Transforming Gender Identities through Quota System-Confronting the Question of Women’s Representation in Politics

Today quotas are being introduced in countries where women only constitute a small minority in parliament, and the world is witnessing historical transformations in women‘s representation, for example from 19 per cent women in parliament to 35 in one election (Costa Rica) or 36 per cent women in the very first democratic parliamentary election (South Africa). Such great historical fundamental changes might not occur without quota provisions, but the focus here is on electoral gender quotas as a special measure to increase women representation. It is argued that a new international discourse on women in institutional politics is an important factor behind recent introduction of quotas all over the world, even in countries that previously had a very low representation of women. However, the fact that some countries have opened up for quotas, while others have not, and secondly, the fact that specific types of quota systems do seem to occur in regional clusters, all point to the need for contextual based research about what we will call the translation of this international discourse into individual countries and regions, and about the mechanisms behind the introduction of quotas nationally. The study will be done with a search light on situation in India and other political systems.