October 3, 2005, marks a dozen years since Argentina started the quota
ball rolling via the first use of gender quota legislation applying to all
parties for the election of national legislators.1
Prior to this date, the world's experience with quotas
had been limited to intraparty quota rules and token reserved seats. For a
cogent discussion of the distinction between quota legislation, reserved
seat legislation, and intraparty quota rules, see Norris (2001).
For the October 3, 1993, Argentine
Chamber of Deputies election, all political parties were required to
present closed party lists on which women accounted for a minimum of 30%
of the candidates, and furthermore, a comparable proportion of these women
had to be placed in “electable” positions on the lists (
Jones 1996). Although the initial implementation
process was not free of problems (
Durrieu 1999),
in a short time the gender quota became an established fixture of the
Argentine political system. The impact of the quota legislation on the
representation of women in the Argentine congress was nothing short of
dramatic, with women now accounting for 34% and 44% of the seats in the
Argentine Chamber of Deputies and Senate, respectively, a marked contrast
to the situation prior to the adoption of the quota legislation, when
women on average held a mere 5% of the seats in both legislative
bodies.
Over the past dozen years, a host of other countries have adopted
quota legislation. While the effectiveness of this quota legislation in
enhancing the presence of women in the legislature has varied, with far
more negative than positive experiences (Htun and Jones
2002; Krook 2005), we can identify
several other “success” stories, such as Belgium (Meier 2004), Costa Rica (Jones
2004), and Mexico (Baldez 2004). Here,
however, my goal is not to explain the success or failure of different
forms of quota legislation, or to analyze the effect of increases in the
number of female legislators on public policy. Instead, I will endeavor to
answer the three questions posed by the editors for the authors in this
Critical Perspectives on Gender and Politics section: 1) Are quotas a good
idea? 2) Should more countries adopt them? 3) Should the United States
consider them?
Are Gender Quotas a Good Idea?
My answer to this question is context and quota contingent. By
context, I refer to existing barriers to women's equal representation
in a country (or state or municipality). By quota, I refer to the
specifics of the quota legislation being discussed.
Quotas are a good idea in instances where women are significantly
underrepresented in proportion to their presence in the general population
(i.e., approximately 50%).2
I do not address
the issue regarding what constitutes “significant”
underrepresentation, since what is considered significant will depend in
part on context-specific factors, such as age of the democracy, the status
of women in society, political culture, etc.
This significant
underrepresentation constitutes a very strong signal that there are
cultural, economic, institutional, and/or societal factors that
combine to unfairly limit women's access to equal representation in
public office. And in virtually all instances, the only method that will
redress this underrepresentation in the short or medium term is the
adoption of effective gender quotas.
For example, a country like Denmark, which has neither a national
quota law nor relevant political parties that possess intraparty quota
rules (International IDEA and Stockholm University
2005), and yet where women account for 37% of the unicameral
national legislature (Folketinget), is a place where I would suggest that
the adoption of gender quotas is not a particularly good idea. On the
basis of the current gender distribution of legislative seats, it would
appear that significant barriers to the election of women legislators do
not exist, and that the political costs of gender quota legislation
outweigh the marginal representational benefits that would be achieved by
this legislation.
In contrast, a country like Japan, which has neither a national quota
law nor relevant political parties that possess intraparty quota rules
(International IDEA and Stockholm University
2005), and where women account only for 7% of the national lower
house (Shugiin), is a place where I would suggest that the adoption of
gender quotas is a good idea. Clearly, the Japanese political system
possesses a variety of cultural, economic, institutional, and/or
societal barriers that combine to severely limit the election of female
legislators.
As I mentioned, my response to this question also depends on the type
of gender quota that is being proposed. All quota legislation is not
equally effective in the goal of facilitating the election of a
substantial proportion of female legislators (Htun and
Jones 2002; Jones 2004; Krook 2005). The most effective quota laws generally
contain all of the following features: placement mandates (in concert with
closed party lists), a high minimum percentage of women candidates (or low
maximum percentages for either sex), application to all legislative seats
(and not, for instance, to only a modest proportion of the seats), the
employment of quotas within a context of moderate-to-large multimember
electoral districts (i.e., districts that elect a moderate to large number
of legislators), and adequate enforcement of compliance with the quota
legislation.3
Quota legislation can
potentially be successful in concert with relatively small electoral
districts, assuming an ideal configuration of the rules regarding
placement mandates, minimum quota percentages, compliance, and seat
allocation.
Quota legislation that lacks one or more of these
features often will be ineffective.
Quota legislation that is likely to be effective—that is, it
will result in the election of a substantial proportion of women
legislators—is a good idea. In contrast, quota legislation that is
likely to be ineffective is not a good idea. The latter legislation will
in most instances not have the desired effect (i.e., the election of a
substantial proportion of female legislators). At the same time, it will
allow the primarily male establishment to claim to have supported
legislation to enhance women's representation (and, hence, not to
feel as much pressure to support other legislation in the future that
would be beneficial for women, perhaps even an effective gender quota
law). It is also likely to weaken a country's most prominent feminist
leaders (assuming they were key advocates of the adopted quota
legislation), who, following election after election in which the
proportion of women elected does not significantly increase, will be
compelled to explain the quota legislation's failure to their
constituents.
One caveat to the preceding statement that the adoption of ineffective
quota legislation is a bad idea is the following. It is possible for quota
activists to employ a two-stage quota legislation adoption strategy. Under
this strategy, quota activists agree to the adoption of inferior
legislation (the first stage) under the logic that at that point in time,
they have two choices: the inferior quota legislation or no quota
legislation at all. At the same time, the antiquota establishment is
content with the ineffective legislation because it realizes that it will,
in practice, not have a salient impact on the electoral process. Then,
once this adopted quota legislation fails to have its
“promised” effect of electing a significant proportion of
women, quota activists can use the gap between the legislation's
“promise” of enhanced female representation and the
legislation's “reality” of limited female electoral gains
to pressure the antiquota establishment, via the courts and public
opinion, to adopt effective quota legislation (the second stage).
Should More Countries Adopt Gender
Quotas?
The answer to this question follows directly from the discussion in
the previous section. If a country finds itself in a situation where women
are significantly underrepresented in its legislative bodies (national,
state, municipal), and at the same time the type of quota legislation
proposed is likely to be effective, then that country should by all means
adopt quota legislation. Quota legislation represents the only method by
which to substantially increase the percentage of female legislators in a
country in the short to medium term.
If, on the other hand, a country finds itself in a situation where
women are not significantly underrepresented in its legislative bodies,
then that country should not adopt quota legislation. Similarly, even if a
country finds itself in a situation where women are significantly
underrepresented in its legislative bodies, but the quota legislation
proposed is unlikely to be effective, then quotas are not a good idea
(unless, perhaps, as part of a well-planned two-stage “bait and
switch” strategy, such as that described in the previous
section).
Should the United States Consider Adopting
Gender Quotas?
The anemic representation of women in the U.S. House of
Representatives (15%) and U.S. Senate (14%) is a national embarrassment.
As of June 30, 2005, the Inter-Parliamentary Union's ranking of women
in the lower/unicameral legislature of the world's nations placed
the United States sixtieth (Inter-Parliamentary Union
2005). While this ranking is somewhat misleading, since several of
the legislatures ranked ahead of the United States are oppressive
dictatorships (e.g., Cuba) where the national legislature performs a
purely decorative function and has scant political or policy relevance,
the fact remains that the percentages of women in the U.S. House of
Representatives and Senate are comparatively very low. Furthermore, this
low level of female legislative presence is repeated in the country's
state legislatures where, as of 2005, a mere average of 23% of state
legislators were women, with the state with the greatest presence of
female legislators (Maryland) possessing a legislature (General Assembly
and Senate) in which only a third (34%) of the members were women (Center for American Women in Politics 2005).
This significant underrepresentation of women would at first glance
make the United States an excellent candidate for gender quotas.
Furthermore, the United States already has substantial experience with
implicit racial and ethnic quotas, that is, majority-minority districts
(Lublin 1999) designed to increase the
descriptive representation of racial and ethnic minorities (principally
African Americans and Latinos, but also Native Americans and Asian
Americans).4
Although there is no legislation
requiring majority-minority districts to be represented by legislators who
belong to the minority group that is the majority (or plurality) in the
district, empirically there are relatively few cases in which Anglos (or
other nonmembers of the minority group) are elected in majority-minority
districts (Lublin 1999).
The United
States also is not without experience with gender quotas, as the
Democratic Party employs gender quotas for the selection of delegates to
its quadrennial national convention. In 2004, the party's rules
mandated that the rank-ordered closed party lists used for the election of
delegates at the state/district level alternate women and men on the
list (i.e., a zipper system).
However, unlike the case for the selection of delegates to the
Democratic National Convention, all members of the U.S. House of
Representatives and U.S. Senate are selected from single-member districts.
In a similar vein, an overwhelming majority of U.S. state legislators also
are chosen from single-member districts. Furthermore, the most popular
electoral reform being advocated today in the United States (instant
runoff voting/the alternative vote) would not alter the single-member
district aspect of elections at the national, state, and local level.
Finally, the successful creation of majority-minority electoral
districts depends in large part on residential housing segregation based
on race and ethnicity. The lack of gender-based housing segregation,
combined with the relative absence of gender-polarized voting, indicates
that the majority-minority district model is not an option for the
enhancement of women's representation in the United States. At the
same time, the options of mandating that specific congressional districts
only elect women or that a political party present a set of congressional
candidates of which women represent a minimum percentage (e.g., no more
than 67% of a party's U.S. House candidates can be of the same sex)
are sufficiently at odds with political and constitutional reality in the
United States that it is unrealistic even to consider them as potential
remedies.
In sum, while the United States clearly represents a case where women
are significantly underrepresented in the country's most prominent
legislative bodies, it is not a good case for the adoption of quotas,
inasmuch as quota legislation is incompatible with the combination of the
electoral rules (i.e., single-member districts) employed to select all
national and most state legislators and the country's weak political
party system in which individual politicians, not the national or state
political parties, are the relevant political unit. In addition, any
reform of the current single-member plurality (or majority runoff)
districts employed for the election of all national and most state
legislators is unlikely in the immediate future. And in any event, the
most likely electoral reform (instant runoff voting) would not alter the
single-member district nature of the system.
While the probability of the creation of multimember districts for the
election of members of the U.S. House of Representatives and Senate is
extremely unlikely in at least the short to medium term, quotas do
represent a potential viable option for the United States at the state
level in two rare instances: for the election of legislators to the
handful of state legislative chambers that presently employ multimember
districts for the election of a large percentage of their legislators
(e.g., at least two-fifths of the chamber) and to the one state
legislative chamber in which there exists a realistic (albeit still
remote) possibility of adopting multimember districts along with a
semiproportional form of seat allocation (i.e., cumulative voting).
Eleven state legislative chambers (10 lower houses and one senate)
elect their members (in all cases more than half) from multimember
districts (with the most common size for these districts being two
legislators) (Squire and Hamm 2005).5
Two of the chambers (the Idaho House and the
Washington House) possess two-member districts in which citizens cast a
single ballot in two separate races within their district (i.e., the
“post or place” system) (Squire and Hamm
2005). The remaining nine chambers employ the plurality rule, with
voters allowed to vote for multiple candidates (but not allowed to cast
multiple votes for the same candidate).
In these states, the
adoption of effective quota legislation is eminently feasible. For
example, legislation could be adopted that specifies that no more than 50%
of the candidates in a district with an even number of legislators can be
of the same sex (with a one-candidate gender difference allowed in
districts with an odd number of legislators).
6 In a district that elects three members (or where a party has
three candidates, if, for instance, it does not present a full slate), a
party would have to present at least one female candidate, while in a
district with five members, a party would have to present at least two
female candidates, etc.
However, in some of these chambers (where
multimember districts are employed), quota legislation may not be
advisable due to the substantial proportion of women elected to office at
present (without quota legislation), such as the Idaho House (36% female),
Maryland House (35%), Arizona House (33%), and Vermont Senate (33%). In
contrast, quota legislation would clearly be advisable in some of the
other chambers, such as the South Dakota House (20% female), North Dakota
House (19%), West Virginia House (18%), and New Jersey House (16%).
For instance, the New Jersey House (General Assembly), North Dakota
House, and South Dakota House elect all of their members from two-member
districts (every political party can nominate two candidates, and voters
are provided with two, noncumulative, votes). If gender quota legislation
were adopted, requiring each political party to nominate one person of
each sex for elections in every district, the percentage of women elected
would increase dramatically. This increase would be especially large in
New Jersey, where in July 2005, only three districts had legislators from
different parties (one Democrat and one Republican), while the 37 other
districts had legislators from the same party (i.e., both were either
Democrats or Republicans).7
The adoption of
similar legislation for the North Dakota House and the South Dakota House
would likely have a comparable (though perhaps slightly weaker) effect on
women's representation. As of July 2005, 36 of North Dakota's 47
two-member districts are represented by legislators from the same party,
while 28 of South Dakota's 34 two-member districts are represented by
legislators from the same party (one of South Dakota's districts is
presently split into two single-member districts in order to create a
majority–minority district for Native Americans).
Assuming
that partisanship would continue to dominate vote choice more than would
gender (which is the case in most instances), the adoption of a 50% quota
would substantially increase (to somewhere between 35% and 50%) the
percentage of women in the New Jersey General Assembly.
The other potential avenue for the implementation of effective quota
legislation would exist in Illinois if the state returns to the use of
cumulative voting to elect the members of its House of Representatives
(between 1870 and 1980, the Illinois House was elected using cumulative
voting). Under the proposed system, each district would elect three
representatives. Were cumulative voting to be adopted in Illinois,
political parties could be required (via the adoption of gender quota
legislation) to present lists at the district level in which no sex
accounted for more than 67% of the candidates, if the party runs three
candidates, or 50% of the candidates, if the party runs two candidates.
However, the adoption of quota legislation might not be considered
necessary in Illinois at the present time, since women now account for 30%
of House members, and the adoption of quota legislation, such as suggested
here, would be unlikely to increase this percentage by more than 10% at
best.
Conclusion
Gender quotas are a good idea in principle. However, when considering
the adoption of gender quotas in a country, state, or municipality, the
context of women's representation and the details of the quota
legislation to be adopted (including how it interacts with the existing
electoral rules) are of paramount importance. Quotas are only a good idea
in the context of significant underrepresentation of women in the targeted
legislative bodies, combined with quota legislation that is likely to be
effective (i.e., to result in a substantial increase in the percentage of
women elected). Absent a significant underrepresentation of women or quota
legislation that is likely to be effective, quotas are in most instances
not a good idea, since either they are unnecessary or they are destined to
fail to result in a noteworthy increase in the percentage of women
elected.
