Gender gap in elected positions

We share an interesting interview where Doctor Aura Peñas, Coordinator of the Center for Studies in Democracy and Electoral Affairs (CEDAE) of Colombia, shares her reflections on a capital issue such as the gender gap in elected positions in the country.

How important is the commitment to the United Nations sustainable development goals for the RNEC?

The National Registry of Colombia, as the state body in charge of holding elections and other citizen participation mechanisms, has assumed several commitments by political will, that is, without a judicial or legal order:

• Carry out the registration of electoral information disaggregated by sex, in order to demonstrate the trends in the participation of women as voters, candidates and elected to public corporations (Congress of the Republic, departmental assemblies, municipal councils and local administrative boards) and to positions uninominal (Presidency/Vice Presidency of the Republic, departmental governors, municipal and district mayors).
• Focus public resources on gender equality, including in the budget of the Center for Studies in Democracy and Electoral Affairs an item destined for electoral education with a gender perspective, which is applied to virtual courses, in-person workshops and forums to make women's leadership visible.
• Produce knowledge about trends in women's access to candidates, disaggregated by political party or movement, and generate working documents that are published on the CEDAE website.
• Disseminate appropriate knowledge about gender equality in access to public positions among political organizations, academic institutions, international cooperation organizations and civil society organizations that influence the participation of women.

Social leadership in 21st century Colombia, especially in local areas, has a woman's face. Women in Colombia have played a fundamental role in the “real” process of pacification after many years of conflict, a consequence of a role that very often, especially in rural areas, has been forced by the absence of male victims of the numerous armed conflicts.

And to this end, 16 special temporary peace seats were created in Congress, in the House of Representatives, in the development of the Peace Agreement. The institutional design gave priority to rural women in the registration of candidates, and included the alternation of genders on the lists, in order to ensure that women occupied half of the seats. However, because the lists of candidates were not closed but with preferential voting, only 3 women accessed the 16 seats in the Chamber.

Could the 60/40 ratio in the ratio of men/women registered as candidates in the last territorial elections be considered a success?

It is a relative success, since the ideal is parity in the registration of women and men, 50% of candidates for each sex. We need, as an electoral organization, to work on the disaggregation of historical data on women's candidacies, in order to demonstrate historical trends in elections for national and territorial public offices.

Why is the ratio at the national level 30%, while at the local level it drops to 20%?

• For women, access to power is more difficult as we approach the center of economic, political, administrative, welfare, and public service decision-making, which are municipal level positions. Local electoral competition is more unfavorable for women, as it is more physically and symbolically violent than the debate in national elections.
• Furthermore, territorial elections are more marked by sexism in the selection of candidates, in political party decisions on endorsements, campaign financing, access to legal advice specialized in electoral law and mentoring in political communication.
• Nor can we underestimate the care time that is required of women who live in territories, which frequently reduces income levels for women and makes the exercise of formal politics incompatible with motherhood.

The electorate, due to gender bias, tends to prefer to vote for men, whom they stereotypically perceive as more suitable for politics than women.

Would maturity between 45-50 years be a differential factor when it comes to granting greater confidence in elected women?

The older age of those elected could be explained as the result of a longer political career at the territorial level, more recognition from the community and more experience in developing campaigns.

In the Congressional elections held in 2022, it is evident that younger women arrived, with skills in managing social networks and digital communication, who can run more effective campaigns and select their audiences with appropriate technological tools. Local campaigns continue to be too expensive and ethically more confronting for women, due to the frequency of resorting to the illegal campaign strategy that consists of corrupting voters (vote buying), and the use of traditional candidate positioning strategies, such as massive parades through the streets, financing of local festivals, among others, which require large investments

How is the proportion of indigenous and Afro-Colombian women among the elected women valued?

It is a modest, although significant, advance that demonstrates greater openness of the Colombian electoral political system to ethnic leadership.

However, as is the case with women and other groups excluded from the system of political organizations that compete in the electoral arena, the full guarantee of the multicultural rule of law in Colombia is distant.

What have been the training efforts of the registry to promote a more active role for women in Colombian politics?

• The Registry Office has been a pioneer in electoral training for women, with the creation of a diploma course called “School of political participation for women,” and a virtual course on campaign design. The two training processes have benefited nearly 24,000 women throughout the national territory.
• Young electoral training through the “School of new leadership in democratic culture” diploma has benefited more than 20,000 women.
• Since 2020, the Registry has held forums on elections with gender and differential approaches: ethnic women, peacebuilders, victims of armed conflict, young people, with diverse gender identities, with disabilities, which have reached 90,000 people.
• She has held in-person workshops on the design of political campaigns with a gender focus, for more than 600 beneficiary women.

Would it be possible to achieve parity in elected women by 2027? Is it a likely scenario?

A serious and rigorous exercise by the Colombian state is necessary that promotes the coordination of actions between the legislative branch, the executive branch and the electoral organization to promote women's access to candidacies and campaign resources within political organizations, parties and movements.

In addition to these efforts, it takes decades to achieve parity in the inclusion of women in elected positions in Colombia.

Conclusions

The National Registry implemented a training strategy aimed at training women in various political aspects and campaign strategies, courses that were widely received and were offered free of charge.

On this occasion, for the candidate registration process, the Electoral Management Directorate developed a form that allowed more detailed sociodemographic information to be collected from the registered candidates.