Why Do Authoritarian Regimes Adopt Quotas: Lessons from African Cases Aili Mari Tripp Professor of Political Science and Gender & Women’s Studies University of Wisconsin-Madison
[email protected] ABSTRACT Since the mid-1970s, but especially since the mid-1990s, international and internal domestic pressures have mounted to improve women’s political representation. This study asks why non- democratic countries in Africa have adopted quotas to promote women’s representation in legislatures when they are not especially interested in promoting other civil, political and human rights? It explains the adoption of quotas primarily in terms of changing international norms, donor and domestic women’s movement pressures, conflicts with Islamists in some countries, as well as postconflict impacts. Regime type does not impact level of representation in Africa, however, it does impact what women can do once in parliament. This paper briefly explores what difference women parliamentarians have made in non-democratic countries like Rwanda and Sudan and Tunisia under Ben Ali and contrasts them with hybrid regimes like Uganda under Yoweri Museveni. Introduction Women’s political representation, particularly in legislatures, has been one important arena for advancing women’s status. Since the mid-1990s, international and internal domestic pressures have mounted to increase women’s political representation through the use of legislative gender quotas, leading to increases in representation throughout the globe and to a situation where one finds non-democratic countries like Rwanda, with the highest rate of legislative representation of women in the world. This study asks why do non-democratic states adopt gender quotas and other female friendly policies when they are not especially interested in promoting other civil, political and human rights? It also situates the adoption of quotas alongside other measures to promote women’s rights in order to gauge the depth of commitment to a women’s rights agenda.