It is well known that women and minorities are both systemically underrepresented in national parliaments. There are factors that can explain why they are both underrepresented, for instance, electoral system design is one of the big factors that has impact on women and minorities representation. Along with demographic and socioeconomic factors, and cultural variables. Although, women and minorities are both systemically underrepresented in national parliaments, I argue that the types of electoral challenges they face and the institutional tools used to overcome them are not same.
One of many of the electoral challenges women and minorities face is the design of the electoral system. For both groups, proportional representation (PR) electoral
…show more content…
There are three explanations is to why women are underrepresented. One, social explanations, women are underrepresented because the ideology that women should be domestic and they should not be running to be MPs. Two, institutional explanation is the ideology that men will do better job than women. Three, behavioral explanation, the ideology that voters prefer man over women although this has diminished now, it is still true for older voters. The most important reason that women fare better under PR systems relates to party strategy in putting together a slate of candidate. Setting up quotas, it forces parties to nominate women, as stated in the paper that state-mandated quotas may result in dramatic increases in the proportion of women elected (Paxton, Hughes and Painter 6). Setting up quotas for women is the most common mechanism used to promote the participation of women in political life, and has been used with varying degrees of success all over the world: by the ANC in South Africa, the Peronist Party (PJ) and the Radical Civic Union (UCR) in Argentina (IDEA Handbook 121). Costa Rica as an example, in 1996 they adopted a national quota and in 2002 substantially strengthened its quota law. These two events influenced Costa Rica’s level of women’s participation, but only in the years after the quota was implemented (Paxton, Hughes and Painter
A proportionate electoral system (otherwise known as proportional representation or PR) grants its voters a voice in their vote. The way that the PR system works is that for every percentage of votes a party receives, they will be granted around the same percentage of seats in parliament. For example, if a party receives 35% of the votes, they would receive 35% of the seats in legislature. This is important for Canada because it gives smaller parties a better chance of retaining a seat. There are many different varieties of PR, due to the fact that at often times, the voting percentages do not evenly translate into the number of seats available (King, 2000). For instance, if a party receive 33.6% of the vote, they can’ receive 33.6% of seats. Because of this, numerous variations of the PR system have been created. The most common...
The results of recent elections in Britain have raised many significant questions about the current political situation in the country, particularly concerning the electoral system. Therefore, the problem of “crisis” in Britain’s democracy has been the subject of wide speculation among analysts and political scientists over recent years. In addition, it is widely recognized that the traditional electoral system in the UK - first past the post - is the main cause of that crisis and should be replaced as part of a plan to reconstitute the democratic culture (Kelly 2008). By longstanding critics of the system, opponents advocate the use of proportional representation (PR) for selecting MPs. Due to this problem, it is going to be a referendum on changing the electoral system of the country's parliamentary elections.
When asking the question, “What are the differences between men and women?” what things come into mind? When asking friends what their thoughts were they stated things such as men are stronger, women are weaker, men are bigger, women are smaller, men make more money, etc. Due to the obvious assumptions that people have been making for centuries it is thought by some Americans that males are the dominant sex. Before watching Miss Representation I had always gotten so upset at certain men for the way they treated women or the things they would say to them. After this film I realized that their actions might have stemmed from “rules” that they were taught an early age; those rules being the rules of masculinity. After reviewing the rules it finally clicked to me why
However, the proposed systems must be thoroughly examined for their compatibility with Canada’s needs and their ability to resolve the issues outlined in this paper. From distortion in representation to Western alienation and to making the voices of minorities heard, the new system must also ensure that Parliament fulfills its role in representing, legislating, and holding the government. More importantly, after the current government abandoned its promise on electoral reform, it is important for researchers and future governments to build on the knowledge acquired by the Special Committee on Electoral Reform as well as previous experiences of the provinces with electoral
Tanguay, Brian, and Steven Bittle. "Parliament as a Mirror to the Nation: Promoting Diversity in Representation through Electoral Reform." Canadian Issues (2005): 61-63. ProQuest. Web. 20 Mar. 2012.
The debate about electoral reform is not a new issue it has been discussed for quite some time, but with the recent studies, “Concerns about the relationship between a party’s share of the popular vote in an election and the number of seats it receives”(Howe & Northrup, 2000) has been given more attention. The first past the post system has continually elected governments that display grossly unfair party representation. “The most dramatic evidence was provided by the Progressive Conservatives, who captured 16% of the national popular vote but only won 2 seats (0.7%) in the House of Commons…In Quebec, the sovereigntist voice of the Bloc Quebecois was amplified…when 49.2% of the vote garnered 72% of the provincial seats for the Bloc…”(Braving the New World p.177).
In conclusion, it can clearly be seen that, because of the inequality to vote, gender, religious and race exclusions were pronounced side effects. Gender exclusions were shown through the inequality to vote due to the views of women in society. Religious exclusions were expressed through the uneven opportunities to vote through the prejudice set against the religions. And, racial exclusions were shown through the lack of the ability to vote be the intentional discrimination that these races were victims of. While others may say that these exclusions of groups can be seen through other actions, voting inequalities straightforwardly shows this. This is because when only specific groups can vote, it can be seen that the other groups are unfairly treated to their franchise.
The authors describe some of the advantages of a MMP system: “Mixed electoral systems provide fairly proportional outcomes, maintain the geographic link between constituents and members, provide for greater choice, and allow the opportunity for smaller parties to represented in Parliament” (p. 11). This system works better than the current FPTP or plurality system, because it allows citizen’s a second opportunity to have a voice. This is important because it would allow our minority groups to have a greater political influence. As mentioned earlier, in the current system all votes for candidates who lost, were insignificant to the election outcome. The authors explain: “Only those votes that go to the eventual winner count towards electing a representative, which may discourage people from voting or promote disaffection with the system” (p. 3). Alternatively, the MMP system allows citizen’s a second opportunity to elect party members in order to proportionally represent the popular
Women have been discriminated against since the beginning of time, as early as the first people, Adam and Eve. Eve was called the evil one, who ate fruit from the tree of knowledge. Once she had the knowledge to know right from wrong, she chose to do wrong and give the fruit to Adam. Examples like these can be shown all over history books, in stories, tales and legends across the entire world. Women have been subordinate to men in virtually all societies throughout history.
Throughout this essay it will be discussed how female representations affects society, what has changed, if has changed during the years. Representations of women were a crucial subject of discussion especially in the concepts of the gaze that often refers to women as objects of the active gaze. The gaze establishes relationships of power, representing different codes such as dominance and subjugation, difference and otherness (Sturken and Cartwright 2009: 111).
The underrepresentation of female’s interests and values is a global phenomenon as there is no country where women are equally represented on all levels of government. Since most women in the Western World gained the right to vote, there is no area of human life or development sector which is immune from the impact of inequitable gender relations. The central thesis of this paper is that women’s underrepresentation in elected office creates serious problems. This paper begins by analysing the key barriers of women to get into politics, especially into leading positions. It will then go on to the argument that women have special interests and needs, and that male politicians cannot represent those concerns adequately. Additionally, this paper describes further problems in today’s political world, such as women’s identification with
...ntries women are restricted in where they can and cannot work. Most commonly, they seem to be restricted from jobs in which physically taxing tasks are the norm. This is no doubt due to the stereotype that women are fragile and weak and must be protected (a stereotype that can hold true, but that is not always true). This also seems to be consistent across culture. However, despite the fact that these restrictions were enacted to protect women, they place heavy limitations on women’s opportunities. Furthermore, these are not the only injustices many women across the world face. However, the only way to fight these injustices is to increase women’s participation in politics, as discussed in the UN report from 2008. It is absolutely vital that women be able to actively participate in politics without letting gender discrimination and stereotypes get in the way.
Women's suffrage refers to the right of women to participate in democratic processes through voting on the same basis as men. In the medieval and early modern periods in Europe, the right to vote was typically severely limited for all people by factors such as age, ownership of property, and gender. The development of the modern democratic state has been characterized internationally by the erosion of these various limitations following periods of collective struggle. Women's suffrage has been achieved as part of this process of modernization at different times in different national contexts, although very few nations granted women the right to vote in elections before the twentieth century (Freedman, pp. 63).
A major way in which women have a lower status in society than men can be seen through women in politics. There are three major key areas of women in politics which focus of these points these consist of the attitudes towards women in politics, how women are represented thought the eyes of the law and through their occupational activity. It is not unknown that women are drastically misrepresented in Irish politics today. According to the Central Statistics Office (CSO, 2013) the amount of women TDs stand at 25 compared to 141 male TDs. That roughly estimates out that just 15 per cent of Dáil member are women. This major misrepresenta...
The implementation of gender quotas in electoral politics is a mean to combat the democratic deficit that occurs when a social group is excluded from the political sphere due to structural or cultural reasons. Quotas are a form of affirmative action/positive discrimination which is meant to remove the structural and cultural obstacles that keep women out of the formal political ...