Out of 67 parliaments across the world, women account for at least 30 per cent of membership, according to the Inter-Parliamentary Union. In 2015, 47 countries went to the polls and 22.6 per cent of elected representatives were women.
The global organisation of national parliaments, in its report titled 'Women in Parliament in 2015', states that the rise of women representatives in average share of all parliamentary seats following elections in 2015, was a meager 0.5 percentage points.
However, the global percentage of women lawmakers has gone up in the last decade, observes the report. "In 2005, the group was predominantly composed of Nordic countries, while today we find countries from sub-Saharan Africa, Latin America, Europe, the Arab States and Asia," it states.
Mexico, not Canada, shows the way
Even though Canada made international headlines with its "gender-balanced cabinet", it is Mexico that is close to achieving gender parity. Out of the 498 parliamentarians in its Lower House 211, or 42.4 per cent, are women. Whereas the 338-strong Canadian parliament has only 88 women MPs. Both Mexico and Canada have implemented women's quota. In Mexico, a revised gender parity law requires at least 50 per cent of the candidates fielded by a political party in either federal or state legislative elections to be women.
Suriname, a little-known South American nation without any gender-specific quota has elected 13 women MPs to its 51-member parliament, with an increase of 15.7 percentage points in women’s representation compared to the previous term.
The United Arab Emirates (UAE) achieved a regional first with the appointment of a female Speaker of the Federal National Council.
The Pacific and Asian countries, where there are no quotas, sent fewer women to their parliament last year. In the much publicised elections in Myanmar, which saw campaigns by the country's pro-democracy icon Aung San Suu Kyi, around 800 women reportedly contested. But only 12.7 per cent of its Lower House and 13.7 per cent of its Upper House are women.
India was not taken into account, as its parliamentary elections were held in 2014.
source: PRS Legislative'Quotas are necessary, but not sufficient'
The report observes that in elections where quotas were legislated, women took almost a quarter of the parliamentary seats available. In 2015, women appeared to have won seats where political parties adopted voluntary quotas.
"In 2015, parliamentary elections were held in 58 countries. Some form of electoral gender quota was used in 28 countries, where elections were held for
34 chambers. Women hold 28.3 per cent of the seats in these chambers. No form of quota was used in 30 countries, where elections were held for 36 chambers.
In those chambers, women represent a mere 13.5 per cent of all members. Results here again confirm that the implementation of quotas leads to more women being elected," the report states.
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