Lenita Freidenvall

Judging gender quotas : predictions and results

While electoral gender quotas are rapidly disseminating all over the world, they are also meeting with fierce resistance. A closer look at quota debates reveals that a considerable number of arguments for and against quotas take the form of quotas. This article identifies a number of key predictions from the quota debate in relation to three dimensions: descriptive representation, substantive representation and symbolic representation. Through examples from the growing quota research, the article discusses how nine selected pairs of predictions have been or could be tested empirically. By this we hope to move the discussion of quotas away from the present deadlock between quota proponents and opponents. A central argument made is that the differences in research results do not only derive from variations between the countries, but also from the use of disparate criteria of evaluation. The article points to the need for clarification and the development of common concepts and criteria.

A Discursive Struggle—The Swedish National Federation of Social Democratic Women and Gender Quotas

In 1993, the Social Democratic Party in Sweden adopted the zipper system, a gender quota system whereby women and men are placed alternately on all party lists. The National Federation of Social Democratic Women had, however, as early as in 1928 proposed that the Social Democratic Party introduce gender quotas so that women would be placed in safe positions on the party lists. In this article, the struggle of The National Federation of Social Democratic Women for an increased parliamentary representation of women and its demand for gender quotas during the period 1970–1993 is analysed. Its strategies to put the issue of womens under‐representation on the political agenda are outlined as well as the major discursive frames that the debate was embedded within. The article suggests that the discursive controversies over gender quotas can best be understood in the context of competing conceptions regarding historical development, equal opportunity, local autonomy and cooperation between women and men. One main point is that the zipper system, despite its radical institutional effect, can be seen as a discursive solution to the norm of cooperation.

Discursive Strategies for Institutional Reform: Gender Quotas in Sweden and France

Gender quotas have emerged in recent years as a key strategy for increasing women’s representation in electoral politics around the globe. Appearing today in more than 100 countries, these measures take several forms, including changes by individual political parties to their party statutes, as well as reforms initiated by national legislatures to revise constitutions and electoral laws (Dahlerup 2006b; Krook 2009). The shared goal is the nomination of more female candidates, most often to national parliaments. The spread of gender quotas to diverse contexts, as well as their mixed effects on the numbers of women elected, has inspired a large literature on quota policies. To understand quota adoption, scholars often begin with an analysis of quota debates, exploring how proposals are framed and justified in specific contexts. While advocates and opponents may vary across countries, a common approach is to map and unpack the content of these discourses,noting how actors articulate their positions in relation to existing political values (Freidenvall 2005; Holli et al. 2006; Krook et al. 2009). In many cases, these controversies lead to quota reform, but the apparent resolution of these debates does not ensure that quotas will be implemented fully. Rather, some reforms produce jumps, while others experience stagnation, or even decreases in the numbers of women elected.

Institutionalizing Intersectionality in the Nordic Countries: Anti-Discrimination and Equality in Denmark, Finland, Norway, and Sweden

Addressing multiple inequalities through anti-discrimination measures has become a new policy priority across Europe. This trend is also reflected in the Nordic countries, where equality politics is currently undergoing great changes. Public policies increasingly take an ‘integrated’ and ‘multiple’ approach to inequality and discrimination, moving away from a single gender equality framework. A central debate over these reforms has been whether the multidimensional framework threatens to ‘downgrade’ gender equality measures.

Gender Quotas and Ethnic Minority Representation : Swedish Evidence from a Longitudinal Mixed Methods Study

In this paper, we study the ways in which affirmative action for one political minority, gender quotas, impact on intersectional representation. In a quantitative analysis of detailed panel data from 285 Swedish municipal assemblies, the numerical impact of a zipper placement mandate in Swedens largest political party, the Social Democratic Party, is analyzed. No evidence that this quota helped, or hindered, the intersectional representation of men or women is found in the short run, but it is found that a weak numerical impact may exist in the long run. A qualitative analysis of party records and interviews with key actors sheds further light on these results. Differences in the norms of representation for women and polyethnic minorities, coupled with weak organizational and practical constraints for formulating policies for the latter, appear to be likely explanations.

Intersectionality and candidate selection in Sweden

This article addresses how intersectionality can be applied to studies of candidate selection. Based on empirical examples on the three stages of candidate selection in Sweden, it concludes that intersectionality is of importance not only in addressing the intersections between different forms of inequality and the resulting hierarchies between them, but also in drawing attention to dominant categories in any given context. By asking ‘which women’ and ‘which men’ are included as aspirants, candidates, and/or elected representatives, the mechanisms of inclusion and exclusion in candidate selection can be brought to the fore, particularly the ways in which the ‘norm’ (usually white privileged men) remains in power.

WHY NOT CORPORATE GENDER QUOTAS IN SWEDEN

Sweden has for a long time been in the forefront internationally when it comes to equal representation of women and men in politics. In the economic sphere, however, male dominance persists. Even though Swedish governments have for more than 12 years argued for increased representation of women on company boards to address unequal representation, corporate gender quotas have not been adopted. This article examines the ways in which Swedish governments have perceived the issue of womens under-representation on company boards during the period 2000–12 and analyses the implications these perceptions have had for the solutions governments have presented to increase representation. Using empirical data consisting of government bills, reports and answers by ministers to interpellations, the article demonstrates how the identification and diagnosis of the problem affect which solutions seem rational and legitimate and, in the end, opened up different opportunities for change. The article also shows that the discursive development concerning womens representation in politics has taken a different path than the one on company boards, a path that opened up the possibility for solutions such as quotas and the potential for a faster increase in the representation of women.

Remaking Political Citizenship in Multicultural Europe: Addressing Citizenship Deficits in the Formal Political Representation System

Political citizenship is probably the dimension of citizenship with which readers are most familiar, at least in its conventional meaning of nationality, the right to vote and to stand for election. In fact, definitions of citizenship often conflate it with political citizenship. For instance, Leydet (2006), drawing on Cohen (1999), Kymlicka and Norman (2000), and Carens (2000), highlights three dimensions of citizenship, and these pertain to the political world: a person’s citizenship, as a legal person free to act according to the law and to claim the law’s protection; a person’s right to act as a participant in political institutions (the above-mentioned voter and representative); and a person’s membership of a political community (nation) that provides a source of identity (a nationality). However, the feminist critique has moved the discussion of citizenship beyond the rights granted by state authorities to the terrain of practices and identities chosen, constructed and performed by citizens and residents in their daily lives on intimate, social and political levels; in other words, moved it into the spheres of participation, identity and belonging, as understood by the FEMCIT project team.

Electoral gender quota systems and their implementation in Europe : Update 2013

Abstract The report maps the diffusion of electoral gender quotas in the 30 EU/EEA countries. In 21 of the countries some type of gender quotas are in use, either legislated or voluntary party quo ...

Framing Women Politicians in Old Democracies

This chapter looks at the changing ways in which women politicians have been framed over time. The dominant attitude at the time when women got the vote was that women’s proper role was in the fami ...