Bridging the enduring gender gap in political interest in Europe: The relevance of promoting gender equality

Notwithstanding the improvement in gender equality in political power and resources in European democracies, this study shows that, on average, declared interest in politics is 16 per cent lower for women than for men in Europe. This gap remains even after controlling for differences in men's and women's educational attainment, material and cognitive resources. Drawing on the newly developed European Institute for Gender Equality's (EIGE) Gender Equality Index (GEI) and on the European Social Survey (ESS) fifth wave, we show that promoting gender equality contributes towards narrowing the magnitude of the differences in political interest between men and women. However, this effect appears to be conditioned by the age of citizens. More specifically, findings show that in Europe gender‐friendly policies contribute to bridging the gender gap in political engagement only during adulthood, suggesting that childhood socialisation is more strongly affected by traditional family values than by policies promoting gender equality. In contrast, feminising social citizenship does make a difference by reducing the situational disadvantages traditionally faced by women within the family and in society for middle‐aged people and older.     

Direct Democracy and Women's Political Engagement

What are the conditions that promote gender equality in political participation? In this article, I propose that the presence of direct democracy expands gender equality in political participation by signaling the system's openness to women's voice, confirming their political competency, and highlighting their stake in political decisions. To test this argument, I leverage a quasi‐experiment in Sweden in the aftermath of the introduction of universal suffrage, where the type of municipal political institutions was determined by a population threshold. My findings lend strong support to the effect of direct democracy on the political inclusion of women. I find that the gender gap in electoral participation was smaller in municipalities using direct democracy than in similarly sized municipalities that only had representative institutions.     

Competing Gender Paradigms: Gender Difference, Fetal Rights and the Case of Johnson Controls

Political debates over the concept of “fetal rights” pose in sharp relief questions regarding the meaning of biological gender difference for gender equality. Can the state's obligation to “protect” fetal health be used to modify or control women's behavior? If so, what does this mean for women's status as full and equal citizens in a democratic society? This article addresses these questions through an analysis of the political, legal, scientific and moral debates over “fetal protection policies” in hazardous workplaces.     

Parity in France: A ‘Dual Track’ Solution to Women's Under-Representation

As the world's first country to adopt a ‘parity’ quota, France could be considered an example of the growing phenomenon of quotas as a ‘fast track’ solution to the problem of women's under-representation. French universalism had impeded a more ‘incremental track’ to gender equality whilst placing a constitutional ban on quotas. The design of ‘parity’ as a means of overcoming these hurdles was both normative and pragmatic. Parity could be considered an example of a symbolic policy, where grand claims were made early on but the corresponding legislation only became effective over time. While the practical constraints on parity have delayed its impact, the recognition of the need to ‘legislate equality’ has had a more profound impact, leading to the creep of parity into other areas such as ethnic minority representation and parity in the workplace. This broader societal change is indicative of a ‘dual track’ to gender equality.     

The profile of gender equality issue attention in Western Europe

This article investigates the factors that drive governments to pay attention to gender equality issues and place them upon executive agendas. In line with studies of the dynamics of issue attention, which demonstrate the importance of investigating variability in the attention policy makers give to issue demands across policy domains, this article argues that policy issues related to gender equality are multidimensional and patterns in executive attention vary across the different types of gender issues. Multidimensionality of gender equality issues reflects different dynamics in agenda‐setting as different issues invoke contrasting constellations of political representation, institutional friction and veto points. To investigate this variation, this article proposes a twofold distinction between class‐based and status‐based gender equality issues and assesses the validity of three sets of explanations for when gender issues succeed in reaching executive agendas: women in politics, party ideology and economic performance. Drawing on governmental attention datasets from the Comparative Agendas Project, a systematic comparative quantitative analysis of the determinants of gender equality issue attention in five Western European countries is conducted. The main findings confirm that the mechanisms through which different types of gender equality issues gain executive attention differ according to the kind of the gender equality demand. Costly class‐based gender equality issues are more likely to receive executive attention when the economy is performing well, when there is a strong presence of Social Democrats and when there is a high proportion of female MPs. In contrast, economic performance, party politics and women's parliamentary presence do not seem to exert any impact on status‐based issues. Instead, critical actors in the government seem to be the strongest driver for attention over this second type of gender equality issue. This study contributes a gendered dimension to the policy agendas scholarship, adding theoretical and empirical depth to the understanding of how non‐core issues secure their place on full governmental agendas. By focusing on how to secure governmental attention for gender equality issues, the article makes a major contribution to understanding the initial genesis of gender equality policies.     

Gender,Citizenship, and Constitutionalism in Zimbabwe: The Fight Against Amendment 14

This article examines the nexus between gender, citizenship and constitutionalism. By using the case study of the 14th Amendment to the Constitution of Zimbabwe, I seek to illustrate how the rights of women with respect to citizenship are manipulated by the state, with this discrimination often couched under African 'culture' or 'tradition'. The article also interrogates the limitations of utilizing the courts in the struggle for gender equality, because of the patriarchal values which are upheld and promoted, often erroneously. In describing the surprising victory by civil society groups and activists in challenging both the courts and the state nationally, this piece concludes with some thoughts on how a broader struggle for gender equality is necessary in the pursuit of social justice.     

Gender Equality Architecture: The Intergovernmental Level in Federal Systems

This article provides a first overall account of the intergovernmental components of Australia's gender equality architecture in the period 1978–2014. From the 1990s this is largely a story of institutional fragility. In explaining this, factors identified by scholars of state feminism, such as lack of political will, partisan ideologies and discursive shifts, particularly the increased influence of neoliberal approaches to governance, are taken into account. The new factor introduced is that of executive federalism, characterised by decision‐making behind closed doors. When women's intergovernmental bodies attempted to open doors to community input this proved fruitless, particularly in the area of economic decision‐making. Repeated attempts to introduce gender‐disaggregated reporting on the outcomes of Commonwealth‐State agreements were also largely unsuccessful. The article concludes that the democratic deficits associated with executive federalism – lack of parliamentary oversight or accountability and lack of community consultation – are closely related to the deficits in gender mainstreaming.     

Japanese women in grassroots politics: building a gender-equal society from the bottom up

Abstract

The 1979 UN Convention on the Elimination of all Forms of Discrimination against Women highlights the importance of equal participation of women in public life. Since the early 1960s, women in Japan have voted in elections at significantly higher rates than men. However, Japanese women's equal participation in policy formulation and decision making lags far behind major democracies. Gender equality is stated under the Japanese Constitution, but social practices are far from equal. There are no legal constraints on Japanese women's right to candidacy for public office, but they are far underrepresented in local and national elected assemblies. In 1999 an important landmark in the substantial progress towards gender equality took place when the Japanese government, for the first time, legally denounced the stereotyped division of roles on the basis of gender and described men and women as equal partners. An unprecedented amount of legislation, together with policy changes and organizational reform at the national level were introduced from this state-led initiation. In the same year, women's grassroots groups were rapidly moving beyond the reach of policy, organizational, and legal changes; they successfully conducted a major nationwide campaign for ‘More Women to Assemblies¡’ and increased the number of elected women representatives at the local level at an unprecedented rate. The purpose of this article is to assess the potential of increased women's political voices in Japan, which can be seen as an alternative way of solving the problems of political disengagement in the male-dominated representative democracy. To this end, the article examines the course of watershed events in 1999 towards a gender-equal society in Japan, with special emphasis on the importance of grassroots missions in eliminating barriers to Japanese women's political participation.     

Concepts of citizenship underlying EU gender equality policies

This article assesses the framing of gender equality in the EU political discourse from 1995 to 2005 and the conceptualisations of citizenship that emerge from it. To assess the extent to which EU gender equality policies meet the aspirations of the concept of a gender equal citizenship, it develops an analysis of how different feminist approaches to citizenship are related to concepts of rights and responsibilities in EU gender equality policies. The frame analysis of a selection of EU policy documents in the areas of family policies, domestic violence, and gender inequality in politics reflects different configurations of the relation between feminist conceptualisations of citizenship and citizens' distribution of rights and responsibilities. Findings show that both gender-neutral and gender-differentiated conceptualisations of citizenship are present in EU policy documents, while a gender-pluralist approach tends to be absent. They also reveal that, while both men and women are formally treated as right-holders, women are framed as mainly responsible for eradicating the barriers to an equal enjoyment of citizenship rights. Moreover, men and women are constructed as different citizens. The article concludes that EU formal definitions of citizenship based on the concept of equality, while promoting legal gender equality and acknowledging the existence of gender obstacles to the enjoyment of an equal citizenship for women, are not by definition translated into policy initiatives transformative of traditional gender roles. In this respect they could hamper the achievement of a gender equal citizenship in the European Union.     

Women are more likely than men to blame structural factors for women's political under-representation: Evidence from 27 countries

Over time, gender and politics research has made progress in identifying those factors that result in low numbers of women in political institutions and in making evidence-informed suggestions about how to ameliorate them. These factors include discrimination in party recruitment processes, male-dominated political culture and broader gender inequalities in society. In contrast, little is known about public opinion regarding these drivers of women's political under-representation, especially whether to who or what women assign blame for the under-representation of women in politics differs from men. This article provides the first discussion and analysis of blame assignment for women's numeric under-representation in politics. In doing so, it outlines and operationalises a framework that distinguishes between meritocratic explanations of women's under-representation, whereby the blame for women not holding political office in greater numbers is assigned to women themselves, and structural explanations, whereby social forces external to women are seen to result in their numeric under-representation. Cross-national data from 27 European countries is used to show that women are significantly more likely than men to assign blame for women's numeric under-representation to structural factors. The hierarchical nature of the dataset is exploited using multilevel models and significant differences in levels of structural blame assignment between countries is found as well as between-country variation in the probability of women assigning blame to structural explanations for women's under-representation. Finally, the category of structural explanations is disaggregated in order to assess their relative prominence and to provide strong corroborative evidence that women predominantly assign blame for women's under-representation to political culture over other structural blame factors. The article concludes with a discussion of the implications of the study's findings for policy makers contemplating the pursuit of gender equality policies aimed at increasing women's political representation and makes suggestions for the direction of future research in this area.     

Gendered Perceptions and Political Candidacies: A Central Barrier to Women's Equality in Electoral Politics

Based on the second wave of the Citizen Political Ambition Panel Study, we provide the first thorough analysis of how gender affects women and men's efficacy to run for office. Our findings reveal that, despite comparable credentials, backgrounds, and experiences, accomplished women are substantially less likely than similarly situated men to perceive themselves as qualified to seek office. Importantly, women and men rely on the same factors when evaluating themselves as candidates, but women are less likely than men to believe they meet these criteria. Not only are women more likely than men to doubt that they have skills and traits necessary for electoral politics, but they are also more likely to doubt their abilities to engage in campaign mechanics. These findings are critical because the perceptual differences we uncover account for much of the gender gap in potential candidates’ self‐efficacy and ultimately hinder women's prospects for political equality.     

Uncivil society and social policies in Brazil: The backlash in the gender,sexual, and reproductive rights and ethnic and racial relations fields

This paper analyzes how dynamics between Brazil's right-wing populist government and civil and uncivil organizations affected the role of civil organizations, especially rights-based ones, and Brazil's democratization process. These dynamics contributed to stripping policies of their progressive nature and rejecting the values of diversity, freedom, and equality. Our analysis relies on the inhabited institutions approach to comprehend the role of action, interaction, and meaning in institutionalized spaces. We analyzed two policy fields—gender, sexual, and reproductive rights, and ethnic and racial relations—through documents and in-depth interviews. Our analysis shows that Bolsonaro's government mobilized mechanisms related to institutional changes, the replacement of actors, and their interactions to inhibit civil society organizations' influence in policy formulation and provision and strengthen the participation of uncivil groups, thereby legitimating conservative ideas and discourses, and closing civic space for NGOs with rights-based agendas.     

Gendering the vote for populist radical-right parties

ABSTRACT

Why do more men than women vote for populist radical-right (PRR) parties? And do more men than women still vote for the PRR? Can attitudes regarding gender and gender equality explain these differences (if they exist)? These are the questions that Spierings and Zaslove explore in this article. They begin with an analysis of men's and women's voting patterns for PRR parties in seven countries, comparing these results with voting for mainstream (left-wing and right-wing) parties. They then examine the relationship between attitudes and votes for the populist radical right, focusing on economic redistribution, immigration, trust in the European Union, law and order, environmental protection, personal freedom and development, support for gender equality, and homosexuality. They conclude that more men than women do indeed support PRR parties, as many studies have previously demonstrated. However, the difference is often overemphasized in the literature, in part since it is examined in isolation and not compared with voting for (centre-right) mainstream parties. Moreover, the most important reasons that voters support PRR parties seem to be the same for men and for women; both vote for the populist radical right because of their opposition to immigration. In general, there are no consistent cross-country patterns regarding gender attitudes explaining differences between men and women. There are some recurring country-specific findings though. Most notably: first, among women, economic positions seem to matter less; and economically more left-wing (and those with anti-immigrant attitudes) women also vote for the PRR in Belgium, France, Norway and Switzerland; and, second, those who hold authoritarian or nativist views in combination with a strong belief that gays and lesbians should be able to ‘live their lives as they choose’ are disproportionately much more likely to vote for PRR parties in Sweden and Norway. Despite these findings, Spierings and Zaslove argue that the so-called ‘gender gap’ is often overemphasized. In other words, it appears that populist radical-right parties, with respect to sex and gender, are in many ways simply a more radical version of centre-right parties.     

David Cameron's ‘Problem’ with Women: Representing Women in the Coalition Government

Prior to the election in 2010 David Cameron pledged that his first cabinet would comprise one‐third women and would be the most family friendly ever. Since forming the Coalition Government, he appears to have a ‘problem’ with women. We argue that this problem stems from: the weak representation of women in cabinet and across government; the diminishing resources available to government actors to support gender equality policy; and women's exclusion from the key Coalition networks, both formal and informal, that determine government policy.     

Gendering the Rwanda Defence Force: A Critical Assessment

Over the past five years the Government of Rwanda has placed renewed emphasis on increasing the number of female military personnel and gender mainstreaming the Rwanda Defence Force (RDF). This article examines the efforts made by the RDF since 2007 to meet these strategic requirements and integrate women into the national security organ. It is suggested that, in spite of Rwanda's success in bringing women into the political sphere, women are still reluctant to join the military. It is argued that prevailing societal values and attitudes, conflicting narratives within official discourse about the role of women as security actors, resource constraints and the RDF's emphasis on ‘gender equality’ are barriers to achieving RDF goals. Drawing on in-depth interviews with RDF military personnel and government officials, as well as documentary research, the article first provides an overview of the Rwandan government's approach to mobilizing women to securitize the state, before examining how the RDF aims to progress the Women, Peace and Security (WPS) agenda nationally and within local communities. The article then reflects on some of the factors that are hindering the recruitment and retention of female military personnel.     

Drawing Comparative Lessons from France and Germany

The article reviews the lessons learned from a systematic comparison of the policy cases in France and Germany, presented in the previous articles, for building a theory of feminist policy formation and for the design of effective policy in this new arena of government action. It assesses the relative impact of Europeanization and different contextual factors found in each national setting—gender policy regimes, state–society relations, political party influences, structure of the state, women's movement mobilization, women's policy offices, and the role of women in political office. The analysis concludes the symposium with a reflection upon these findings in terms of our knowledge and under‐standing of feminist policy and the responsiveness of Western postindustrial democracies to demands for social justice and equality.     

Gender Equality as a Closed Case: A Survey among the Members of the 2015 Danish Parliament

Despite almost unanimous adherence to the principle of gender equality in contemporary Denmark, a society with a long historical record of gender equality policies and almost 40 percent women in parliament, are there still divergences to be found among the members of parliament concerning gender equality principles and policies? This article argues that in order to identify underlying cleavages it is necessary to pose fundamental questions that go beyond the day‐to‐day disagreements on policy issues. Based on a new survey of the members of the Danish parliament, this study finds that the support for gender equality is not just a matter of lip service insofar as few MPs hold traditionalist views on women. However, the study reveals conflicting perceptions, left‐right cleavages and gender gaps, sometimes also within the parties. A new discourse is identified, supported by a large minority that includes all of the male MPs from the four right‐wing parties; this minority considers gender equality to be a ‘closed case’ – that is, as having by and large been achieved. This may provide clues to the puzzle of the stagnation in gender equality reforms in spite of the general support for ‘gender equality’. The article discusses the possible connection between the ‘closed case’ discourse, present neoliberal trends in society and the recent construction of gender equality as an ‘intrinsic Danish value’ – an argument familiar in other countries with a harsh debate over immigration.     

The Review of the APS: Is gender really on anyone's agenda?

As recently as 2016, the Australian Government stated its commitment to increasing gender equality in the Australian Public Service (APS) workforce. In May 2018, the Prime Minister announced a broad‐ranging Review of the APS, but gender equality was not mentioned in the Review Terms of Reference. An interim Review report was released in March 2019, which was also largely silent on gender issues. We examine the submissions to the Review to assess whether, and how, organisations have considered gender equality. We found an almost universal gender blindness in submissions and conclude that this may have contributed to the Review panel ignoring gender equality issues in their interim report. We further conclude that without a focus on gender equality within the Review and ensuing reforms, the APS gender equality strategy is rendered merely symbolic. We recommend the Review implement gender mainstreaming to ensure gender equality can progress in the APS.     

Security, Equality, and the Clash of Ideas: Sweden's Evolving Anti-Trafficking Policy

Seeking to explain the emergence of anti-trafficking initiatives, scholars have explored two sets of ideas??national security and gender equality??thought to shape policy. In this study, we examine whether such ideational influence accounts for Sweden's evolving anti-trafficking policy over the past decade. As powerful domestic ideas about gender inequality informed the adoption of an abolitionist prostitution policy in the 1990s, one would expect similar ideas to influence domestic responses to the related issue of cross-border trafficking. However, our case study shows that the policy area of trafficking has largely followed a different ideational path. Gendered ideas, periodically nested in a human rights discourse, have been salient in the public debate on trafficking in human beings, especially during the campaign to boycott the 2006 FIFA World Cup. However, they have exerted substantially less influence on Swedish legislative initiatives to combat trafficking, with security concerns still holding sway.