Women Engaging Politically: Beyond Magic Bullets and Motorways
This policy paper by Mariz Tadros, adopts an upside-down approach to women’s political empowerment. While the number of women we need to get into legislatures has often assumed centrestage, this paper takes women’s pathways as its starting point. In so doing, it challenges the narrow conception of women’s political engagement as occupying formal positions and seeks to present a more nuanced perspective on the spaces, relationships and ways of working that influence power hierarchies and dynamics.
The paper’s aims are two-fold. First, through a multi-country case study, it explores the possibilities and limitations of mainstream approaches such as quotas to strengthening women’s access to political power. Second, it seeks to broaden the debate by practically engaging with the question of how we can support women’s political leadership in ways that speak to women’s realities in very concrete ways.
Download 'Women Engaging Politically: Beyond Magic Bullets and Motorways', Pathways Policy Paper, Mariz Tadros (pdf file 1 MB)
Further Reading
Abbas, S. (2010) ‘The Sudanese Women’s Movement and the Mobilisation for the 2008 Legislative Quota and its Aftermath’, IDS Bulletin 41.5: 62-71
Abdullah, H. (2010) ‘Forging Ahead without an Affirmative Action Policy: Female Politicians in Sierra Leone’s Post-war Election Process’, IDS Bulletin 41.5: 62-71
Araújo, C. (2010) ‘The Limits of Women’s Quotas in Brazil’, IDS Bulletin 41.5: 17-24
Ballington, J. (2010) ‘Implementing Affirmative Action: Global Trends’, IDS Bulletin 41.5: 11-16
IDEA, Inter-Parliamentary Union and Stockholm University (2010) ‘Global Database of Electoral Quotas for Women’
IPU (2010) ‘Review of Inter-Parliamentary Union’s Gender Programme ‘Promoting Gender Equality in Politics’, Geneva: Inter-Parliamentary Union
IPU (2011) ‘Women in National Parliaments’, Inter Parliamentary Union, 30 April
Kantengwa, J. (2010) ‘The Will to Political Power: Rwandan Women in Leadership', IDS Bulletin 41.5: 62-71
Khattak, S. (2010) ‘Women in Local Government: The Pakistan Experience’, IDS Bulletin 41.5: 52-61
Krook, M. (2008) ‘Quota Laws for Women in Politics: Implications for Feminist Practice’, Social Politics 15: 345–68
Nazneen, S. and Tasneem, S. (2010) ‘A Silver Lining? Women in Reserved Seats in Local Government in Bangladesh’, IDS Bulletin 41.5: 35-42
Sagot, M. (2010) ‘Does the Political Participation of Women Matter? Democratic Representation, Affirmative Action and Quotas in Costa Rica’, IDS Bulletin 41.5 25-34
Sharma, D. and Sudarshan, R. (2010) ‘Towards a Politics of Collective Empowerment: Learning from Hill Women in Rural Uttarakhand, India’, IDS Bulletin 41.5: 43-51
UN (2006) ‘Millennium Project’
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