Sweden’s Feminist Initiative are on the rise, but what does the history of women’s parties tell us about their prospects?

With the success of Soraya Post and Feminist Initiative in Sweden this year, Claire McGing looks at women’s political parties, how they emerge, what influences they can have, and the challenges they face. While the influence of women’s parties has historically frequently been transitory, they nonetheless have a ‘contagion’ effect on mainstream parties, who seek to protect their status by feminising their organisations

Analysis of the women selected and elected by quota in Ireland dispel the myth that they were under-qualified

The introduction of legal gender quotas for the 2016 general election in Ireland resulted in a marked improvement in the number of women candidates selected and TDs (parliamentarian) elected. However, questions of merit and qualifications were continually raised about women candidates throughout the campaign. In this blog Fiona Buckley and Claire McGing assess the political experience of women candidates and dispel the myth that women candidates were unqualified or unmerited candidates

Is local office a springboard for women to Dáil Éireann?

Previous research has found the single transferable vote electoral system is relatively friendly to women candidates. Despite this, female representation in the Irish Parliament remains substantially lower than in most other democracies. Drawing on pipeline theory and localism, we assess the impact of local office-holding on the success of male and female major party candidates in the 2007 and 2011 Irish general elections. We find previous experience in local office is a key springboard to higher office for men and women, and when women serve in local government the likelihood of election increases significantly

Gender and Electoral Representation in Ireland

This article reviews the historic and contemporary challenges to women’s electoral representation in Ireland. After summarizing the cultural and institutional obstacles to greater female representation, this article analyzes candidate selection, especially in relation to the 2011 Irish General Election, a process that appears to be the significant hurdle preventing more women from attaining elected office. It also discusses the proposed legislation that uses quotas to ensure the major political parties in Ireland nominate initially at least 30 per cent of their candidates to be women. It is hoped that this measure will redress the historic and chronic underrepresentation of women in Irish electoral politics.Dans cet article, les auteurs reconsidèrent les défis auxquels les femmes candidates à la représentation électorale ont fait et font encore face en Irlande. Après avoir résumé les obstacles culturels et institutionnels qui s’opposent à une plus grande représentation des femmes, cet article analyse le processus de sélection des candidats notamment lors des élections législatives irlandaises de 2011. Ce processus semble être un obstacle visiblement considérable à l’élection de davantage de femmes. Cet article s’interroge aussi sur la législation qui propose d’imposer des quotas afin de garantir la nomination d'au moins 30 % de femmes au sein des partis politiques principaux d'Irlande. Cette mesure devrait parvenir à résoudre le problème de la sous-représentation des femmes dans les élections irlandaises

The impact of online misogyny on women’s participation: democracy experts respond

Many women, including a number of high-profile British politicians, have been the targets of misogynistic abuse via social media. Democratic Audit recently featured an article by Laura Bates, arguing that this trend has negative effect on rates of female participation in public life. In this post we ask leading democracy and gender experts to respond, sharing their experiences and views on how misogyny undermines democracy

'Women of character': Women's Political Representation in Dáil Éireann in Revolutionary and Post-Revolutionary Ireland

This chapter outlines and assesses women’s political representation in Dáil Éireann, the lower house of the Irish Parliament, in both revolutionary and post-revolutionary Ireland. It argues that the establishment of the Irish Free State and the onset of Civil War in 1922 represent a shift in the opportunities available for women to enter parliamentary politics. Although the first woman MP ever elected was from Ireland and six women TDs1 were returned in the 1921 general election, Dáil Éireann following independence was a ‘colder house’ for women’s representation. The outright opposition of women TDs (and Republican women more generally) to the terms of the Anglo-Irish Treaty in 1922 was a crucial factor in the decline of women’s representation, as was the influence of various political, legislative and socio-cultural changes in the Irish Free State. Drawing on the parliamentary record and secondary sources, this chapter aims to reveal political women’s agency as activists and politicians in the decades that followed the establishment of the Irish Free State and considers the gendered obstacles the first women TDs faced in their roles. In doing so, the chapter assists with an important reappraisal of women in politics over this period

Electoral quotas and women’s rights

Electoral gender quotas, which aim to increase either the proportion of women candidates or political representatives, are currently used in over a hundred countries around the world. In most cases quota measures have been adopted over the past two decades. This chapter shows that the 1995 Beijing Declaration and Platform for Action fundamentally changed the international discourse on the diagnosis of women’s underrepresentation in politics and thus the solutions to it. As opposed to waiting for women to incrementally “catch up” with men, quotas represent a fast-track approach to increasing women’s representation in politics. Significantly, the use of electoral gender quotas means that the Global South has now overtaken the Global North as world leaders in women’s parliamentary representation. This is a rapid turnaround on the situation just 20 years ago where the Scandinavian countries and the Netherlands were at the top of the world rankings for women’s representation.Despite there being resistance to their adoption and full implementation in most contexts, this chapter argues that electoral gender quotas have significantly advanced women’s access to parliamentary politics at a global level. The use of proportional representation (PR) continues to progress women’s representation to a much greater extent than plurality/majoritarian systems, and PR systems are generally more facilitating of quota implementation. Voluntary party quotas can be as effective as legal quotas if the right institutional and ideological factors are present. When properly implemented, quotas obstruct highly male-dominated recruitment patterns by encouraging or requiring parties to select increased numbers of women candidates or representatives. </p

Feminist and gender geographies in Ireland

This report discusses feminist and gender geographies in Ireland. We first focus on the ways in which gender constructs Irish geographies, updating numbers of women in academic positions across Ireland. This shows that women are increasingly in secure positions, but remain under-represented in more senior positions. We then turn to research. We discuss how femininities and women, and masculinities and men, have been addressed in Irish geographies. The focus on femininities and women is crucial given recent strides towards gender and reproductive justice. We then briefly summarise sexualities work. The report concludes by arguing that Ireland not only has vibrant gender/feminist geographical scholarship, it also has significant potential for emerging research and developing new theorisations and research agendas