LESSONS ON GENDER EQUALITY AND WOMEN’S POLITICAL EMPOWERMENT If the experiences of Spain and France are any indication, a gender quota may be a helpful tool for Germany to comply with its constitutional equality mandate. While women make up only 31 percent of the Bundestag, in Spain, women hold 45 percent of seats in the Congress of Deputies and 41 percent of seats in the Senate. 21 In France, women hold 40 percent of seats in the National Assembly and 35 percent of seats in the Senate, up from less than 11 percent of total seats in the Parliament in 1997. 22 Both France and Spain saw increases in women’s representation in elected office after the quotas were put in place. 23 Enforcing Quotas Courts and Election Management Bodies (EMBs) have also been called on to enforce the implementation of quotas under a variety of circumstances, resulting in equally varied results. While not an exhaustive list of all cases related to gender quotas, the role of courts and EMBs in enforcing quotas has been highlighted in the selection of cases contained in the ElectionJudgments.org database. In Indonesia, for example, the Bawaslu (the independent General Election Supervisory Agency), considers whether the EMB violated election laws during the election administration process. In one such case, a political party challenged a ruling of the EMB, which disqualified its candidate lists in two electoral districts for not meeting the 30 percent gender quota. However, by utilizing both its discretion and administrative flexibility, the Bawaslu allowed the party to “cure” both lists, simultaneously enforcing the gender quota and ensuring efficient election administration. 24 In 2019, the Supreme Court of Argentina took the opposite tack, upholding the letter of the law but perhaps not the spirit. In Together for the Change Without Formalizing Candidacies, the court considered a case in which a male candidate died and was replaced by the next male candidate on the list. The court rejected the petitioners’ argument that the next candidate, a woman, should have replaced the deceased candidate to fulfill the constitutional goal of providing for the representation of women. 25 Instead, the court determined that the substitute candidate should be 21 Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance (IDEA), Inter-Parliamentary Union and Stockholm University, Gender Quotas Database (2021). https://www.idea.int/data-tools/data/gender-quotas/country-view/103/35 22 Id. 23 In Spain, for example, “[t]he law has led to a steady increase in the number of women elected, and, interestingly, not only in the case of the socialist PSOE but also the conservative People’s Party (PP), which had previously opposed quotas.” https://eige.europa.eu/gendermainstreaming/good-practices/spain/electoral-quotas-work. In France, the gender quota “created change on local and national levels, spurring progress in women’s representation and serving as an example of quantifiable change created through structural reforms.” 24 See Suryadharma Ali & M. Romahurmuziy v. General Election Commission (June 13, 2013), https://electionjudgments.org/en/entity/vhzytxi6czr In one district, the list did not follow the “zipper” system for the placement of women on the candidate list (in which men and women candidates are listed in alternating order to prevent all the candidates of one gender being listed at the bottom of the ticket). In another district, one of the women candidates had an expired ID, which rendered her ineligible to stand for the election leaving the list short of the 30 percent requirement. For the list with the “zipper problem” the party was given the opportunity to reorder the candidates in accordance with the zipper system. The candidate with the expired ID (who presented an official letter explaining the delay in getting her ID renewed) was permitted to remain on the list, and therefore the ballot. 25 Article 37 of the Constitución Nacional [Const. Nac.] (Arg.). provides that “[t]rue equality of opportunity between men and women in running for elected and party offices shall be guaranteed through affirmative actions in the regulation of political parties and in the electoral system.” This provision is operationalized through the electoral law, under which parties are required to alternate men and women on their candidate lists, effectively ensuring gender parity in the lists of candidates for the National Congress. 9