Women's Leadership
The webinar focused on the challenges and opportunities for women politicians in the digital space. Speakers discussed key issues such as online harassment, technology-facilitated gender-based violence, and misinformation/disinformation, all of which hinder women's participation in politics. The discussion also emphasized the importance of digital literacy, legal safeguards, and creating safer online environments for women in politics. Additionally, speakers highlighted the need to engage men in these discussions and support women at the grassroots level.
The invited speakers were:
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Chikas Kumle (Nigerian politician, Women Political Activist)
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Gloria Anderson (Founder & Executive Director at TEDI, Tanzania)
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Juliane Muller (Associate Programme Officer, Digitalization and Democracy, International IDEA)
Key Takeaways and Next Steps
Several action points were identified for different stakeholders.
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Electoral commissions should raise awareness among their staff about the challenges women face in digital political spaces, collaborate with civil society organizations and political parties to better understand and address these challenges, and advocate for and participate in policy reforms to protect women online.
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Political parties need to develop actionable policies and legal frameworks to support and protect female candidates. They should also publicly condemn online abuse against women and take disciplinary action against perpetrators within their parties.
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Women’s rights organizations play a crucial role in advocating for stronger support for women in politics by political parties and electoral bodies. They should also push for digital literacy programs that incorporate a gender perspective.
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Digital platforms must implement and enforce gender-sensitive community guidelines to protect women in political spaces.
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iKNOW Politics in collaboration with civil society organizations should continue organizing webinars and discussions on women’s political participation in the digital age while actively engaging in the development of online safety guidelines and policies for women politicians.
Women’s participation in politics and leadership remains low in African countries due to various factors, including online harassment and a patriarchal system that hinders their involvement.
This was highlighted during a workshop attended by journalists from Sub-Saharan African countries, held in Nairobi, Kenya and spearheaded by International IDEA https://www.idea.int/ and WYDE.
Speaking at the workshop, Josephine Mwangi, the Program Manager for the Women’s Political Participation Project in Africa and West Asia from IDEA, stated that the limited participation of women in politics is driven by multiple factors, including the way media portrays women.
The African Barometer report, published in November 2024, revealed that women’s representation in African parliaments stood at only 27% in 2024. Additionally, the report showed that the increase in women’s political participation in Africa has stagnated, with only a 1% rise recorded between 2021 and 2024.
The workshop also highlighted that one of the key barriers to women’s representation in politics is the threats and harassment they face, both when participating in politics and when using social media platforms.
Read here the full article published by WinoTz on 21 February 2025.
Image by WinoTz
Young women in America have seen two female presidential candidates lose to President Donald Trump during some of the most formative years of their lives.
Four young voters on the GBH News video series “Politics IRL,” debated whether the glass ceiling is breakable, and if the country is making progress toward one day seeing a woman in the oval office in wake of Trump’s latest victory.
“The fact that we’re nominating female candidates is least a move in the right direction,” said 26-year-old independent Leandena Dankese.
She noted former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley’s 2024 run for president. “It was admirable to see women in office actually trying to reach for the presidency and getting closer and closer each time.”Jaclyn Corriveau, a 34-year-old Republican, said Kamala Harris’ candidacy is a bad case study for female candidates, considering her “forced nomination.”
“We need to think about how Hillary Clinton and Kamala Harris came into their nominations. I think Hillary came up through a much more democratic process. Kamala Harris was anointed,” Corriveau said.
Read here the full article published by GBH News on 4 February 2025.
Image by GBH News
COLOMBO, Sri Lanka – It was a brief remark during a mundane session of parliament. But to Harini Amarasuriya, Sri Lanka’s prime minister, it was the moment she realized that her country, wrecked not long ago by strongman leaders and their populist politics, had entered a potentially transformative moment for women.
A male colleague (and “not a very feminist” one, as Amarasuriya described him) stood up to say that the island nation could not get more women into the formal workforce unless it officially recognized the “care economy” – work caring for others.
To Amarasuriya, it was “one of the biggest thrills” to hear language in government that had long been confined to activists or to largely forgotten gender departments. “I was like, ‘OK, all those years of fighting with you have paid off,’” she said with a laugh during an interview in December at her office in Colombo, the capital.
Two years after Sri Lankans rose up and cast out a political dynasty whose profligacy had brought economic ruin, the country is in the midst of a once-in-a-lifetime reinvention.
Read here the full article published by The Spokesman-Review on 4 February 2025.
Image by The Spokesman-Review
Worsening levels of abuse are deterring future politicians from careers in parliament, a group of MPs have warned.
Bradford West MP Naz Shah, Rother Valley MP Jake Richards and ex-Dewsbury MP Mark Eastwood said women received more threats and abuse than male colleagues - and it was discouraging their staff from careers in politics.
The politicians made the claims after Spen Valley MP Kim Leadbeater told Radio 4 earlier this week that the level of abuse had increased since her sister Jo Cox was murdered by a far right terrorist in 2016.
Leadbeater said the level of "abuse and nastiness in politics" then was "nowhere near what it is like now".
Richards, who worked on the prosecution of Cox's killer as a junior lawyer, said the abuse had caused members of his parliamentary staff to reconsider careers in politics, which was "pretty shocking".
He said: "We need people from all backgrounds and perspectives to get into public life and to represent us or we'll go wrong politically.
"It's not just about looking after MPs and not hurting feelings, it's about how we make our politics work better."
Read the full article here.
1. Defends Mexico’s Sovereignty
Claudia Sheinbaum, the newly elected president of Mexico, has reiterated the need to “keep calm” in the face of several executive orders and threats issued by President Donald Trump regarding trade, migration, and other issues that impact U.S.-Mexican relations.
2. International Criminal Court Prosecutor Requests Arrest Warrants for Taliban Leaders
This week, a prosecutor from the International Criminal Court (ICC) officially requested arrest warrants for two Taliban leaders in Afghanistan under charges of gender-based persecution. The warrants, which cite article 7(1)(h) of the Rome Statute, target supreme spiritual leader Hibatullah Akhundzada and Abdul Hakim Haqqani, who has been the chief justice of Afghanistan since 2021.
3. Iraqi Parliament Passes Law to Permit Marriage of Girls as Young as Nine
The Iraqi parliament has enacted legislation allowing the marriage of girls as young as nine. The law revokes a ban enacted in 1959 that made the statutory minimum age for marriage eighteen, with some allowance for individuals as young as fifteen to marry with legal approval.
Read here the full article published by the Council on Foreign Relations on 24 January 2025 .
This collaborative report between, Lokniti a programme of the Centre for the Study of Developing Societies and Konrad Adenauer Stiftung has attempted to look at women and politics from a multi-track perspective. While the assessment relied quite extensively on existing aggregate data on the theme and an exhaustive review of literature, the key focus of the analysis was the findings of a survey conducted among women across the country. The report is divided into eight chapters including the conclusion and the introduction and relies heavily on Lokniti’s survey data. Having chosen a sample of respondents that helped best mirror the larger `universe` it was meant to represent (Indian women), a range of questions on the patterns of political participation and representation were asked. The survey attempted to assess the perception of women to different dimensions of political participation and representation and the challenges in this regard. The survey findings have helped present the socio-economic and cultural context that define and decide the attitudes and perception of women to issues of political participation and representation. The varied factors that contribute to greater women’s participation in politics and the pathways to greater political representation were also assessed as part of the study. The study examines the perceptions of women to their role as voters. Their views on different dimensions of political participation and the barriers to the same are also studied. The impact of political socialization and the family are also analysed as part of the survey. Factors that influence voting decisions as well as womens’ perception of women as leaders, has also been attempted in this study.
Click here to see the academic article.
Research showing that there is strong correlation between increased female labor force participation and women’s political participation is essentially based on empirical data from Western, democratic, and developed contexts. In this article, we discuss whether these conclusions hold for non-Western, nondemocratic, and developing settings too. Through a study of Ethiopian women’s employment and political agency, we find that employment is actually not significantly related to the level of women’s participation in local political meetings and is negatively related to their interest in politics.
Click here to download the article.
In 2018, a record number of women were elected to Congress, but it’s a different story when you look at governorships. Today, only nine women serve as governor, tying a previous record first set in 2004.
Twenty states have never had a woman governor, whereas only one state has yet to send a woman to Congress. The numbers are even more stark when it comes to women of color and LGBTQ women: only two states have ever elected a woman of color governor, and there has only been one openly LGBTQ woman elected governor.
When running for executive office, women face obstacles that men running simply do not. The Barbara Lee Family Foundation has consistently found that voters have been more comfortable seeing women serve as members of a legislature than they have been electing them to executive offices—positions where they will have sole decision-making authority.
This research, which asks about hypothetical Asian Pacific Islander American, Black, Latina, lesbian and white women candidates of the two major political parties, comprehensively examines what it takes for a woman to prove to voters she is ready to serve in executive office. For context, it also includes some of the lessons learned from interviews with 2018 gubernatorial candidates and their campaign staffs.
Click here to see the report.
Americans elected more than 100 women to office in the 2018 midterm elections, but women still hold less than a quarter of the seats in Congress.
Why are women so poorly represented? Theories include: women are less politically ambitious; there is a lack of support from political parties and donors; voter prejudice and a dearth of information about female politicians influence votes.
UCLA Anderson’s Melanie Wasserman was interested in a less-understood piece of the puzzle: Do women breaking into politics react differently to an electoral loss than men? If so, does this contribute to the low percentage of women who hold office?
Her analysis of 11,466 candidates in closely won local races in California between 1995 and 2014 (including city, county, and school districts) finds women new to politics were less likely than men to run again within four years of losing a close race. For men, losing an initial election caused a 16-to-19 percentage point decline in the probability of their running in another election within the next four years. Women exhibited an additional 7-to-11-percentage point decrease in the probability of running again, relative to the male candidates.
Click here to read the full article published by UCLA Anderson Review on 1 November 2019.
Political parties act as gatekeepers, meaning that improvements in the representation of women depend on parties’ willingness to nominate women candidates. Previous research suggests that party characteristics and gender quotas largely explain women’s nominations, but overlooks the political context in which parties operate. This study highlights the gendered outcomes that occur when parties make nomination decisions in times of public discontent, namely increasing political distrust and increasing perceived corruption. We theorize that parties hold similar biases to voters: gender stereotypes that regard women as more trustworthy and honest should advantage women as political trust falls and perceptions of corruption rise. We hypothesize that parties nominate larger percentages of women in these circumstances. Using two waves of data from over 100 political parties in 18 Latin American countries, we find that parties nominate more women when a large proportion of the public distrusts the national legislature, providing support for the theory.
Click here to see the academic article.
From mayors to MEPs: new study reveals women’s representation across Europe.
Women make up half of humanity, yet account for only 1/3 of political decision-makers in Europe and around 15% of mayors. A new study by the Council of European Municipalities and Regions (CEMR) shows that despite some gains, politics remains a man’s world.
One-of-a-kind, “Women in Politics: Local and European Trends” provides in-depth analysis of women’s representation in 41 European countries and all levels of government, from local councils all the way up to the European Parliament.
Covering a ten-year period, the study breaks down the data by country, shows where and how women have made gains and provides recommendations on how to make further progress.
Click here to see the report.