect the different social meanings attributed to men and women. Hence, the unequal participation and representation of women and men is evident in the predominance of men among the leaders of political parties or movements, parliamentarians, cabinet ministers and heads of governments and states. In most countries, although not in all, women and men have equal rights to vote and to stand for elective positions. After at least 40 years of struggle, Kuwaiti women gained comprehensive political rights in 2005. In 2003 in Oman and Qatar, women were granted the right to vote and to stand for parliamentary office for the first time. Currently women make up only 19% of the parliaments of the world. 4 Why, then are there so few women in elective positions of power and decision making at all levels? Why is that political transitions keep producing and reproducing men as leaders in higher proportions to women? To illustrate the point, despite the promising start to the year, according to the Inter Parliamentary Union by the end of 2011, women represented only 10.7% of parliamentarians in the Arab region. The Arab region remains the only one in the world without any parliament that has at least 30% representation of women. However, it is worthy to note that a number of countries in the Arab region have introduced quotas to improve the political participation and representation of women, in the face of political, cultural, religious, economic and institutional factors that pose particular challenges to women in this region. For example, in Morocco, following the 2011 elections and in accordance with a bill passed by the Council of Ministers on 9 September 2011, women now constitute 16.7% of Morocco’s Lower House and this is largely due to the reservation of 60 seats for women and 30 for candidates under the age of 40. In Tunisia, the political parties participating in the October 2011 elections were required to include women in their electoral lists in strict alternation. In theory, this was a strong affirmative measure, but in practice, most of the more than 80 parties contesting the elections (with more than 1,500 lists registered) won only one seat in any one constituency, which went to the male candidate invariably heading the list. In Libya, the adopted Election Law stipulates that the General National Congress (constituent assembly) would be composed of 200 members elected freely and directly, and requires parity on party lists for 80 of these seats. In Egypt, however, the new law on the Exercise of Political Rights amended the previous quota for women, which used to allocate 64 seats (or 12%) in the parliament to women. The amended law required each political party to include one woman on their candidate list, but did not require the positioning of women in “winnable” slots – each party has the freedom to decide where to allocate the name of the woman candidate, even at the bottom of the list. This has ultimately resulted in a decrease in the number of seats held by women before the revolution and democratic uprising, with only 10 women out of 508 members (2%). MOBILISATION OF WOMEN AS WOMEN In any political transition process, a key question is why women choose to organise or not to organise in the different contexts. It is important to pose this question because it points to the reality of the diversity among women and the absence of a homogenous “category” of women who are not differentiated by class, religion or ethnicity. Equally important is the fact that not all women may have women’s strategic interests on the top of their agenda during transformative transitional processes. It can be argued that women’s exclusion is due in part to the significant social and ideological differences among women as well as to the dynamics of social mobilisation in transitional processes. 4 http://www.quotaproject.org/aboutQuotas.cfm See Women in Parliament in 2011-The Year in Perspective, Inter-Parliamentary Union. WOMEN IN POLITICS DANISH INSTITUTE FOR PARTIES AND DEMOCRACY PAGE 41
Page 1 and 2: DANISH INSTITUTE FOR PARTIES AND DE
Page 3 and 4: DANISH INSTITUTE FOR PARTIES AND DE
Page 5 and 6: Of course this search will also bui
Page 7 and 8: CONTENTS 9 Young women in politics
Page 9 and 10: YOUNG WOMEN IN POLITICS From househ
Page 11 and 12: litical parties ‘rely on the stat
Page 13 and 14: ing able to keep up with and ‘bei
Page 15 and 16: youth population. Overall, it could
Page 17 and 18: dialogue across party lines. It als
Page 19 and 20: The program was broadly understood
Page 21 and 22: BIBLIOGRAPHY Ann, Teo Sue and Shuib
Page 23 and 24: WOMEN IN LOCAL LEVEL POLITICS Socia
Page 25 and 26: While contesting the post of an ele
Page 27 and 28: In fact training and capacity build
Page 29 and 30: enforcing these norms in ways that
Page 31 and 32: WOMEN IN LEADERSHIP POSITIONS AT TH
Page 33 and 34: amidst a scenario where only 0.6% w
Page 35 and 36: Jaipur: Rawat Publications, 2006. M
Page 37 and 38: WOMEN IN TRANSITION COUNTRIES Strug
Page 39: A year later, women in the Arab Spr
Page 43 and 44: OPENING SPACES AND INCREASING ACCES
Page 45 and 46: GENDER AND DEMOCRACY Danish democra
Page 47 and 48: ulation were now able to read about
Page 49 and 50: y American, French, German, and Bri
Page 51 and 52: THE STRUGGLE FOR WOMEN’S REPRESEN
Page 53 and 54: On the municipal level, development
Page 55 and 56: and set new standards of female cit
Page 57 and 58: NETWORKS AND TOOLKITS Some resource
Page 59 and 60: EMPOWERING WOMEN FOR STRONGER POLIT
Page 61: MAKING DEMOCRACY WORK FOR WOMEN: IN
Page 64: CHRISTIANSBORG SEMINAR The ’Chris

Background Document - Danish Institute for Parties and Democracy

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