LESSONS ON GENDER EQUALITY AND WOMEN’S POLITICAL EMPOWERMENT Executive Summary With support from USAID, in 2021 IFES launched ElectionJudgments.org, a database for national election judgments from around the world. 1 IFES has used this database, which is intended to facilitate the exchange of sound precedents across jurisdictions, to conduct an initial analysis of critical judgments on gender and elections decisions. For elections and political participation for women, comparative case law provides insight into real-world efforts to operationalize the goal of gender equality espoused by many countries but achieved by almost none. A review of the litigation in this space, from France to Samoa and Kenya to Mexico, shows that the argument for gender equality and fairness has been used both for and against the cause of women’s equal participation in politics. This analysis found that questions related to gender quotas and other affirmative actions designed to operationalize gender equality were widespread, and that these measures are most impactful when accompanied by institutional commitment on the part of the courts to enforce the spirit and the letter of the law. These cases also raised important questions for the field about possible conflicts between LGBTQI+ rights, women’s rights, and Indigenous rights, as well as the limitations of gendered quota systems grounded in a gender binary that is losing resonance with a growing portion of the population. Ultimately, this paper finds that, while courts can play important roles in enforcing laws intended to promote gender equality and protect the equal political participation of women, these efforts will ultimately be ineffective, and even pyrrhic, without both societal and institutional action. Introduction For true democracy to exist, all citizens must have equal access to elections. 2 The International Convention on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR), to which 173 countries are States Parties, makes clear that this includes equal access for women and men. Per Article 25, “every citizen shall have the right and the opportunity, regardless of their sex, to take part in the conduct of public affairs and to have equal access to public service in his country.” 3 Furthermore, the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW) explicitly promotes women’s political participation by requiring countries that have ratified the convention to take action to ensure women’s equal participation, mentioning specifically the right to vote, stand for election, hold public office and participate in the formation and implementation of government policy. 4 1 The Elections Judgments database is supported by the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) under the Global Elections and Political Transitions (GEPT) Program. 2 See Gender equality in elections, IFES, (Apr. 10, 2019), https://www.ifes.org/issues/gender-equality; see also 12 Principles of Good Governance, Council Eur. 3 UN General Assembly, International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, art. 25, 16 December 1966. 4 Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women, art. 7, 3 September 1981, https://www.ohchr.org/documents/professionalinterest/cedaw.pdf: 5