Gender Quotas and Party Strategy in Tunisia’s 2018 Municipal Elections

• In Event: Gender and Institutional Change in the Middle East and North Africa

Abstract

Following the 2011 revolution and political liberalization in Tunisia, the regime adopted progressive gender quota laws for its national elections that required electoral lists to alternate between men and women, ensuring that half of all candidates were female. These laws were amended for the 2018 municipal elections to add a rule that half of a party’s lists must also be headed by women, closing a loophole that had allowed parties to run mostly male-headed lists. On the surface, these quotas appear to have been successful in ensuring female representation, as 47 percent of newly elected municipal councilors are women. A deeper examination, however, reveals that—despite numerical parity—Tunisian parties and other political actors adopted a variety of strategies to manipulate the quota rules to their advantage while adhering to the letter of the law. Using an original survey of roughly 2000 candidates for the municipal elections, as well as data from the electoral commission, we demonstrate that party elites—who are overwhelmingly men—acted to both mitigate the perceived risks of running female-headed lists and to maintain their own power. These manipulations occurred through a variety of mechanisms, including the strategic placement of female-headed lists, list proliferation, and the selection of certain types of male and female candidates. This strategic behavior has implications for women’s empowerment, representation, and party building in Tunisia and other countries that adopt similar quotas.

Authors

• Alexandra Domike Blackman, Stanford University

• Julia Clark, University of California, San Diego

• Aytuğ Şaşmaz, Harvard University