WUNRN
Women Living Under Muslim Laws -
WLUML
ELECTORAL POLITICS: MAKING QUOTAS
WORK FOR WOMEN
Publication
Authors: Homa Hoodfar and Mona Tajali
Date: 2011
– 226 Pages
Languages available: English
The goal of reducing gender
inequalities in political representation has been elusive in many different
kinds of political systems, even though women have made substantial progress in
legal rights, education, economic resources, employment opportunities, and
healthcare in the same polities. This book argues that gender quotas are an
important strategy to improve women's political representation in legislatures
and political parties and it lays out the history of this approach across the
globe. It suggests however, that gender quotas are themselves not an 'easy fix'
to gender discrimination since similarly designed quotas have had different
outcomes across cases. The book's comparative approach untangles the various
factors which need to be considered in designing, lobbying for, and
implementing gender quotas so that they can be effective. While teasing out
some shared experiences, this volume encourages coalitions of activists to
develop context-appropriate strategies to craft effective campaigns to end
women's exclusion from poltiical decision-making. It also emphasises that
women's movements need to build public support for gender quotas and influence
their design and implementation if they are to move beyond 'tokenism' and significantly
improve political representation for women. It is a tremendously useful and
informative volume for activists and scholars across the globe and does a
masterful job in explaining divergent outcomes both within regions and across
them. Hoodfar and Tajali argue that although more and more countries are
successfully and creatively using gender quotas, some of the wealthiest
long-standing democracies still continue to experience greater legislative
gender inequalities.
-Diane Singerman (Co-Director of
Middle East Studies at
Homa Hoodfar is Professor of Anthropology at
Mona Tajali is an independent researcher and a PhD candidate in the Department of Humanities
at