Legislative Quotas for Women: A global and ... - Aurat Foundation

Usually, this model has guaranteed seats for women candidatesthrough party lists. The biggest disadvantage is the absence of ‘electoralconstituencies’. A few countries have and some are trying for constituency-baseddirect elections under this model.Rwanda deserves special mention and appreciation. It currently topsthe IPU ranking in leading the world for having 56% proportion ofwomen’s representation in the lower house, with 45 women in thehouse of 80, in elections 2008. Rwanda has a quota system ofreserved seats like Pakistan’s, but its electoral system is PR and itsConstitution says:"The State of Rwanda commits itself that women are granted at least30 percent of posts in decision making organs", (Constitution, Article9 [4]).The 80 members of the Chamber of Deputies are elected as follows:53 members elected by direct universal suffrage through a secretballot using closed List PR; 24 women two from each province andfrom the city of Kigali by an electoral college with a women onlyballot; 2 members elected by the National Youth Council; and onemember elected by the Federation of the Associations of the Disabled(Constitution, Article 76).(ii) Legislated candidate quotas (constitutional and/or legislative)This type of quota set a minimum proportion of women on candidatelists, as a constitutional or legal requirement. Such quota provisionsare stipulated in the national legislation or electoral laws of a country.It is done through a clause in the electoral law which states that acertain percentage or number among those elected must be women.Nearly 33 countries are using this type of quota in all continents, bothin developing and developed world. Some of these are Angola,Argentina, Belgium, Bolivia, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Brazil, France,Indonesia, Mexico, Nepal, Spain, and Uzbekistan.23