1. Kara Ellerby University of Delaware
There’s No Gender in Gender Quotas: Reframing Women’s Inclusion in Government
Kara Ellerby University of Delaware

2. Women’s Representation as Gender Equality?
Goal 5: Achieve gender equality and empower all women and girls
UN: “Gender equality is not only a fundamental human right, but a necessary foundation for a peaceful, prosperous and sustainable world.
End all forms of discrimination against all women and girls everywhere
Eliminate all forms of violence against all women and girls in the public and private spheres, including trafficking and sexual and other types of exploitation
Eliminate all harmful practices, such as child, early and forced marriage and female genital mutilation
Recognize and value unpaid care and domestic work through the provision of public services, infrastructure and social protection policies and the promotion of shared responsibility within the household and the family as nationally appropriate
Ensure women’s full and effective participation and equal opportunities for leadership at all levels of decision-making in political, economic and public life.
Ensure universal access to sexual and reproductive health and reproductive rights as agreed in accordance with the Programme of Action of the International Conference on Population and Development and the Beijing Platform for Action and the outcome documents of their review conferences
Undertake reforms to give women equal rights to economic resources, as well as access to ownership and control over land and other forms of property, financial services, inheritance and natural resources, in accordance with national laws
Enhance the use of enabling technology, in particular information and communications technology, to promote the empowerment of women
Adopt and strengthen sound policies and enforceable legislation for the promotion of gender equality and the empowerment of all women and girls at all levels

3. More Women in Government
over one-hundred countries has some sort of quota to promote more women in government. The number of all-male cabinets has declined from 70% in 1979 to about 17% in 2009 (Jacob et al 2013).

4. But…

5. Add-Gender-and-Stir
Why is there such a discrepancy, despite a global focus on women’s representation as a key aspect of global gender equality?
Global Add-Gender-And- Stir Campaign
Gender = Women (What is a gender quota?)
Gender has become a technocratic shortcut
labeling any policy or practice to add women to exclusionary institutions as “gender equality.” Ultimately,
When gender and women are treated as interchangeable terms, gender loses its analytical force and becomes just another variable to plug in or control for. When gender and women are interchangeable terms, gender becomes a technocratic shortcut: a way to acknowledge, measure and address women’s subordination without the complex feminist discussions regarding why (many) women are subordinated and (many) men dominate. Gender-as-shortcut dodges and muddles how gender roles and binaries shape people, institutions, policies, and thus politics. This leaves researchers and practitioners to “connect the dots” between particular narratives or variables and gender as an explanation. Without this discussion of feminist (analytical) gender, gender itself becomes an essentialized measure primarily meaning women. It is a way to acknowledge power without discussing the production of power
This technocratic gender shortcut also serves as an instrumentalist tool for governments and global institutions seeking to improve governance and economies. What this means is that women are included—via quotas, employment laws and the criminalization of violence—as a means to a more stable, prosperous and peaceful world. But including women to improve governance and economics actually relies upon and perpetuates tired gender tropes in the process. Ultimately, the very processes meant to emancipate women and promote gender equality actually reinforce women’s subordination by leaving sexist institutions in place. When institutions and scholars use the “gender shortcut,” it is a way of acknowledging power without actually discussing the production of power. But without a discussion of how gender produces particular forms of power, women’s subordination (and many other marginalized groups) will not radically change.

6. Problem 1: Informal Barriers and Bounded Agency
Women’s representation higher if:
insulted from popular vote
occupy positions of lower power and prestige
already women in other branches
better connected than nearly everyone else
Disruption to status quo

7. Problem 2: Gendered Binaries
Women over-represented in ‘feminine’ ministries
‘Competency’ deficits
Less homosocial political capital (networks and experience)

8. Problem 3: Which women? Intersectionality is missing…
Elite women rule
racially marginalized women under-represented
ethnic quotas detract from sex quotas

9. Women Are “Good Governance” and “Smart Economics”
These policies actually reinforce gendered binaries and (neo)liberal world order because women are being included as women to serve a purpose
Women are Good Governance
Women are: “selfless,” “community-oriented,” “less corrupt(able),” “bridge builders”
Separate political empowerment from economic/social empowerment and redistribution; essentializes women

10. There are no ‘shortcuts’
One can include women, challenge male domination and allude to power dynamics while still maintaining belief systems that women (and other marginalized groups) are different, inferior, incompetent, incapable and undeserving
As long as women are promoted as women then gender remains a powerful force is shaping their inclusion
Women’s inclusion is necessary, but not sufficient to challenging a kyriarchical world system that perpetuates binary thinking about a host of powerful social identifiers such as gender, race, class, sexuality and geography.