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101. The Complementarity Mechanism: How Parties Regulate Newcomers’ Access to Power

Author

UCL - SSH/SPLE - Institut de sciences politiques Louvain-Europe, Celis, Karen, Erzeel, Silvia, ECPR Joint Sessions of Workshops, UCL - SSH/SPLE - Institut de sciences politiques Louvain-Europe, Celis, Karen, Erzeel, Silvia, and ECPR Joint Sessions of Workshops

Abstract

Ethnic minorities are relative newcomers in formal electoral politics in Belgium. The first ethnic minority representative entered the Belgian federal parliament in 1995. Since then, ethnic representative have not made up more than 6% of the federal MPs. Surprisingly the majority of these ethnic minority representatives have been women. This article explores why ethnic minority women have gained quicker inroads into formal politics than ethnic minority men. Based on 25 interviews with party officials, we find that gendered patterns of ethnic minority representation are the result of how parties include newcomers on candidate lists. The integration of newcomers is marked out by two dynamics: (1) parties’ search for effectiveness, which benefits incumbents and severely limits newcomers’ access to power and (2) parties’ search for representativeness, which provides opportunities for new groups but at the same time introduces elements of competition between groups. We argue that ethnic minority women were elected in larger numbers because they were able to cash in what we label a ‘complementarity advantage’: they were least threatening to incumbent power and thus enhanced parties’ effectiveness, while their ‘intersectional identity mix’ maximized the representativeness of the list. We conclude that this complementarity mechanism is essential for understanding how new groups enter politics, and for explaining why some (sub)groups gain quicker inroads than others.

Published
2014

102. Spiegeltje, spiegeltje aan de wand... Wat met diversiteit in de politiek van ons land?

Author

UCL - SSH/SPLE - Institut de sciences politiques Louvain-Europe, Erzeel, Silvia, Celis, Karen, Severs, Eline, UCL - SSH/SPLE - Institut de sciences politiques Louvain-Europe, Erzeel, Silvia, Celis, Karen, and Severs, Eline

Abstract

Sinds 1995 is er in België een groeiende aandacht voor diversiteit in de politiek. Een vaak gehoorde stelling is dat de groep van vertegenwoordigers meer divers is geworden. Maar is dit wel zo? In dit hoofdstuk tonen we aan dat de Belgische politiek de afgelopen twintig jaar inderdaad merkelijk ‘diverser’ is geworden: het aantal vrouwen en etnisch-culturele minderheden in de verschillende parlementen is substantieel toegenomen. Maar tegelijkertijd zijn er grenzen aan die diversiteit. Het aantal verkozen arbeiders is historisch laag. Vrouwen, etnische minderheden en arbeiders ondervinden bovendien nog steeds drempels in de politiek. Deze beperken niet alleen hun toegang tot de politieke macht, maar ook de ruimte die zij hebben om een verschil te maken eens ze verkozen zijn. Structurele maatregelen om diversiteit te bewerkstelligen bestaan tot slot enkel voor vrouwen, en deze zijn niet altijd in staat om een brede transformatie van de machtsrelaties teweeg te brengen.

Published
2014

103. La professionalisation des partis politiques en Belgique: vers l’intégration de la dimension de genre

Author

UCL - SSH/SPLE - Institut de sciences politiques Louvain-Europe, Erzeel, Silvia, Vandeleene, Audrey, Congrès Triennal de l’Associaton Belge Francophone de Science Politique, UCL - SSH/SPLE - Institut de sciences politiques Louvain-Europe, Erzeel, Silvia, Vandeleene, Audrey, and Congrès Triennal de l’Associaton Belge Francophone de Science Politique

Abstract

Even though there is a growing body of work documenting trends towards a professionalization of gender in political organisations and institutions in which parties are indirectly involved (such as women’s movements, parliaments, equality bodies and policy machineries), we know very little about whether and how parties as extra-parliamentary organisations have become more professionalized in their efforts to integrate a gender dimension in their workings. This paper therefore asks ‘to what extent and how a professionalization of gender has taken/is taking place in the Belgian parties’. This question is largely explorative and includes three sub-questions: (1) Who are the key gender experts and professionals in the Belgian parties, (2) What are the main tasks or daily assignments of these gender experts/professionals?, and (3) What is the (institutional) position of gender experts in the party? In order to answer these questions, the paper explores the ‘gendered’ aspects of party professionalization in 11 Belgian parties and map the different actors and tasks involved based on new and original data gathered by the authors in 2006 and 2014. The results show that a professionalization of gender is overall limited. Although parties have included gender experts in their organization (for instance in study centres or through the establishment of intra-party women’s groups), this gender expertise is often not structurally embedded, and thus not professionalized.

Published
2014

105. The professionalization of political parties in Belgium: the case of gender equality

Author

UCL - SSH/SPLE - Institut de sciences politiques Louvain-Europe, Erzeel, Silvia, Vandeleene, Audrey, 3rd edition of the Conference Belgium: The State of the Federation, UCL - SSH/SPLE - Institut de sciences politiques Louvain-Europe, Erzeel, Silvia, Vandeleene, Audrey, and 3rd edition of the Conference Belgium: The State of the Federation

Abstract

Political parties throughout Europe are witnessing a significant professionalization of their daily functioning. Professionalization refers to an institutional process “by which professionals become more central to an organization, in this case a party” (Webb & Kolodny 2006: 338). The centrality of professionals is most obvious in parties’ reliance on an expanding body of professional staff members and experts with specialized skills (a.o. marketing professionals, consultants, spin-doctors and public relations experts) performing traditional party functions and supporting the leadership in the management of the party. These professionals replace – or at least complement – member-volunteers and party bureaucrats in the party apparatus (Norris 2000). Although party professionalization is a phenomenon that has received considerable academic attention, research on the professionalization of Belgian political parties remains scarce. In this paper, we will study –in an explorative way– to what extent and how professionalization has taken/is taking place in the Belgian parties, focusing on gender equality. On the one hand, we will ‘map’ the presence of “gender professionals” in Belgian parties: who are they, what are their main tasks, to what extent is their presence institutionalized in the party and how has this changed over time? On the other hand, we will reflect on the consequences of the presence of “gender professionals” for the internal dynamics and power relations within parties. We conduct an in-depth case study of one particular policy domain, but we will reflect on the broader implications for processes of party professionalization in other domains as well. We explore the professionalization of gender equality in 11 Belgian parties based on new and original data (including document analysis and interviews) gathered by the authors in 2006 and 2014. The results show that party professionalization is overall limited. Although parties have included gender experts i

Published
2014

106. A nation of vicars and merchants’: religiosity and Dutch MEPs

Author

UCL - SSH/SPLE - Institut de sciences politiques Louvain-Europe, Caluwaerts, Didier, De Vlieger, Pieter-Jan, Erzeel, Silvia, UCL - SSH/SPLE - Institut de sciences politiques Louvain-Europe, Caluwaerts, Didier, De Vlieger, Pieter-Jan, and Erzeel, Silvia

Abstract

Religion is a major driving force in the Dutch political system and as European integration has progressed, it is often argued that these national practices affect how national representatives act in the European Parliament (EP). Our aim in this study is to determine to what extent the religious divide impacts upon the work of Dutch MEPs in the European political arena. On the basis of the RelEP survey and interviews, we argue that religious or secular views are very salient to Dutch MEPs, but that their impact is largely indirect. Moreover, we find that Dutch MEPs actively use the EP and its committee system in an attempt to redefine the relationship between church and state in the Netherlands. And finally, we argue that the European arena offers new opportunities for mobilisation among those promoting secularist interests.

Published
2014

110. Women, feminists and the left: Critical Actors in the substantive representation of women? A cross-national study of MPs and the substantive representation of women

Author

Erzeel, Silvia, Celis, Karen, Ecpr General Conferece, Potsdam, and Political Science

Subjects
representation of women, gender and politics
Abstract

This paper deals with the question who the critical actors in the substantive representation are. It considers to what extent women, feminists and left parties map onto the critical actors in the substantive representation of women.

Published
2009

111. Integratie van een genderdimensie? De impact van de quotawetten op het intern functioneren van de Belgische politieke partijen

Author

Erzeel, Silvia, Petra, Meier, Politicologenetmaal, Nijmegen, and Politieke Wetenschappen

Subjects
recruitment and selection, gender quota
Abstract

Parties play a central role in recruiting and selecting political elites. This gatekeeping function is considered to be one of the most important functions of parties. In order to improve the gender balance in politics, parties and governments have increasingly adopted measures to reduce some of the structural thresholds women face in politics. Research on gender quotas has often studied the impact gender quotas have on the presence of women in legislative assemblies. The impact of gender quotas on the internal functioning of parties is less known. However, as Hazan and Voerman (2006) point out, candidate selection at the party level is conditioned by the electoral system at the national level, and reforms of the electoral system are expected to have an impact on candidate selection methods of parties and the types of candidates selected. In this paper we hypothesize that the introduction of legal gender quotas in Belgium has influenced the internal organization of the Belgian parties. We expect that the introduction of gender quota acts has encouraged parties to re-evaluate their recruitment and selection rules. In this paper we study the statutes of the Belgian parties, complemented with semi-structured expert interviews. We conclude that Belgian political parties have not profoundly altered their rules and procedures in order to counter women's under-representation in politics.

Published
2009

112. Claiming to represent women: a study of Parliamentary Questions in Belgium (1995-2007)

Author

Erzeel, Silvia, Deschouwer, Kris, Depauw, Sam, Politics, First European Conference On, Gender, Belfast, and Political Science

Subjects
representation of women
Abstract

Understanding of women's representation would benefit from a shift to micro-level studies of what is going on in the substantive representation of women. (Childs and Krook 2006) As such, it counters criticisms of essentialism that handcuffs particular interests to sex - taking diversity and intersectionality seriously. Conceptions of interests as unattached to, or as definable only by, the person who has them have a profound impact on practices of representation, Pitkin (1967) asserted - paving the way for conceptions of surrogate representation (Mansbridge 2003) and a politics of presence (Phillips 1994). Neither, however, fully captures the representative's creative role in linking interests to identities: a representative portrays an audience as having this or that interest, and presents her/himself as possessing a particular capacity or attribute that enables her/him to represent that audience (Saward 2006:302). This study provides a three-case empirical application of Saward's conception of representative claims - based on Members' of Parliament contributions to recent debates on integration policy in Belgium and the Netherlands (from parliamentary proceedings and press clippings). It will demonstrate how political parties portray the identities of immigrant and non-immigrant women, defining their interests as they claim to represent them, and how women (or women's organizations) publicly react to these claims. The comparison of Belgium and the Netherlands allows consideration of the impact of partisan loyalties and institutional factors: in particular, the prominent position of the party policy expert. As integration policy is a regional competency in Belgium, the research design also highlights the impact of available cultural codes.

Published
2009

117. The Complementarity Advantage: Parties, Representativeness and Newcomers' Access to Power.

Author

Celis, Karen and Erzeel, Silvia

Subjects
*POLITICAL participation of minorities, *POLITICAL candidates, *WOMEN in politics, *POLITICAL affiliation, *TWENTY-first century, *ELECTIONS, BELGIAN politics & government
Abstract

Why have ethnic minority women--a group experiencing 'double barriers' in society and politics--gained inroads into formal politics in Belgium more quickly than ethnic minority men? Our qualitative analysis of candidate selection shows that political parties prefer ethnic minority women candidates because their 'intersectional identity mix' is maximally complementary to groups embodied by the incumbents. It enables party selectors to maximise the representativeness of the list by including a limited number of newcomers. The groups that are able to cash in on such a 'complementarity advantage' vary depending on the identity of the incumbents and the political salience of social groups' identities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Published
2017
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119. Power, privilege and disadvantage: Intersectionality theory and political representation.

Author

Celis, Karen, Severs, Eline, and Erzeel, Silvia

Subjects
SOCIAL groups, INTERSECTIONALITY, REPRESENTATIVE government, POLITICAL privileges & immunities, POWER (Social sciences), ONTOLOGISM, POLITICAL participation
Abstract

This article critically reviews the extant literature on social group representation and clarifies the advantages of intersectionality theory for studying political representation. It argues that the merit of intersectionality theory can be found in its ontology of power. Intersectionality theory is founded on a relational conception of political power that locates the constitution of power relations within social interactions, such as political representation. As such, intersectionality theory pushes scholarship beyond studying representation inequalities – that are linked to presumably stable societal positions – to also consider the ways in which political representation (re)creates positions of privilege and disadvantage. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Published
2016
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124. Gender and Ethnicity : Intersectionality and the Politics of Group Representation in the Low Countries

Author

UCL - SSH/SPLE - Institut de sciences politiques Louvain-Europe, Celis, Karen, Erzeel, Silvia, UCL - SSH/SPLE - Institut de sciences politiques Louvain-Europe, Celis, Karen, and Erzeel, Silvia

Abstract

This article studies how Belgian and Dutch parties regulate demands for representation by women and ethnic minorities, and how this influences the representation of intersectional groups. We argue that demands for representation by multiple groups bring competition into play. Ethnic minorities have found it particularly difficult to integrate into electoral politics in Belgium where parties maintain a stricter hierarchy of gender over ethnicity. Dutch parties are somewhat more open, but more so for minority women than for minority men.

Published
2013

126. Nationale bemoeienis of lokale autonomie? Het lijstvormingsproces bij gemeenteraadsverkiezingen

Author

UCL - SSH/SPLE - Institut de sciences politiques Louvain-Europe, De Winter, Lieven, Erzeel, Silvia, Vandeleene, Audrey, Wauters, Bram, UCL - SSH/SPLE - Institut de sciences politiques Louvain-Europe, De Winter, Lieven, Erzeel, Silvia, Vandeleene, Audrey, and Wauters, Bram

Abstract

In dit hoofdstuk trachten we enkele hiaten op te vullen door drie aspecten van het lijstvormingsproces te belichten: wie de lijsten samenstelt op het lokale niveau, welke criteria daarbij gehanteerd worden en uit welke organisaties de kandidaten vooral gerekruteerd worden. Zo kunnen we een antwoord formuleren op de vraag of dit lijstvormingsproces bij de gemeenteraadsverkiezingen vooral een lokale aangelegenheid is, dan wel of het nationale partijniveau een stevige vinger in de pap heeft.

Published
2013

127. How legislators think about gender quotas: a cross-national study

Author

UCL - SSH/SPLE - Institut de sciences politiques Louvain-Europe, Erzeel, Silvia, Caluwaerts, Didier, Third European Conference on Politics and Gender, UCL - SSH/SPLE - Institut de sciences politiques Louvain-Europe, Erzeel, Silvia, Caluwaerts, Didier, and Third European Conference on Politics and Gender

Published
2013

132. Is it male chauvinism, party affiliation or political apathy? Gender-based preferential voting in Belgium

Author

UCL - SSH/SPLE - Institut de sciences politiques Louvain-Europe, Erzeel, Silvia, Caluwaerts, Didier, Meier, Petra, ECPR Joint Sessions of Workshops, UCL - SSH/SPLE - Institut de sciences politiques Louvain-Europe, Erzeel, Silvia, Caluwaerts, Didier, Meier, Petra, and ECPR Joint Sessions of Workshops

Abstract

This contribution studies voters’ gender preferences for electoral candidates on the occasion of the 2009 regional elections in Belgium. The question is to what extent voters cast a preference vote for either male or female candidates, and how this preference can be explained. The results show that more than half of the group of voters expresses a clear gender preference, and this preference is often at the advantage of male candidates. Contrary to common assumptions, however, we find that differences in voters’ gender preferences can only partially be explained by voters’ own gender. The link between voters’ and candidates’ gender exists, but it is relatively weak and holds only for men. Much more important are voters’ access to political resources and party affiliation. Politically disengaged and rightwing voters display a clear preference for male candidates. Voting for female candidates expresses an informed choice made by higher educated voters.

Published
2013

140. Het belang van feministische attituden en contacten voor de substantiële vertegenwoordiging van vrouwen

Author

UCL - SSH/SPLE - Institut de sciences politiques Louvain-Europe, Erzeel, Silvia, Caluwaerts, Didier, UCL - SSH/SPLE - Institut de sciences politiques Louvain-Europe, Erzeel, Silvia, and Caluwaerts, Didier

Abstract

Vrouwen in de politiek zijn nodig, anders dan mannen hebben zij meer aandacht voor de situatie van de vrouw, zo blijkt uit onderzoek. Is het dan , voor het behartigen van vrouwenbelangen, voldoende om veel vrouwen in de politieke besluitvorming te hebben? Silvia Erzeel en Didier Caluwaerts deden de proef op de som en vroegen parlementsleden, mannen en vrouwen, naar hun feministische bewustzijn.

Published
2011

148. Beyond the Usual Suspects: Non-Left, Men and Non-Feminists as Critical Actors in the Substantive Representation of Women. A Cross-national Study of MPs and the Substantive Representation of Women

Author

UCL - SSH/SPLE - Institut de sciences politiques Louvain-Europe, Celis, Karen, Erzeel, Silvia, New Conservatisms and New Approaches Conference, UCL - SSH/SPLE - Institut de sciences politiques Louvain-Europe, Celis, Karen, Erzeel, Silvia, and New Conservatisms and New Approaches Conference

Published
2010

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