Promoting Women’s Political Participation: A Pathway to Peace

By Tanya Henderson, Amanda Domingues, and Ursala Knudsen-Latta

“It is the sense of Congress that—

  • the meaningful participation of women in conflict prevention and conflict resolution processes helps to promote more inclusive and democratic societies and is critical to the longterm stability of countries and regions;
  • the political participation, and leadership of women in fragile environments, particularly during democratic transitions, is critical to sustaining lasting democratic institutions; and
  • the United States should be a global leader in promoting the meaningful participation of women in conflict prevention, management, and resolution, and post-conflict relief and recovery efforts.”

                                                                                      —Women, Peace and Security Act of 2017

The Women, Peace, and Security (WPS) Act, which the US Congress passed in October 2017, recognizes that women’s political participation is essential to peace and security. The act mandates

a national strategy on WPS; training of relevant personnel at the Departments of State and Defense and at USAID; stakeholder consultation; and progress reporting. US support and commitment will be essential to overcome the serious barriers women around the world face as they seek increased political participation and leadership in peacebuilding processes.

Women can be powerful actors in achieving and sustaining peace in their communities and nations.1 Advancing or transforming women’s empowerment and increasing gender equality are important levers to move a country forward democratically and have proven, long-lasting effects on countries’ democracy, stability, and peacefulness. A study of 40 peace processes in 35 countries showed that when women substantively influenced a peace process, an agreement was almost always reached, countries experienced higher rates of implementation, and peace was 35 percent more likely to last 15 years or more.3 Similarly, post-conflict peacebuilding has been more successful in societies where women are empowered.4 A cross-national study of postwar contexts with a high risk of conflict recurrence found that peacebuilding efforts are more successful in societies where women have relatively higher social status (box 1).5

An International Peace Institute study of 182 signed peace agreements between 1989 and 2011 found that there is a 35 percent increase in the probability that a peace agreement will last 15 years or more when women are effectively included.44

Peace processes provide historic opportunities to promote women’s participation and high-level decision making and to embed gender equality goals in emerging political settlements.6 Women’s participation in politics tends to increase in post-conflict settings: Across Africa, South Asia, and Southeast Asia, the percentage of women in parliaments is significantly higher in post-conflict countries than in countries without conflict.7 Nonetheless, women  are frequently excluded from critical peace processes,  and as a result, women’s interests and political leadership  are not reflected in resulting agreements.8 For example, between 1992 and 2011, women made up just 2 percent of mediators and 9 percent of negotiators in 30 official peace talks.9 Accordingly, only 7 percent of agreements signed between 1990 and 2010 referenced gender equality or women’s rights.10

The Democratic Republic of Congo peace talks that were  held in Sun City, South Africa, in 2002 illustrated the relationship between women’s exclusion from peace  processes and their continued exclusion from political participation and leadership. The Congolese government  and other warring parties claimed, “Women did not have  any right to participate [in the peace process] because they were not fighters, nor had they enjoyed meaningful representation in national decision-making bodies before  the war.”11 In essence, those who decide the former  continue to decide the latter.

Women in every part of the world continue to be largely marginalized from the political sphere.12Globally, just one  in five parliamentarians is female (23.5 percent), and there are 37 states in which women account for less than 10 percent of legislators in single or lower houses.13 Only 11 countries (out of 195) are led by female heads of state.14 Despite multiple international agreements, regional frameworks, and national laws recognizing and upholding women’s right to participate in politics and reach leadership positions, the widespread absence of women in political and decisionmaking bodies persists. Recent estimates from the World Economic Forum predict that gender parity in politics will not be achieved for another 99 years at the current pace of change (box 2).15

As of July 2017, women made up 23.5 percent of parliaments worldwide, varying widely by region. Nordic countries lead the rankings with 41.7 percent, followed by the Americas with 28.1 percent, Europe (excluding Nordic countries) with 26.5 percent,  Sub-Saharan Africa with 23.6 percent; Asia with 19.4 percent, and Arab States and the Pacific.45 

Even when women are elected or appointed to positions of political leadership, underlying inequality and discrimination limit their political power and influence. For example, female ministers hold 18 percent of cabinet-level positions globally but are disproportionately assigned portfolios such as social affairs, health, and education—roles traditionally considered “more fitting” for women—while men dominate defense and finance, portfolios with larger budgets and “hard” power.16

Nevertheless, growth in women’s political leadership is considered one of the most important trends of this century.17 Over the past two decades, women’s representation in national parliaments has doubled.18 Since 2000, the number of female heads of state or government has increased from 4.7 percent to 8.8 percent. In countries where legislated quotas are in place, women secured twice as many seats as countries without quotas (24 percent versus 12 percent). Even in countries with voluntary quotas, women still obtained 10 percent more seats.

Despite such progress, there is still a long road ahead to achieve gender equality in the political sphere. Structural barriers and socioeconomic inequities continue to hinder gender parity in national governments around the world.

Supporting and increasing women’s participation and political leadership is a well-established goal of US foreign policy. Post-conflict peacebuilding and state-building processes are strategic moments to dismantle the crosscutting structural inequalities, hierarchies, and systemic marginalization that undermine democratic integrity and hinder sustainability and resilience in the transition out of conflict. Executive Order 13595, which instituted the US National Action Plan (NAP) on Women, Peace and Security, along with the WPS Act of 2017 together outline the US commitment to promote the meaningful participation of women in peace processes and their political participation and leadership in fragile and transitional environments.19

Why Advancing Women Matters for  Peace and Security

A 40-year study on international crises found that a state is five times less likely to use violence when faced with an international crisis when the percentage of women in parliament increases by 5 percent.20 Further, higher levels of female participation in parliament reduces a country’s risk of civil war, as well as the risk of relapse into conflict once war has ended.21 When 35 percent of a nation’s legislature is female, the risk of relapse into conflict is near zero (box 3).22

Conflict prevention efforts, including countering violent extremism are found to be more effective when women are involved. Women frequently have critical knowledge of impending conflicts that can help to prevent the escalation of violence before it begins. Interviews with 286 people in 30 countries across the Middle East, North Africa, and South Asia further suggest that women are the first in their communities to stand up against terrorism.47 

Countries with more women in government also enjoy better standards of living across multiple sectors of society, leading to increased peace and stability.23 For example, in India, women political leaders tend to favor wealth redistribution, support child-related expenditures, and invest more than men in schools, female teachers, primary education, and beds in hospitals and dispensaries.24 In West Bengal, villages with more women in political leadership saw an increase of investment in drinking water, and facilities and roads were almost twice as likely to be in good condition.25 In ethnically diverse countries, “the presence of a female national leader is correlated with a 6.6 percent increase in GDP growth in comparison to having a male leader.”26

When women are elected in sufficient numbers, they tend to introduce norms essential for good governance and progressive democracies.27 A World Bank study of more than 100 countries showed that higher percentages of women in parliament correlated to decreased corruption in government.28 In post-conflict or fragile states, women’s active inclusion in government strengthens transitions to democracy. As elected or appointed officials, they can increase the legitimacy of nascent institutions, broaden the political agenda, and promote consultative policymaking. In the Philippines, women with direct access to high-level peace talks between the government and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front advocated for a more inclusive process and led national consultations across 13 regions to ensure that participants represented religious, indigenous, youth, and other groups.29 More inclusive policymaking undergirds a “human security” approach to establishing sustainable peace and reframes security as an individual’s ability to live with dignity, free from fear and want, rather than as state protection (box 4).

In Northern Ireland, women leaders secured language in the Good Friday Agreement on victims’ rights, as well as provisions for reintegration of political prisoners, integrated education, and mixed housing. 49  During the political transition in Afghanistan, women in the constitutional assembly that convened in 2003 and 2004 advocated for the rights of the disabled and supported the Uzbek minority’s efforts to gain official recognition for their language.50  In South Africa, women leaders of all races played a key role in developing a new national security framework based on human security during the country’s transition from apartheid to political democracy.

Political bodies with more female legislators generally introduce a greater number of laws to promote human rights and advance the rights of women and girls. In Argentina, for example, female parliamentarians introduced 78 percent of the bills related to women’s rights.30 After a parliamentary gender quota was introduced in Morocco in 2011, amendments to the Family Code, Penal Code, and labor and property laws substantially advanced women’s rights. In places as diverse as East Timor, Croatia, Rwanda, and South Africa, an increase in the number of female lawmakers is correlated with legislation related to antidiscrimination, domestic violence, family codes, inheritance, and child support and protection.31 While the causal connection is not yet clear, overwhelming evidence shows that when women are more empowered, “countries are less likely to go to war with their neighbors, to be in bad standing with the international community, or to be rife with crime and violence within their society.”32 Gender equality and women’s empowerment is proving to be a better indicator of a country’s peacefulness than commonly used metrics such as democracy, religion, and GDP (box 5).33

Statistical analysis of data from a majority of countries between 1977 and 1996 shows that the higher the proportion of women in parliament, the lower the likelihood that the state carried out human rights abuses such as political imprisonments, torture, killings, and disappearances.51

Barriers to Women’s Increased  Political Participation

The disparity in women’s political representation is a result of social, cultural, and economic barriers. Violence, lack of funding, and corruption stand out as significant barriers  (box 6).

The Honorable Iyabo Obasanjo, former Nigerian senator (2007–11), stated, “As a senator in Nigeria, I experienced violence, media bias, and targeting by various groups, opposition parties and government operatives. My reaction, like that of many women, was to leave politics. In developing countries, women legislators are routinely targeted for intimidation, they are the last to enter politics and the first to leave.”52 

Violence

Women political leaders and candidates face psychological, physical, and sexual violence. Women are often targets of intimidation and coercion specifically because they are women, with the goal of pressuring them to leave politics, resign as candidates or political officials, withdraw from their membership in political parties or other political institutions, or to otherwise remain silent on the political issues they care about.34 This violence affects politically active women around the globe, regardless of their roles, whether as activists, civil society leaders, voters, candidates, or elected or appointed officials.

A 2016 Inter-Parliamentary Union global study found that more than 80 percent of the women surveyed experienced psychological violence; nearly 45 percent received threats of death, rape, beatings or abduction; and 20 percent of the women legislators had been physically attacked during their electoral term.35 Similarly, in political party assessments by the National Democratic Institute, approximately 55 percent of women surveyed indicated that they had personally experienced violence while carrying out political party functions, with 48 percent saying that they had experienced psychological violence, which is the most widely reported type of violence against women in politics.36 Bias and unequal access to the media further widen the gap between male and female candidates, where women candidates are at best underrepresented and marginalized, and at worst are targeted, ridiculed, and distorted.37

Lack of Financial Resources

Lack of financial resources remains one of the most significant deterrents for women in politics, and women face unique economic and financial challenges in campaigns for political office.38 These restrictions range from women’s exclusion from circles of power and moneyed networks to their often inferior economic status. Across Africa, Asia, and Latin America, women are reluctant to become political candidates for a variety of economic reasons: They do not feel they ought to invest family resources in political campaigns; they are unwilling to ask for credit or risk their own or their family’s capital; they are unable to pay for domestic and care work that they would no longer be able to do; and they are unwilling to leave their jobs to campaign and risk labor market uncertainty if they are not elected.39 Not only do women struggle to raise funds to run a campaign, they often receive little or no financial assistance from their political parties.40 Without means for securing the necessary funds, women candidates either choose not to run, run at significant disadvantages compared with male counterparts, or rely on external funding that may be tied to political favors or suspect agendas. Corruption and Conflict

In conflict-affected contexts and emerging democracies, these barriers to women’s political participation increase exponentially. Increased security concerns add significant physical, psychological, and financial burdens. Corruption widens the gender gap in politics. In post-conflict environments, the use of “black money”—earned during the war or through weapons sales—to fund political campaigns deepens the inequity between male and female candidates, where women generally have less access to such profits and a weak rule of law makes the enforcement of campaign finance regulations unlikely.

A well-known Afghan woman parliamentarian, the Honorable Shinkai Karokhail, shared an example of how inferior economic status, compounded by corrupt campaign practices and weak rule of law, can substantially hinder female candidates. During a campaign for parliament, her male challenger hosted a reception for their constituents on the same day (and same time) as her campaign event. Despite the illegality of “vote buying,” he provided lavish food for attendees and gave everyone new clothing and winter hats. Even though she was the incumbent, only 300 people attended her event while over 2,000 attended his. Karokhail said she could not compete because she did not have the same financial resources that he did.41

Recommendations

The WPS Act of 2017 commits the US government to support and increase women’s political participation as a core principle of its foreign policy. The WPS Act mandates a national WPS strategy that coordinates the efforts of the Departments of State, Defense, and Homeland Security as well as USAID. This mandated strategy gives the current administration an opportunity to recommit to and update the principles of the 2016 NAP while increasing support for gender-primary programs that uphold women’s political participation as a catalyst for peace and stability.

Additionally, through the training mandated in the WPS Act, the administration can support staff across the Departments of State, Defense, and USAID by providing them with knowledge and best practices for addressing barriers to women’s political participation. Such training can truly provide value at all levels of the US government— from equipping USAID staff who design programs around women’s political movements, to State Department diplomats who work with women political leaders internationally, to those who reduce threats of violence against women in politics by providing security assistance. This whole-ofgovernment approach is critical to creating sustainable impact on such complex social and political issues.

Funding

Currently, only about 2 percent of American foreign aid dedicated to peace and security efforts goes to activities where gender equality or women’s empowerment is the principal objective.42 Additionally, while USAID supported women’s political leadership in 55 countries across five regions between 2008 and 2013, many of these programs were gender-integrated rather than gender-primary, and as a result the support for women’s political participation was merely a secondary objective in a larger democracy promotion effort.43 During this period, funding for half of the gender-primary program was less than $150,000, and durations of all programs were usually three years or fewer. The current administration therefore can improve on previous administrations’ efforts by allocating more peace and security funding to gender equality or women’s empowerment programs, especially gender-primary programs. Additionally, the administration should prioritize gender-primary programs, or programs with the primary objective of transforming gender norms, in its WPS strategy and departmental implementation plans.

The United States should seize the opportunity that the WPS Act presents to strengthen its support of women globally and ultimately to ensure the security of its own citizens.

To take advantage of this opportunity, the US government should take the following actions:

1. Uphold the NAP, WPS Act, and national strategies to promote women’s increased political participation and leadership.

  • Continue to implement the US National Action Plan on Women, Peace, and Security and conduct the planned review in 2020 in consultation with civil society.
  • Mandate gender integration in US foreign policy initiatives related to women’s political participation and leadership.
  • Provide training to relevant personnel at DOD, DOS, and USAID on the importance of promoting women’s political participation and decision making in line with the WPS Act, NAP, and other US foreign policy strategies.
  • Continue to support the special envoy for global women’s issues.

2. Increase protection for women in politics and high-level decision making.

  • Fund and mandate gender integration into electoral violence prevention efforts.
  • Promote increased awareness of widespread gender-based political violence and preventative measures.
  • Provide training to relevant personnel at DOD, DOS, and USAID on prevention and protection initiatives to reduce violence against women in politics.

3. Promote increased “upstream” support to increase

women’s political leadership (e.g., education, healthcare, economic empowerment)

  • Continue to support women and girls’ education, access to health, and economic empowerment efforts.
  • Increase funding for gender-primary programs that promote and strengthen women’s political participation, including grants to local civil-society organizations that support women’s leadership.
  • Engage with traditionally marginalized women to build capacity and support networks to increase their access to political participation and leadership.
  • Provide training and mentorship networks for newly elected female politicians.

4. Support women’s equal political participation and remove barriers that limit women’s access to political leadership.

  • Pressure governments with weak or exclusionary election laws that limit women’s equal access to political participation.
  • Support political party reform efforts that focus on reducing barriers to entry and participation by women, especially in party leadership roles.
  • Challenge harmful gender norms and resulting discriminatory practices in all foreign assistance and policy.
  • Pressure repressive governments to open civil society space to ensure women’s organizations can organize and build networks of support for women candidates.
  • Support anticorruption initiatives and free and fair electoral processes in post-conflict countries and new and emerging democracies.
  • Provide gender-sensitive training to relevant personnel at DOD, DOS, and USAID on advancing free and fair elections.

5. Increase US foreign aid funding for gender-primary peace and security initiatives.

  • Increase funding allocations to activities that promote women’s equality and empowerment.
  • Increase funding allocations to activities that promote women’s effective participation in peace and security processes.
  • Increase funding allocations to activities that advance women’s equal political participation and leadership.

About the Authors

Tanya Henderson, Founder and Director, Mina’s List, a program of Peace is Loud. Tanya is an international human rights and gender lawyer whose work has focused on women’s rights and empowerment; the role of women in conflict resolution and peace-building; and women’s political participation through U.S. policy, international multi-lateral agencies and civil society, and coalition building among global women political leaders. She was a Policy Director for Women’s Action for New Directions (WAND), the US National Director for the Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom (WILPF), a legal consultant for the Ministry of Social Affairs in Lebanon on issues of gender based violence and women’s political participation, and part of a research team in Ethiopia working with Harvard Medical School to research and draft policy on gender inequality, economic development, and health. Her work has been published in academic journals as well as various print and social media outlets. She holds a B.S. from the University of Massachusetts Boston, a J.D. from Suffolk University Law

School, and pursued an LL.M. in international law from The Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University. She has also earned several certificates in mediation and conflict negotiation.

Amanda Domingues, Program Officer, NDI. Amanda

Domingues is a Program Officer at National Democratic

Institute. While at NDI she has worked both on the Gender, Women and Democracy (GWD) team and the Southern and East Africa team. In her role on the GWD team she served as the lead on work pertaining to Peace, Security, and Democratic Resilience and violence against women in political parties. In her current position on the Southern and East Africa team she works to support NDI’s electoral programs in the region, focusing on gender inclusive elections. Prior to joining NDI, Ms. Domingues attended graduate school at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), where she focused on inclusive peace processes and constitutional reform. While at UCLA, Ms. Domingues was an African Studies Department Fellow and also worked as a Graduate Student Researcher for the Center for the Study of Women.

Ursala Knudsen-Latta, Research and Policy Officer,

Saferworld. Ursala Knudsen-Latta is a Research and Policy

Officer based in Washington DC. Prior to joining Saferworld,

Ursala worked at Alliance for Peacebuilding (AfP) and

Women in International Security. Ursala works on Saferworld US’ advocacy team and focuses on issues of violent extremism, gender and conflict, and SDG16. Ursala studied Religions and Theology at the University of Manchester, where her research focused on religion and conflict in South Asia. She worked with the Anchorage Interfaith Council, and the North American Interfaith Network before graduating with a Masters International Peace and Conflict Resolution from American University.

References

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  • Marie O’Reilly, Andrea Ó Súilleabháin, and Thania Paffenholz, “Reimagining Peacemaking: Women’s Roles in Peace Processes” (New York: International Peace Institute, 2015).
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Women’s Political Leadership and Accelerating Progress towards Equality” (Atalanta, 2017), 9, https://static1.squarespace.com/ static/595411f346c3c48fe75fd39c/t/5a198d188165f542d67

9b618/1511623962875/Getting-Impatient-Atalanta-Report_FINAL. pdf, citing Katherine Kidder et al., “From College to Cabinet: Women in National Security. Military, Veterans & Society” (Washington, DC: Center for a New American Security, 2017).

  1. Pamela Paxton and Melanie Hughes, Women, Politics and Power: A Global Perspective (Washington, DC: Sage Publications, 2017).
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Action Plan on Women, Peace, and Security,” press release, December 19, 2011, https://obamawhitehouse.archives.gov/thepress-office/2011/12/19/executive-order-instituting-national-actionplan-women-peace-and-securit.

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Policy-making in Rural India,” Background Paper for UNICEF, “The State of the World’s Children Report 2007,” p. 11, 15 and 16.

  • Barboni, “Getting Impatient,” p.17.
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  • Susan Perkins et al., “Ethnic Diversity, Gender, and National Leaders,” Journal for International Affairs 67, no. 1 (2017): 85–103.
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  • Mark Jones, “Legislator Gender and Legislator Policy Priorities in the Argentine Chamber of Deputies and the United States House of Representatives,” Policy Studies Journal 25 (1997): 618.
  • National Democratic Institute, “Why Women in Politics?” Gender, Women & Politics webpage, Washington, DC.
  • O’Reilly, “Why Women?”
  • Ibid.
  • National Democratic Institute, “#NotTheCost: Stopping Violence against Women in Politics: A Call to Action,” (Washington, DC: NDI, 2016); Gabrielle Bardall, “Breaking the Mold: Understanding Gender and Electoral Violence,” white paper series (Washington, DC: IFES, December 2011).
  • Inter-Parliamentary Union, “Sexism, Harassment and Violence against Women Parliamentarians” issues brief (Geneva: IPU, October 2016), http://archive.ipu.org/pdf/publications/issuesbrief-e.pdf.
  • National Democratic Institute, “No Party to Violence: Analyzing Violence against Women in Political Parties: Preliminary Findings from Pilots in Cote d’Ivoire, Honduras, Tanzania, and Tunisia” (Washington, DC: NDI, 2018), https://www.ndi.org/sites/default/ files/NDI_No_Party_to_Violence_ReportFinal.pdf.
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Campaign Coverage,” Communication Studies 60, no. 4 (2009): 326–43.

  • “Women Candidates and Campaign Finance” (New York:

Women’s Environment and Development Organization, December 2007), http://www.wedo.org/wp-content/uploads/womencandidates-and-campaign-finance-report-final.pdf.

  • Julie Ballington, “Empowering Women for Stronger Political

Parties: A Good Practices Guide to Promote Women’s Political

Participation” (New York and Washington, DC: United Nations Development Programme and National Democratic Institute, 2011), http://www.undp.org/content/dam/undp/library/gender/ gender%20and%20governance/EmpoweringWomenFor%20

StrongerPoliticalParties.pdf; see also “Women Candidates and

Campaign Finance.”

  • NDI, “No Party to Violence.”
  • Sana Johnson, “Listening Session for the Afghan Pilot Project,” Peace Is Loud blog (New York: Mina’s List, June 24, 2015).
  • Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development,

DAC Network on Gender Equality, “Aid Projects Targeting Gender Equality and Women’s Empowerment (CRS),” OECD.Stat dataset, http://stats.oecd.org/Index.aspx?DataSetCode=GENDER.

  • USAID, “Women’s Leadership as a Route to Greater

Empowerment: Desktop Study” (Arlington, VA: Management Systems International, 2014), http://pdf.usaid.gov/pdf_docs/ pa00k87m.pdf.

  • O’Reilly et al., “Reimagining Peacemaking,” 12–13.
  • Barboni, “Getting Impatient.”

47.  Karima Bennoune, “Your Fatwa Does Not Apply Here: Untold

Stories from the Fight Against Muslim Fundamentalism (New York: 

W. W. Norton & Company, 2014); see also “Bennoune: Support

Muslims Resisting Fundamentalism,” International Peace Institute, October 2, 2013, http://www.ipinst.org/events/ speakers/details/486benn.

  • Chang et al., “Women Leading Peace,” 46–47.
  • Tobie Whitman and Jessica Gomez, “Strategies for

Policymakers: Bringing Women into Government” (Washington, DC: The Institute for Inclusive Security, March 2009).

  • Erik Melander, “Political Gender Equality and State Human Rights Abuse,” Journal of Peace Research 42, no. 2 (March 2005): 149-166.
  • Obasanjo was quoted in a 2017 prospectus of nonprofit Mina’s List.