Parity/Disparity: Electoral Gender Inequality on the Tightrope of Liberal Constitutional Traditions

(Excerpt) To force an end to the seemingly interminable war with Sparta, Lysistrata, the title character in Aristophanes’ comedy, exhorts the women of Athens to achieve peace by arousing their husbands’ desires while refusing them any gratification. This political act would force the men to end the war: “[d]oesn’t matter what they threaten to do — even if they try to set fire to the place — they won’t make us open the gates except on our own terms.” Two thousand three hundred years later, democracy and gender still have a tortured relationship. Although most democracies provided women with the right to vote and stand for office long ago, in most countries, democracy means government by, and possibly for, men. The United States’ gendered political system is typical — eighty-five years after women won the right to vote, they constitute less than one-fifth of elected representatives. Women occupy few political offices, not merely in one nation, but around the world. To combat this electoral gender inequality, various democracies with the support of international organizations, have adopted quota requirements for legislatures or political parties, ensuring that women actually participate in politics, rather than play the role of “a few tokens in political life.” Scanning women’s representation worldwide, Scandinavian countries have levels generally above 40%. Ireland enacted a quota that requires parties select women to fill 40% of candidacies. Simultaneously, other democracies, such as Argentina and Brazil also adopted quota laws, albeit with limited enforcement. Despite these apparent successes, most countries have extremely low levels of female representation — with the lowest levels in countries with Islamic governments. France had the most assertive response to electoral gender inequality, enacting the Parity Law (“Parity”) in 2000. Parity amended the French Constitution to require that political parties select women as half of their candidates for public office. French parties have to field women candidates or face fines or exclusion from the ballot. The United States, in contrast, maintains a steadfast refusal to debate issues of women’s representation. It is surprising, then, that the United States placed a quota for women’s representation in the draft constitution for the Republic of Iraq. Chapter Four, Article 30 (C) of the Iraqi Constitution states that “[t]he electoral law shall aim to achieve the goal of having women constitute no less than one-quarter of the members of the National Assembly.” Drafters insisted on this provision, fearing that: “if women are frozen out of a nascent Iraqi government, their chances of breaking through later are slim to none.” Apparently, even to the current United States administration, gender does matter in democracy. This Article seeks to situate remedies for electoral gender inequality in the context of liberal democratic theory. This Article does not attempt to present a complete argument for the existence of electoral gender inequality. However, it does presume that gender inequality, in particular electoral gender inequality, raises fundamental questions.

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