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Equalizing Representation of Women and Men in Decision-Making

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Equalizing Representation of Women and Men in Decision-Making Equalizing representation of men and women in decision-making Explaining the different proportions of men and women in the single or lower houses of the national or federal Parliaments A comparative case study Master Thesis International Public Management and Public Policy Faculty of Social Science Erasmus University Rotterdam Supervisor: Dr. S. M. Groeneveld Second reader: Dr. A. G. Dijkstra Writer: E. Hennevelt 297245 Summary Throughout the world, women are still largely underrepresented in important decision-making positions. The international community and the European Union have acknowledged the need to equalize representation of men and women in these positions, because underrepresentation forms an important obstacle to the democratic development of countries. Increasing the levels of representation by women is also seen as a necessary condition for women’s interests to be taken into account in decision-making, which is important for the improvement of the general level of gender equality and the position of women in society. The national Parliament is a very important decision-making body in a democratic system. It is chosen by the voting population, and it has an important voice in national decision-making. The proportions of women Members of Parliament (MP’s) differ largely between European countries. In 2006, European Member States had between 9% and 48% women Parliamentarians. The central research question of this thesis is which factors could explain these large differences in women Parliamentarians. In order to find an explanation for these differences, three countries with high proportions of women MP’s (Sweden, Finland, the Netherlands) and three countries with low proportions of women MP’s (Greece, France, Ireland) are compared on several variables. Besides a focus on factors in the political system, features of the administration and socio-economic factors are also taken into account. The selection of the research variables is based on existing literature. This thesis concludes that current proportions of women in Parliament can be explained primarily by the extent to which women’s organizations have made claims for equal representation, and the extent to which political parties have responded to these claims with programmatic and organizational change. Hypotheses concerning features of the administration and socio-economic forces could not be confirmed. Further research should include more countries to increase the reliability of the results, and should select the cases based on variety in de explaining variables in order to actually establish causality. Word count (Introduction - Conclusions): 31.715 Figure 1: Poster to encourage women to vote : ‘If women vote, the democracy is complete’ – Quetzaltenango, Guatemala (June 2007) i ii Acknowledgements First of all I would like to thank dr. Sandra Groeneveld for her supervision. Her precise and constructive feedback has been very helpful in improving this thesis. She always replied on documents and questions with feedback within a few hours, despite her busy schedule. This has facilitated my progress greatly. Her interest in this topic and her dedication to the supervision made our cooperation very pleasant. I thank dr. Geske Dijkstra for the work she has done as second reader. I thank dr. Kerstin Kolam, dr. Eeva Raevaara, dr. Inge Bleijenbergh, dr. Maria Stratigaki, dr. Eléonore Lépinard and dr. Yvonne Galligan for the insightful interviews and their feedback on the case studies. Their professional views and opinions, and enthusiasm for the topic of this research were very inspiring. Teachers and professors of the IMP programme, thank you for providing many interesting insights into the world of international public administration. Also I would like to thank my family and friends for their many encouragements. The ‘IMP elite’ especially, for sharing the many ups and downs that accompany writing a thesis. And Tim, my lovely, thank you for knowing how to deal with women’s issues ☺ iii iv Contents Summary ................................................................................................................................................ 1 Acknowledgements ................................................................................................................................ 3 List of tables ........................................................................................................................................... 7 List of figures.......................................................................................................................................... 7 List of abbreviations .............................................................................................................................. 8 1 Introduction .................................................................................................................................... 1 1.1 Problem analysis ...................................................................................................................... 1 The international context and the process of agenda setting ........................................................... 2 Proportions of women representatives in the Parliaments of European Member States ................. 5 1.2 Research questions ................................................................................................................... 7 Central research question ................................................................................................................. 7 Sub research questions ..................................................................................................................... 7 1.3 Scientific aim and practical relevance ..................................................................................... 8 1.4 Research method ...................................................................................................................... 8 Comparative case study design ........................................................................................................ 8 Case selection .................................................................................................................................. 9 Method and sources of inquiry ........................................................................................................ 9 Outline ............................................................................................................................................... 10 2 Theoretical framework ................................................................................................................ 12 2.1 Gender equality ...................................................................................................................... 12 2.2 Choosing variables ................................................................................................................. 14 2.3 Designing a framework for analysis ...................................................................................... 14 Political system .............................................................................................................................. 15 Administrative system ................................................................................................................... 19 Socio-economic forces ................................................................................................................... 20 2.4 Hypotheses ............................................................................................................................. 23 3 Case studies high-proportion countries ..................................................................................... 25 3.1 Case study: Sweden ............................................................................................................... 25 Conclusions .................................................................................................................................... 29 3.2 Case study: Finland ................................................................................................................ 31 Conclusions .................................................................................................................................... 35 3.3 Case study: The Netherlands ................................................................................................. 36 v Conclusions .................................................................................................................................... 41 4 Case studies Low-proportion countries ..................................................................................... 42 4.1 Case study: Greece ................................................................................................................ 42 Conclusions .................................................................................................................................... 46 4.2 Case study: France ................................................................................................................. 47 Conclusions .................................................................................................................................... 52 4.3 Case study: Ireland ................................................................................................................ 53 Conclusions ...................................................................................................................................
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