Fostering Women’s Political Participation through Parliamentary Support Aimed at Prevention of Electoral Violence

This programmatic option describes the role of parliaments in eliminating physical and online gender-based violence, highlighting the role of female MPs as well as parliamentary staff as the drivers of change in parliaments.

Parliament & civic participation

ACTIVITY

DESCRIPTION

Globally, women’s participation in politics has increased, largely thanks to quotas, and plateaued at around 25 percent, and there’s a genuine concern it will start decreasing because of powerful deterrents and disenfranchisers like tech-facilitated violence and harassment, but also political violence.

Despite several good examples of political parties and parliaments boosting women’s participation through increased quotas or women’s parliamentary networks pushing through legislative packages to prevent domestic violence and similar issues, the most recent concerning tendency seems to be women considering quitting politics.[1] Hence, the IPU during its 148th Assembly organized a panel on the topic ‘Women in politics: To stay or not to stay?’ that reaffirmed the different types of pressure, intimidation and harassment women had to undergo in order to stay in politics and calling for peer-to-peer support to build resilience among politicians, ensuring better representation of women and adopting codes of conduct.

According to IPU research, women seem to be most affected by political violence throughout the electoral cycle. Both political parties and parliamentary institutions have a major role to play. Furthermore, rapid digital development and unregulated hate speech seem to have proliferated online gender-based violence. We see that public participation in decision-making, legislative inputs and raising digital literacy would need to be strengthened. Measures, monitoring, analysis, accountability and legislative frameworks need to be in place.

Internal parliamentary policies and procedures prohibiting gender-based violence, as well as competent and independent grievance mechanisms, are but a minimum. It is essential to actively involve men to increase their awareness of the scale of the problem.[2]

The following activities may be considered:

  1. Training for political parties: support on developing codes of ethics, guidelines, measures to secure protection of their women members and similar efforts.
  2. Women’s parliamentary networks: support for new and/or existing networks, and organize conferences with local assembly MPs. SDG caucuses may also serve as a good base.
  3. Active involvement of civil society.
  4. Developing platforms for dialogue and development of measures: peer-to-peer support for building resilience and solidarity among politicians, ensuring better representation of women and adopting codes of conduct. Work on actively engaging women’s parliamentary networks in working groups on developing the legislative framework on AI and regulating digital platforms, hate speech and online violence.
  5. Fostering a multidimensional approach: from the global, regional and national to the local level.
  6. Considering galvanizing and supporting women peacebuilders within transitional justice programmes.
  7. Expertise and consultations on developing internal parliamentary policies and procedures prohibiting gender-based violence, as well as competent and independent grievance mechanisms.

Women’s parliamentary networks may be the first point of reference in parliaments but also in cross-party caucuses on SDGs, for example. Clearly, working with women parliamentarians needs to be done in an inclusive manner, through an all-party approach. Women parliamentarians proved to be most engaged and often drivers of change, including in post-conflict contexts, hence their potential for peacebuilding and contribution to transitional justice. Support in terms of seeking approaches to curb violence against women in politics is a commonly received request from parliamentarians.

If we look at the social media – particularly Facebook, X, Instagram, etc. – women parliamentarians are reporting inappropriate comments and images against them, with as many as 58.2 percent highlighting that they had seen images or comments about them that were disparaging or had a sexual connotation, and 66.7 percent of cases included abusive, sexual or violent content. Technological achievement now allows for such content to spread swiftly; and it can be reproduced and remain visible indefinitely. Freedom of expression is also abused to justify hate speech and stifle women’s own freedom of expression.[3]

Finally, online gender-based violence sets a culture of violence where it may be seen as normal and inevitable. In the absence of regulations, it seems to be tolerated and almost inevitable.[4]

[1] 148th IPU Forum of Women Parliamentarians https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NW8tfevKWj4

[2] https://www.ipu.org/news/news-in-brief/2022-11/violence-against-women-parliamentarians-causes-effects-solutions-0

[3] IPU, 2018, Sexism, Harassment and Violence against Women in Parliaments in Europe

[4] Becky Faith, 2024, Tackling Online Gender-Based Violence: Understanding Gender, Development and the Power Relations of Digital Spaces

1.

What are important considerations prior to initiating the activity?

  • Consider involving parliamentary staff who are also exposed to different types of violence and who have much less voice than MPs.
  • Engage with national authorities, parliament leadership, party leadership/whips and other relevant bodies to understand their priorities and expectations for the activity. This ensures alignment with national development strategies and objectives.
  • Consider combining different programmatic options to fit the context and funding availability.

2.

Who is best placed to implement the activity?

  • International assistance providers with experience working with political actors and institutions, particularly parliamentary digitalization and participation, may be well placed to support such efforts, providing advisory support based on best practices in various contexts.
  • Electoral and parliamentary interventions that ideally comprise both parliamentary and electoral support are best suited to integrate activities that foster meaningful participation through digital platforms.
  • Civil society has a role to play in implementing particular aspects of this approach while academia may be added for research.

3.

How to ensure context specificity and sensitivity?

  • Ideally, a relationship exists between parliaments and the implementing partner. In the event that the relationship is built with this initiative, working with entry points and supporting parliament in similar initiatives upon their request, then building demand-driven intuitive interactions with a wider margin of flexibility would be of assistance.
  • Parliamentary staff may be of great assistance in the planning and organization of the support.

4.

How to involve youth?

  • Mainstream parliamentary indicators (IPU UNDP).
  • Create a register of civil society organizations (CSOs), experts or media working to support youth participation if one does not exist already.
  • Intergenerational oversight (in the sense that accountability to this and future generations of young people shouldn’t only be the responsibility of young people and young MPs alone, but rather a general oversight principle).
  • Youth engagement will often require different forms of outreach and communication. They will often be on different platforms and drawn to different types and formats.

5.

How to ensure gender sensitivity/inclusive programming?

  • Engaging women and – where possible – LGBTQI+ movements and organizations more effectively. In some parliaments, it is even women CSOs that provide secretariat services to parliamentary caucuses on certain issues.
  • Mainstream parliamentary indicators (IPU/UNDP).
  • Create a register of CSOs, experts or media in support of women’s participation and the prevention of violence against women if one does not exist already.

6.

How to communicate about these activities?

  • Social media boosting
  • Through the parliamentary education centre
  • Organization of events and conferences

7.

How to coordinate with other actors/which other stakeholders to involve?

  • Coordination meetings for donors/partners on monthly or quarterly basis.
  • Trainings and presentations: Conduct joint trainings with other stakeholders, educational institutions and community groups, to build the capacity of the parliament and/or (female) MPs.
  • Collaborative events and conferences: Partner with various organizations to co-host events that promote women’s political participation and counter violence against women. This can enhance visibility and foster a collective approach to addressing violence against women.

How to ensure sustainability?

  • Developing long- and short-term strategies for fostering women’s public participation.
  • Developing strategies and tools that will remain with parliament as part of the project exit strategy.
  • Probing towards strategic long-term institutionalization.

COST CENTRES

  • MPs and staff peers being brought in to present their experience (online, travel and daily subsistence allowance costs)
  • The cost will be even higher in case of international platforms and event costs.
  • Training of the parliamentary staff
  • Information campaigns and social media boosting
  • Events and travel to local level because not all can afford to travel to the capital (venue, travel, catering, renting of equipment if needed for presentations)
  • Other activities specified under entry points that need to be programmed

LIMITATIONS AND CHALLENGES

  • Given the unpredictable nature of how parliament functions, build agile management and regularly update risks and indicators.
  • The often-political character of violence may pose a challenge to be mindful of
  • Importance of applying a strict do-no-harm principle to any programming in this area.
  • The topic of gender equality has been covered by many partners such as UNWOMEN, IPU and CSOs; there may be overlap and coordination on this topic that proves to be complex since many partners approach MPs directly without much concern for coordinated efforts.

RESOURCES

  • UNDP Somalia, Electoral and Parliamentary Initiative
  • IPU UNDP Global Parliamentary Report 2020
  • IPU Surveys on Women Parliamentarians
  • IPU, 2018, Sexism, Harassment and Violence against Women in Parliaments in Europe

EXAMPLES

IPU study on Iceland – ‘Informing a New Strategy against Sexism and Harassment in the Parliament of Iceland’ – where it was evident that despite Iceland’s well-established gender equality policies and practices, violence against women was on the rise. Hence, the Iceland Parliament adopted the Strategy and Action Plan in May 2023. The plan included preventive actions and provided guidelines on handling cases of sexism and harassment, ensuring that the complainant has access to advice and support throughout the procedure. The effects are yet to be assessed; however, this may be observed as an example of how parliament may be instrumental and active in prevention of violence in an institution and, to some extent, send a message to a wider public.

Council on Women’s Rights, Children’s Rights, and Gender Equality under the Speaker of the Parliament in the Kyrgyz Republic (formed in response to a demand from a broad civic coalition; based formally at Parliament and comprising MPs, government agency representatives and civil society) https://platforma.kg/en/2023/sovet-po-pravam-zhenshhin-detej-i-gendernomu-ravenstvu-pri-t-raga-zhogorku-kenesha-kyrgyzskoj-respubliki/

National Women’s Solidarity Kurultai, initiated by women activists with the support of the Council following the exclusionary political transition of 2021–2022. https://www.undp.org/kyrgyzstan/press-releases/national-womens-solidarity-kurultai-kyrgyzstan-its-way-women-empowerment

 

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