• ssjmarx [he/him]
    ·
    edit-2
    3 years ago

    The web page doesn't let you copy paste, so here's some relevant text from where they talk about the gap in political representation:

    The case of Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union is particularly interesting, considering the sharp decline in female members of parliament after the collapse of the Union and the subsequent widening gender gap. Former Soviet countries, which were once near the top in the world rankings of female representation, have now fallen far behind Western Europe, and even behind many developing countries. This marked decline is due to the removal of the quota system implemented by the Communists, after the Union had collapsed (Saxonberg, 2000). Other regions of the world have shown considerable progress on this measure from the 1950s onwards, except for the MENA. The quota system seems to be an important determinant of the position of women in parliament. This is exemplified in Rwanda, which achieved the highest percentages of women in parliament after the introduction of a quota system in 2002. With 44% of its parliamentarians being women, Rwanda outperformed even Sweden, one of the few countries that has made continuous progress towards closing the gender gap in parliament (without a quota system).