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On the Hill: CHRC event on women in politics, trends and perspectives
March 5, 2008
Beth Hearn
Anders Johnsson, Secretary-General of the Inter-Parliamentary Union, presented a set of statistics to illustrate the level of women’s involvement in parliaments around the world at an event hosted by the Congressional Human Rights Caucus on March 5.
Women constitute just 17.7 percent of all members of parliament around the world. There are only twenty countries in which women have a critical mass of 30 percent representation in parliament – that is, they have reached the level at which women’s representation is considered great enough to influence policies and institutions.
The reasons for the inequality, and indeed for the differences between nations, are complex. It is not, as one might assume, the more established democracies, nor the wealthiest, nor the most powerful, that are at the top of the list of countries with the greatest number of women in parliament. The United States is placed 71st out of the 188 countries for which data is available, with just 73 women (16.8 percent) in the House of Representatives and 16 (16 percent) in the Senate. The United Kingdom is 60th and France is 64th.
The Nordic countries are the best performing. Here, as in most of the other nations with comparatively high numbers of women in parliament, there are quotas that make a certain level of representation mandatory.
There are a few other European states in the top twenty (the Netherlands, Spain, Belgium, Austria and Germany), but there is also a significant presence of South American and African countries (Argentina, Costa Rica, Cuba, Mozambique, South Africa, Uganda, Burundi and Tanzania). The country with the highest number of women in parliament – with 48.8 percent in the lower house and 34.6 percent in the upper – is Rwanda.
Arab states and the Pacific region (excluding Australia and New Zealand) continue to display extremely low levels of women in parliament, with just 9.6 percent in the former and 2.5 percent in the latter.
Though these statistics illustrate a great deal of inequality, it must be recognized that significant progress has been made. In 1995, the world average was 11.3 percent, reflecting considerably lower levels of women’s representation worldwide.
Marie Wilson, President of the White House Project, a group advocating an increase in numbers of women in leadership positions, emphasized this “good news.” Referring specifically to Condoleezza Rice and Madeleine Albright, she asserted that people in the U.S. are now comfortable with the idea of women being present in leadership positions in virtually every arena. The U.S. is in an historic position, said Rep. Lois Capps (D-CA), in that the nation now has its “first-ever viable female presidential candidate.”
However, it is not the case, as might be assumed, that Hillary Clinton represents America’s only chance for a female president in the foreseeable future. Wilson suggested several prominent women who could be on their way towards the presidency: Kathleen Sebelius, Governor of Kansas; Janet Napolitano, Governor of Arizona; Beverly Perdue, Lieutenant Governor of North Carolina; Shirley Franklin, Mayor of Atlanta; and Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-MN).
Rep. Janice Schakowsky (D-IL) pointed out that when women do run for election, they tend to win at an equal rate to men. The problem, therefore, lies in a lack of women running for office. She referred to research which has shown that, in a comparison of equally qualified men and women, women are twice likely to see themselves as insufficiently qualified to run for office. She expressed a serious point about the general disinclination to stand for election among the female population, as well as joking that “we think we actually have to know things before we run, while men often aren’t encumbered in the same way.”
Women, she said, need to be asked to run, and to be made aware that political leadership is a legitimate aspiration – she said she would not have thought to do so herself without persuasion from a friend. “So I am asking you now,” she said. “If anyone is thinking of running for office, you can do it.”
Though the increase in numbers of women in parliament is steady, said Johnsson, it is extremely slow, meaning that equality will not be achieved within his lifetime. While Wilson disagreed about the speed of the process, what was agreed upon was the importance of the issue. “Nothing would change the world more than getting more women into leadership,” said Wilson.
“One day maybe we won’t have to talk about this anymore because there will be genuine equality,” Capps said. “But at the moment we still have work to do.”
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