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Women as Agents of Democratisation

Author : Faith Kihiu

Publisher : LIT Verlag Münster

Page : 249 pages

File Size : 35,38 MB

Release : 2010

Category : Democracy

ISBN : 3643103425

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Book Description

Following a gendered approach, this study presents a descriptive analysis of the role women's organisations have played in the democratisation process in Kenya since the pre-colonial era. Supported by this historical analysis, an indepth study of five political women organisations in Kenya is presented, in which organisations' structure, programs, and strategic approach to political participation presented by the new available spaces after the introduction of a multiparty state in 1992 are illustrated.



Seeing Women, Strengthening Democracy

Author : Magda Hinojosa

Publisher : Oxford University Press

Page : 181 pages

File Size : 32,79 MB

Release : 2020-07-17

Category : Social Science

ISBN : 0197526969

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Book Description

Under what conditions do citizens most effectively connect to the democratic process? We tend to think that factors like education, income, and workforce participation are most important, but research has shown that they exert less influence than expected when it comes to women's attitudes and engagement. Scholars have begun to look more closely at how political context affects engagement. This book asks how contexts promote women's interest and connection to democracy, and it looks to Latin America for answers. The region provides a good test case as the institution of gender quotas has led to more recent and dramatic increases in women's political representation. Specifically, Magda Hinojosa and Miki Caul Kittilson argue that the election of women to political office--particularly where women's presence is highly visible to the public--strengthens the connections between women and the democratic process. For women, seeing more "people like me" in politics changes attitudes and orientations toward government and politics. The authors untangle the effects of gender quotas and the subsequent rise in women's share of elected positions, finding that the latter exerts greater impact on women's connections to the democratic process. Women citizens are more knowledgeable, interested, and efficacious when they see women holding elected office. They also express more trust in government and in political institutions and greater satisfaction with democracy when they see more women in politics. The authors look at comparative data from across Latin America, but focus on an in-depth case study of Uruguay. Here, the authors find that gender gaps in political engagement declined significantly after a doubling of women's representation in the Senate. The authors therefore argue that far-reaching gender gaps can be overcome by more equitable representation in our political institutions.



Governing Women

Author : Anne Marie Goetz

Publisher : Routledge

Page : 346 pages

File Size : 28,96 MB

Release : 2009-01-13

Category : Social Science

ISBN : 1135911061

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Book Description

Though the proportion of women in national assemblies still barely scrapes 16% on average, the striking outliers – Rwanda with 49% of its assembly female, Argentina with 35%, Liberia and Chile with new women presidents this year – have raised expectations that there is an upward trend in women’s representation from which we may expect big changes in the quality of governance. But getting women into public office is just the first step in the challenge of creating governance and accountability systems that respond to women’s needs and protect their rights. Using case studies from around the world, the essays in this volume consider the conditions for effective connections between women in civil society and women in politics, for the evolution of political party platforms responsive to women’s interests, for local government arrangements that enable women to engage effectively, and for accountability mechanisms that answer to women. The book’s argument is that good governance from a gender perspective requires more than more women in politics. It requires fundamental incentive changes to orient public action and policy to support gender equality.



Women in Contemporary Democratization

Author : Shahra Razavi

Publisher : United Nations Research Institute for Social Development

Page : 68 pages

File Size : 38,57 MB

Release : 2000

Category : Democracy

ISBN :

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Book Description

This paper looks at the issue of democratization from a gender perspective. While many of the problems afflicting the "new democracies" (such as the elitist character of political parties, and the failure of the state to guarantee civil and political rights or make a significant dent in poverty) affect all citizens, they are manifested and experienced in gender-specific ways. Women's persistent exclusion from formal politics, in particular, raises a number of specific questions about how to reform democratic institutions, since these institutions are not automatically gender-equitable.



Democratization and Women's Grassroots Movements

Author : Jill M. Bystydzienski

Publisher : Indiana University Press

Page : 412 pages

File Size : 34,6 MB

Release : 1999

Category : Law

ISBN : 9780253334459

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Book Description

The book illustrates how community-based actions, programs, and organizations that allow women to determine their lives and participate in decision making contribute to the creation of a civil society and thus enhance democracy. The case studies show how participation in grassroots movements promotes women's involvement in their organizations, communities, and in societal institutions, as it influences state policy and empowers women in personal relationships.



Sharing Power

Author : Manon Tremblay

Publisher : Routledge

Page : 295 pages

File Size : 23,41 MB

Release : 2017-03-02

Category : Political Science

ISBN : 1351900463

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Book Description

The representation of women in parliament is a subject of extensive research and a focus for political action in the last decade. The wide variation in women's parliamentary presence contradicts the expectation that established or consolidated democracies are more supportive of the presence of women in political life than emerging democracies. This volume explains this variation through a series of closely investigated case studies from the post-Communist transition democracies of Eastern Europe and emerging democracies in Asia and the Middle East to the long-established liberal democratic states. The volume examines the history of women's legislative involvement, clearly addressing the issue of equal opportunities for women in political life on a cross-national basis. It also identifies innovative solutions to redress the power-sharing balance between women and men. Offering a unique comparative perspective, Sharing Power will appeal to students and scholars of politics, women's studies, history and legislative studies.



Feminist Democratic Representation

Author : Karen Celis

Publisher : Oxford University Press

Page : 256 pages

File Size : 29,8 MB

Release : 2020-09-10

Category : Social Science

ISBN : 0190087749

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Book Description

Popular consensus has long been that if "enough women" are present in political institutions they will represent "women's interests." Yet many believe that differences among women--women disagreeing about what is in "their interest"--fatally undermine both the principle and the practice of women's group representation. In this book, Karen Celis and Sarah Childs redress women's poverty of political representation with a new feminist account of democratic representation. Rather than giving up on women's group representation, Celis and Childs re-think and re-design representative institutions, taking women's differences--both ideological and intersectional--as their starting point. Feminist Democratic Representation considers a broad spectrum of contemporary problematics--abortion, prostitution/sex work, Muslim women's dress, and Marine Le Pen--to discuss women's under- and misrepresentation and the "good, bad and the ugly" representative. As problem-driven scholars firmly grounded in feminist and democratic empirical and theoretical political science, Celis and Childs imagine what good representation for women in all their diversity could look like--representation as it should be. To realize this ideal in today's established representative democracies, they present a second-generation feminist design for parliaments and legislatures, underpinned by a re-thinking of feminist and democratic principles. Celis and Childs conceive of representation as a mélange of dimensions, and they shift the focus in women's group representation from feminist outcome to feminist process. Inclusive, responsive, and egalitarian representation for all women demands a new category of representatives in parliaments: the "affected representatives of women" who are epistemologically and experientially close to differently affected women. Affected representatives passionately advocate within political institutions, and publicly hold elected representatives to account. Feminist processes of representation have wide effects and deepen relationships between women and their democratic institutions. Against the more fashionable tide of post-representative politics, Feminist Democratic Representation argues not simply for more, but significantly better, representation.



Engendering Democracy

Author : Anne Phillips

Publisher : Boston ; Northeastern University Press

Page : 200 pages

File Size : 17,39 MB

Release : 1991

Category : Democracy

ISBN :

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Book Description

Democracy is the central political issue of our age, yet debates over its nature and goals rarely engage with feminist concerns. Now that women have the right to vote, they are thought to present no special problems of their own. But despite the seemingly gender-neutral categories of individual or citizen, democratic theory and practice continues to privilege the male. This book reconsiders dominant strands in democratic thinking - focusing on liberal democracy, participatory democracy, and twentieth century versions of civic republicanism - and approaches these from a feminist perspective. Anne Phillips explores the under-representation of women in politics, the crucial relationship between public and private spheres, and the lessons of the contemporary women's movement as an experience in participatory democracy.



Women in Parliament

Author : Julie Ballington

Publisher :

Page : 274 pages

File Size : 43,30 MB

Release : 2005

Category : Political Science

ISBN :

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Book Description

This updated edition of Women in Parliament: Beyond Numbers Handbook covers the ground of women's access to the legislature in three steps: It looks into the obstacles women confront when entering Parliament be they political, socio-economic or ideological and psychological. It presents solutions to overcome these obstacles, such as changing electoral systems and introducing quotas, and it details strategies for women to influence politics once they are elected to parliament, an institution which is traditionally male dominated. The first Women in Parliament: Beyond Numbers handbook was produced as part of IDEA's work on women and political participation in 1998. Since its release in English in 1998, there has been an ongoing interest and demand for the handbook, and responding to the request for the translation of the handbook, IDEA has produced Spanish, French and Indonesian language versions and a Russian overview of the handbook during 2002-2003. Since the first handbook was published, the picture regarding women's political participation has slowly changed. Overall the past decade has seen gradual progress with regard to women's presence in national parliaments. This second edition incorporates relevant global changes in the past years presenting new and updated case studies.--



Birth of Democratic Citizenship

Author : Maria Bucur-Deckard

Publisher : Indiana University Press

Page : 0 pages

File Size : 12,51 MB

Release : 2018-10-01

Category : History

ISBN : 9780253025647

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Book Description

What is it like to be a woman living through the transition from communism to democracy? What effect does this have on a woman's daily life, on her concept of herself, her family, and her community? Birth of Democratic Citizenship presents the stories of women in Romania as they describe their experiences on the journey to democratic citizenship. In candid and revealing conversations, women between the ages of 24 and 83 explain how they negotiated their way through radical political transitions that had a direct impact on their everyday lives. Women who grew up under communism explore how these ideologies influenced their ideas of marriage, career, and a woman's role in society. Younger generations explore how they interpret civic rights and whether they incorporate these rights into their relationships with their family and community. Beginning with an overview of the role women have played in Romania from the late 18th century to today, Birth of Democratic Citizenship explores how the contemporary experience of women in postsocialist countries developed. The women speak about their reliance on and negotiations with communities, ranging from family and neighbors to local and national political parties. Birth of Democratic Citizenship argues that that the success of democracy will largely rely on the equal incorporation of women in the political and civic development of Romania. In doing so, it encourages frank consideration of what modern democracy is and what it will need to be to succeed in the future.