Strengthening Internal Political Party Democracy: Candidate Recruitment from a Gender Perspective

The premise of this paper is that political parties cannot claim to be democratic unless they are inclusive and representative of the population they represent. The candidates parties send to parliament should include a cross-section of society, but by and large, parliaments remain male dominated. The paper will focus on the process of candidate selection by political parties, highlighting the particular obstacles that women face in this process. Because of the uneven political playing field on which women must compete with men, special measures that have be used by political parties to compensate for these cha llenges are also discussed.