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Fast Track Strategies for Achiving Women's Representation in Iraq and Afghanistan: Choices and Consequences
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AST TRACK
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ORRIS
8/27/2006 6:27 PM
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Recent decades have witnessed growing demands for the inclusion and
empowerment of women leaders in elected office. Women representatives have made important strides in some nations but progress worldwide has proved sluggish. A global comparison shows that on average women are one sixth of all members of the lower house of parliamentarian today (16.6%), rising by less than 5 percentage points during the last two decades.
1
The question arising from this situation is whether fast-track strategies are effective
in accelerating the linear pace of change? These strategies include the use of reserved seats where offices are mandated for women members of parliament, statutory gender quotas regulating the proportion of women candidates nominated by all parties, and voluntary gender quotas adopted in internal rule-books governing nomination processes within specific parties. These reforms have been adopted and implemented for local and national office in many places during recent decades, but their effects are by no means straightforward. In some cases, formal rule changes appear to generate a rapid and immediate stepped shift in the number of women in office, whereas elsewhere similar policies seem to produce minimal difference to the outcome. Moreover even where more women attain legislative office through fast track strategies, achieving greater descriptive representation in parliaments, this should not necessarily be equated automatically with their substantive empowerment in decision-making processes.
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The rapid diffusion of fast-track strategies since the early-1990s raises a series of
questions. What have been the overall trends in the proportion of women leaders in parliaments and governments? What types of fast-track strategies are available? Where and why have these policies been adopted and, in some cases, abandoned? And what can we learn about the conditions which lead these strategies to ratchet up the number of women in elected office? This paper adopts a mixed method approach to examine these issues and discuss their implications. Part I provides a global overview of developments and then Part II focuses upon comparing the detailed case studies of Iraq (illustrating the implementation of statutory gender quotas) and Afghanistan (using reserved seats). These qualitative cases exemplify the process of adopting two alternative fast-track strategies in recent post-conflict constitutional settlements. Part III considers the underlying conditions leading towards the effectiveness of these arrangements. Part IV summarizes the conclusions. The broader lessons of the comparison are that mechanisms aiming to bring women into elected office have now spread throughout the world but not all policies are equally effective, by any means. The choice of mechanism is conditioned by the broader context, including the prior level of democracy, the degree of constitutional rigidity, the type of electoral system, global and regional patterns of diffusion, the existence of positive action policies for minority communities, and levels of party institutionalization. No single policy is optimal in all contexts and considerable care is needed to craft and implement the measures which will work best to promote the involvement of women in decision-making processes in each country. Overall the study concludes that new constitutions in post-conflict peace settlements represent a critical window of opportunity to secure the voices of women leaders in the reconstruction of society.
I: What have been the trends in women as leaders in parliaments and
governments?
Recent decades have seen widespread recognition that most parliaments and
governments worldwide fail to reflect the proportion of women in the electorate. This
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F
AST TRACK
~
N
ORRIS
8/27/2006 6:27 PM
2
Recent decades have witnessed growing demands for the inclusion and
empowerment of women leaders in elected office. Women representatives have made
important strides in some nations but progress worldwide has proved sluggish. A global
comparison shows that on average women are one sixth of all members of the lower house
of parliamentarian today (16.6%), rising by less than 5 percentage points during the last two
decades.
1
The question arising from this situation is whether fast-track strategies are effective
in accelerating the linear pace of change? These strategies include the use of reserved seats
where offices are mandated for women members of parliament, statutory gender quotas
regulating the proportion of women candidates nominated by all parties, and voluntary gender
quotas adopted in internal rule-books governing nomination processes within specific parties.
These reforms have been adopted and implemented for local and national office in many
places during recent decades, but their effects are by no means straightforward. In some
cases, formal rule changes appear to generate a rapid and immediate stepped shift in the
number of women in office, whereas elsewhere similar policies seem to produce minimal
difference to the outcome. Moreover even where more women attain legislative office
through fast track strategies, achieving greater descriptive representation in parliaments, this
should not necessarily be equated automatically with their substantive empowerment in
decision-making processes.
2
The rapid diffusion of fast-track strategies since the early-1990s raises a series of
questions. What have been the overall trends in the proportion of women leaders in
parliaments and governments? What types of fast-track strategies are available? Where and
why have these policies been adopted and, in some cases, abandoned? And what can we
learn about the conditions which lead these strategies to ratchet up the number of women in
elected office? This paper adopts a mixed method approach to examine these issues and
discuss their implications. Part I provides a global overview of developments and then Part II
focuses upon comparing the detailed case studies of Iraq (illustrating the implementation of
statutory gender quotas) and Afghanistan (using reserved seats). These qualitative cases
exemplify the process of adopting two alternative fast-track strategies in recent post-conflict
constitutional settlements. Part III considers the underlying conditions leading towards the
effectiveness of these arrangements. Part IV summarizes the conclusions. The broader
lessons of the comparison are that mechanisms aiming to bring women into elected office
have now spread throughout the world but not all policies are equally effective, by any
means. The choice of mechanism is conditioned by the broader context, including the prior
level of democracy, the degree of constitutional rigidity, the type of electoral system, global
and regional patterns of diffusion, the existence of positive action policies for minority
communities, and levels of party institutionalization. No single policy is optimal in all
contexts and considerable care is needed to craft and implement the measures which will
work best to promote the involvement of women in decision-making processes in each
country. Overall the study concludes that new constitutions in post-conflict peace
settlements represent a critical window of opportunity to secure the voices of women leaders
in the reconstruction of society.
I: What have been the trends in women as leaders in parliaments and
governments?
Recent decades have seen widespread recognition that most parliaments and
governments worldwide fail to reflect the proportion of women in the electorate. This
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