Elin Bjarnegård

Disentangling gender, peace and democratization: the negative effects of militarized masculinity

This article investigates, both theoretically and empirically, the relationships between democratization, gender equality and peace. We argue that there is a need to scrutinize both the level of democracy as well as the level of masculine hegemony in societies. Methodologically, we use a combination of quantitative and qualitative analyses to support our argument. We employ regression analysis to show that the relationship between the extent of democracy and the representation of women in politics appears, at first glance, to be non-existent but turns out to be a curvilinear one. We also show that democracy can facilitate peace, but only in interaction with the level of political gender equality, so that more democratic societies are more peaceful only if there have been moves to gender equality. Our interpretation of these findings is illustrated by the contemporary politics of Thailand. Recent political violence in southern Thailand can be accounted for in the context of it being only partly democratized, where a culture of militarized masculinity persists alongside with, and even within, democratic institutions. Such a culture makes it both difficult for women to enter the political sphere, despite democratic elections, and fosters political violence.

Revealing the “Secret Garden" : The Informal Dimensions of Political Recruitment

Candidate selection and recruitment has been notably described as the “secret garden” of politics—an obscure process, often hidden from view, that is regulated largely by internal party rules, info ...

Revisiting Representation Communism, Women in Politics, and the Decline of Armed Conflict in East Asia

This research note evaluates one of the commonly used measurements for political gender equality: representation of women in parliaments. It demonstrates that caution is called for when interpreting results where this variable is used, because parliamentary representation implies different things in different settings. Societies with more women in parliament tend to have fewer intrastate armed conflicts. We investigate this statistical association with a particular focus on East Asia. This region has seen a shift from extremely intense warfare to low levels of battle deaths at roughly the same time as great strides have been made in the representation of women in parliaments. This research note shows, however, that this statistical association is driven by authoritarian communist regimes promoting gender equality as a part of communist ideology, and these countries’ representative chambers have little influence over politics. Using statistical tests and empirical illustrations from East Asia, the note concludes that the political representation of women is an invalid indicator of political gender equality in East Asia. There is thus a need for nuance in assessing the picture painted in earlier research. In addition, the suggestion that more women in parliament will lead to fewer armed conflicts runs the risk of being forwarded as an oversimplified solution to a complex problem, and we briefly discuss the instrumentalization of gender equality in peace and security studies.

Political Parties and Gender Quota Implementation The Role of Institutionalized Candidate Selection Procedures

This article scrutinizes the role of political parties in gender quota implementation. First, it theoretically specifies and operationalizes the concept of bureaucratization in relation to candidate selection. Second, it examines whether parties with bureaucratized selection procedures are better at implementing legally mandated candidate quotas than other parties. We measure implementation as the number of women candidates and women elected (the latter measuring implementation of the spirit of quota laws). Using unique data on almost 100 Latin American parties, the analysis shows that once quotas are in place, parties with bureaucratized selection procedures put substantially more women on their candidate lists than other parties. However, these parties are only better at implementing the letter of the law: they do not get more women elected.

WHY ARE REPRESENTATIONAL GUARANTEES ADOPTED FOR WOMEN AND MINORITIES? COMPARING CONSTITUENCY FORMATION AND ELECTORAL QUOTA DESIGN WITHIN COUNTRIES

This article explores the underlying motives for ensuring the political inclusion of marginalised groups. More specifically, it analyses whether laws guaranteeing representation are designed differently for women and minorities and, if so, whether these differences correspond to normative arguments for group representation. We use a novel research strategy by comparing quota designs in all countries that have adopted quotas for both groups. Theoretically, we reconceptualise the relevant distinction between quota types by focusing on whether a special constituency is created or not. We identify substantial differences in quota design between the two groups. Minorities tend to be guaranteed representation through the creation of special constituencies, whereas gender quotas more commonly imply integration into pre-existing constituencies. The analysis largely supports those who argue that quotas for minorities aim to increase the autonomy of the group in question while gender quotas are adopted with the intention to integrate women into the political system.

Analysing Failure, Understanding Success: A Research Strategy for Explaining Gender Equality Policy Adoption

One of the major challenges within feminist research is to understand the conditions under which gender equality policies are adopted. This article addresses the issue from a methodological point of view: it suggests that previous research on gender equality policy adoption has mostly focused on “successful” cases, and it presents a research strategy for systematically analysing opposition and “failed” attempts at gender equality policy adoption, that is, reform attempts that have not become laws or regulations. A closer analysis of failure is important for understanding success: we cannot be sure that the factors identified as conducive to gender equality reform are really missing in unsuccessful reform attempts unless we pay explicit attention to such attempts. The research strategy suggests three issues that should be addressed: (1) specify and select “unsuccessful” cases, (2) focus explicitly on resistance to the reform proposal, and (3) conduct a dynamic analysis of the strategies of proponents and opponents. We illustrate the research strategy by making use of a failed attempt at reform in the Swedish labour market: the individualization of the parental leave system.

The Gendered Leeway : Male Privilege, Internal and External Mandates, and Gender Equality Policy Change

ABSTRACT This article addresses the question of why male politicians continue to be relatively unlikely to act in favor of gender-equality policy change, despite the advances in gender equality in recent decades. Drawing together literature on men and masculinities, feminist institutionalism and women’s substantive representation, we present a theoretical argument in which we distinguish between an internal and an external mandate to push for gender-equality policy change. We argue that both these mandates apply to female politicians but not to their male colleagues. As a consequence, a gendered leeway exists: men have more leeway than women in political maneuvering. We illustrate this argument by analyzing high-ranked party representatives within the self-labelled feminist Swedish Social Democratic Party. This article contributes theoretically to the launching of a research agenda on the role of men in processes of gender-equality policy adoption.

Pacific men: how the feminist gap explains hostility

ABSTRACT The gender gap in attitudes to foreign policy is well established in public opinion literature. Studies have repeatedly reported that women tend to be more peaceful and less militaristic than men. This article reexamines attitudes of individuals in relation to foreign policy and pits the gender gap against the largely forgotten feminist gap. We argue that the individual-level relationship between gender equality attitudes on the one hand, and tolerance and benevolence on the other, is under-researched, but also that key contributions about the effects of feminism have been mostly ignored in research on the gender gap in public opinion. We return to the notion of a causal relationship between gender equality attitudes, and peaceful attitudes, and of a feminist gap that also exists among men. In a series of novel empirical tests, we demonstrate that attitudes to gender equality, not biological sex, explain attitudes towards other nationalities and religious groups. Using individual-level survey data from five countries around the Pacific: China, Indonesia, Japan, South Korea, and the United States of America, we show that both men and women who reject gender equality are much more hostile both to other nations and to minorities in their own country.

Men’s Political Representation

In much research on gender and representation, the constraining factors for women’s political representation have served as a backdrop against which women’s activities are contextualized, rather th ...

Focusing on Masculinity and Male-Dominated Networks in Corruption

Bjarnegard’s chapter argues for the need to bring the role of masculinity to the fore in future studies of gender and corruption. Hitherto, most research has focused on the role of women and the values they may bring to positions of power. This chapter turns the question around and problematizes the role of male-dominated networks. The core of the argument is that corruption indicates the presence of shadowy arrangements that benefit the already privileged, which in most countries tend to be men. Based on data from Thailand, it reveals how women are locked out of positions of power, since they are not trusted as partners in the network of sensitive exchanges.