Gendering Political Participation in Germany and Beyond: Should Quotas Ensure Gender Parity in Parliaments?

Abstract

The underrepresentation of women in parliaments indicates the political empowerment gap underlying the gender gap and is a symbol of their de facto inequality. Electoral laws that ensure gender parity are therefore on the agenda. This is also the case in Germany (both on the state and federal level) and in the EU in relation to the European Parliament. Gender parity laws typically require political parties to submit zipped lists with an equal number of alternating female and male candidates. The first two gender parity laws of German states were, however, struck down as unconstitutional by the state constitutional courts. According to the Federal Constitutional Court, the Basic Law does not require the enactment of gender parity laws, despite the constitutional obligation to promote the actual implementation of equal rights for women and men. But the FCC has not yet determined what limits the Basic Law may place on voluntarily enacted federal or state gender parity laws. The European Court of Human Rights has accepted gender quotas regarding electoral lists as permissible in the ECHR system. Soft law rules of the Council of Europe favour the use of such quotas. The Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination of Women supports and perhaps requires gender quotas in political representation.