(In) Visible Women In Political Life In Slovakia (original) (raw)
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Twenty Years of Maturing: Slovak Women Exploring the Frontiers of Democracy
International Journal of Politics, Culture, and Society, 2009
The author analyzes Slovakia's road to democracy since the Velvet Revolution of 1989 and pays special attention to the changes in women's position in the society. In the first section, she outlines crucial transition challenges and milestones. The second section, central to the study, shows the last two decades in gender perspective. It starts by explaining women's lukewarm attitudes toward gender issues both during socialism and at the threshold of the new era. The chapter discusses women's persistent marginalization in politics, contrasting this with their active role in civil society. It cites enduring inequalities in the labor market as well as the lingering patriarchal division of responsibilities within families and outlines changes in the patterns of family and private life. Although women in Slovakia as well as men have become more aware of gender inequalities, politicians have remained reluctant to embrace a "gender agenda." A typical feature of contemporary Slovakia is the gap between official documents promoting gender equality, approved under pressure from the European Union, and their implementation in practice. The main actor attempting to close this gap is the pluralist sector of women's nongovernmental organizations that has undergone remarkable growth and diversification. All these elements and processes constitute the setting in which the 2009 presidential election took place. For the first time in Slovakia's history, an incumbent president was seriously challenged by a popular female politician. The third section of the study analyzes the gender dimensions of this unique race.
Chapter 9. Why are there so few female MPs in Slovak parliaments?
The governance of small states in turbulent times. The exemplary cases of Norway and Slovakia, 2012
The research questions in the present chapter are first, whether Slovakia’s low share of female MPs can be explained by institutional factors like the electoral or party system, and second, whether variations between parties can be explained by the voting behaviour of the electorate, the nomination procedures and the selection criteria of the ‘gatekeepers’, or the supply of female candidates. The answer to the first question is no. Slovakia has the most proportional electoral system of all the four Visegrád countries: If PR elections in large constituencies favour female representation, Slovakia should have a higher share of female MPs than the Czech Republic and Poland in the 2000s. Moreover, the size and number of parties explain next to nothing. As for the second question, an insufficient supply of eligible and willing female candidates is not a credible explanation for the low share of female MPs in Slovakia, and certainly not for the variation between parties. Different nomination procedures seems to have mattered more for the female representation of the individual parties than the gatekeepers’ selection criteria. My general impression, based on party interviews, is that gender equality is secondary to other, more important criteria – in particular professional competence and region – in all the parties. Finally, although voting behaviour cannot explain the low overall female representation in Slovakia, it did matter in two cases: the Hungarian parties (MKP and Most-Híd) have a lower average share of female MPs because of preference voting than they would have had otherwise, and the Christian Democrats a slightly higher share.
Proceedings 2021, 2021
The political parties play a unique and fundamental role within the democratic process and they can also play a significant role in what concern the opportunities to promote women in political structures. Thus, the present paper seeks to describe the way in which the main political parties supported the women's involvement within political life at local level (mayors) from 1996 till present. In order to realize the study, quantitative methods are going to be used, the data being collected from the official sites regarding the local elections. In this sense, there were analyzed the 1996-2020 databases that concern: the candidates, their parties and their gender, the winners and their parties, the voters' turnout. The results show that the percentage of female candidates proposed by the parties is slightly increasing, but it does not exceed the 10% threshold, a sign that gender equality is more accepted in theory than in practice. The study focuses on women candidates who have been nominated by parties to run, but also those who have won. Interesting are the situations by parties and two trends can be observed: large parties neglect the attention given to women, these being below the national average (PSD, PNL), and small or newly founded parties promote them to a greater extent.
Lost in a Men's World: Women in Romanian local politics
The aim of this paper is to present, in a descriptive perspective, the women's participation in Romanian politics, with a closer attention to local government. The starting point of this article is the low number of women politicians which represents a feature of the post-communist Romanian political system. In this political system women are an exception rather than a rule. As an exception a woman can announce her intention to run for the Presidency of Romania, however, it is better not to carry out the mind and withdraw, leaving the place for a man. As an exception a woman can be president of the equality committee of Parliament, but as a rule she must be content with the less important role of witness and moral support of the great male enterprises. Using quantitative data we will emphasis the persistence of women's discrimination in Romanian local politics, not as isolated cases but as features of Romanian politics.
WOMEN'S REPRESENTATION IN POLITICS IN SOUTH EASTERN EUROPE
Teorija in Praksa, volume 54, issue 2, pp. 376 - 393, 2017
Quotas are determined to be the main and most effective tool in promoting gender equality. We examine six Southeast European countries where quotas have been either reintroduced (following the abolition of communist-era quota systems) or introduced for the first time. Presenting original data on the descriptive representation of women in parliament, we find significant within region variety. Unlike in Western countries, where women's representation tends to be higher among center and left parties, center-right parties have in some cases staged the most women. We look into quotas, as well as cultural and historical contexts, in order to examine this region-specific phenomenon and account for the within-region variation.
The Need of Local Identity in Politics. The Case of Women Mayors in the North-East Region of Romania
Territorial Identity and Development, 2019
Women's involvement in politics is a complex and multidimensional phenomenon in Romania, following very contradictory and sinuous trends: starting from a high rate of female participation in the political life during the Communism (only as representatives, but not as decision-makers), to an abrupt drop in the 1990s, when politics was male-dominated, to, finally, a rise of female presence in this field, especially when Romania joined EU. Given these premises, the study aims to offer an overview on women's representation in politics at local level, for the 2016 elections, and to understand if there is a connection between the local identity of a future female candidate within the community and her success during the electoral campaign; we have tried to identify the key elements, if any, for a greater presence of women in the politics and if any gender stereotypes are manifested in the studied rural communities; estimating the Romania's probability to have, in the more or less distant future, a greater presence of women in political life, both in urban and rural areas.
Patterns of Women’s Political Activity
The article aims at presenting women’s and men’s political activity, both in its formal aspect (conventional political activity) - manifesting itself in participating in elections or belonging to a political party - and the informal actions (unconventional political activity) - connected with a direct influence on the political sphere. On the basis of research, including that of the current authoress, the evolution of women’s presence in politics is going to be shown. The main manners of explaining the diversification of intensity as well as the chosen forms of political activity among women and men will also be put forward. Key words: women in politics, conventional and unconventional political activity