Cristina Fernández, the president of Argentina.

Latin American leaders like Chile’s Michelle Bachelet and Argentina’s Cristina Fernández — both the first elected female presidents of their countries — have been heralded as examples of gender equality in politics and inspirations to women worldwide. But other Latin American countries retain cultural stereotypes about gender and few women hold office.

Kristen  Sample is senior programme officer at International IDEA and writes at “OpenDemocracy” exploring how different electoral systems have resulted in such varying levels of power for Latin American women.

No hay mujeres: Latin America women and gender equality

Thirty years after the start of the third wave of democracy in Latin America,  the region’s policy-makers and civil society have the “final frontier” of this historic process in sight: to ensure that democracy works for all citizens in equal measure, regardless of gender.

In Latin America there has in recent years been an increase in both the number and percentage of women in politics - embodied by the rise to power of two female presidents, Michelle Bachelet in Chile and Cristina Fernández in Argentina. Their election has, in turn, generated a renewed debate on the state of women in politics today in the region. The reality, perhaps surprising, is that the progress of women in assuming elected office in Latin America varies considerably: between and even within countries, nationally and sub-nationally.

[...]The choice of electoral system has an enormous impact - perhaps more than any other single factor - on the number of women elected to public office.

Chart detailing the percentage of women representatives in elected office in Latin America. Chart: OpenDemocracy

For instance, one basic ground-rule: “list” systems - in which electors select from lists of candidates - are far better at facilitating the election of women (and minority-groups) than first-past-the-post system systems (as found in the United States, Britain and Canada) as they encourage parties to develop comparatively more balanced candidate lists. When a party has to bet on one candidate for a legislative seat - as in the case of a first-past-the-post system - the slot generally goes to a man. When the party presents a list of candidates to represent a legislative district, however, it is more apt to balance the list by assigning selected slots to women. That’s why of the ten countries with the highest percentage of women legislators, nine have some variation of the list system.

Two specific examples demonstrate the importance of the design of the electoral system to more balanced representation:

Why does Argentina have 40% women legislators, while neighbouring Brazil has only 8%? Both countries have list systems with gender-quotas, but they’re only effective in Argentina where parties run “closed” lists and are required to alternate men and women in “electable” positions higher up the list. Brazil, on the other hand, allows parties to present a number of candidates equivalent to as much as 150% of the number of seats being contested and there is no sanction for non-compliance with the quota. Additionally, Brazil’s candidate-centred “open” list-system makes success more dependent on access to campaign funding, an area in which women face greater disadvantages.

Why do women account for nearly one in three legislators in Peru, but only one in thirty mayors? There are at least two reasons for this. First, representatives in collective bodies (legislatures, town councils) in Peru are elected from “list positions” while executives  (president, departmental president and mayor) are chosen from a first-past-the-post system. Second, a 30% quota applies to the legislature and local councils, but not to mayors or other executive positions.

To read more, see the original post.

The views expressed by contributing bloggers do not reflect the views of Worldfocus or its partners.

Photo courtesy of Flickr user ¡Que comunismo! under a Creative Commons license.

Michelle Bachelet, the president of Chile.

Barack Obama’s historic election as the 44th president of the U.S. on Nov. 4 has received international attention from citizens and news media alike.

Here in the U.S., commentators have stated that his victory could happen “only in America.”

Obama himself stated in his 2004 address to the Democratic National Convention that “in no other country on earth is my story even possible.”

Greg Weeks is an associate professor of political science at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte and blogs at Two Weeks Notice, where he takes issue with such a characterization of Barack Obama’s victory and details what he believes are progressive elections in Latin America.

“Only” in America?

As I’ve watched and listened to U.S. media commentary, especially after the election, something has nagged at me. This has indeed been an historic election, but in the United States we try to claim that we are the first to have historic elections. It can happen, we say, “only in America.” I don’t have links, but heard it from both Chris Matthews and Chris Wallace–if you google “obama only in america,” you can get a feel for how broad the sentiment is.

In Latin America, I think of Evo Morales’ impressively large victory in Bolivia in 2005, followed shortly by Michelle Bachelet’s in Chile (remember that the U.S. has not yet elected a woman, unlike many other countries). What of Alberto Fujimori’s 1990 election in Peru (will we see an Asian elected president of the United States?)? Or if we look at class, rather than race, there is no doubt that Lula’s election in Brazil changed history–imagine an uneducated union activist running for president here.

It is truly remarkable that our president-elect is African American, and it says a lot about the progress being made in this country. But let us savor it without pretending that we’re the only ones who have made such progress.

See the original post.

For more, read an article from The Economist about the phenomenon of American exceptionalism.

The views expressed by contributing bloggers do not reflect the views of Worldfocus or its partners.

Photo courtesy of Flickr user Fotograma! under a Creative Commons license.