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Topic Discussion III
Participation in
Democratic Decision-Making:
The Vital Voices of Women, Civil Society and
Pluralism
Room 5
(22 of 22 pages)
What we now have in the Canadian parliament, for example, our legislated on the
issue of sexual assault, which can be a very divisive issue, since it's one of those issues which women experience
very differently from men. And yet in the Canadian Parliament, men got up speaking in favor of my bill, in terms
that would have been unthinkable ten years before. And so the presence of women in significant numbers helped to
change the whole culture, whether it was in parliament or among the judiciary, so that men can be more things.
And what that boils down to, when our colleague, Mr. Shyley Kondowe talked about the reliance of government on
participation, decision making and the fear of it, one of the things that I realized when I was a member of parliament,
was that I was a white, middle class, university educated urban woman from the west of Canada, there was no way
that my experience could ever encompass the experience of all Canadian women. It couldn't encompass the experience
of all the people who lived on my block. And what governments have to come to understand is that the quality of
their legislative output will be the best when there is maximum enfranchisement, when the government caucuses have
the most diverse range of races, when you sit down with people from all parts of your country, from different genders,
from different economic experiences. That's very hard sometimes for people to accept. It's hard to give that up.
And yet in the end, it happens to work towards the legitimacy of democracy. Government leaders can sleep more comfortably
at night when they have that legitimacy and that is a cultural change that sometimes takes some time.
And finally, Sandra De Barraza made a very interesting comment about that women find it difficult to participate
in her country because they were so worried about survival. When some of the other issues have been dealt with
and not necessarily just survival, but when there is the legitimate expectation that the instruments of government
can be influenced, what I have seen in both the United States in Canada, is a number of wonderful leaders, not
just women, but women in particular that I'm thinking of, I'm thinking of the first woman Governor of Oregon, who
in fact became political, because they first of all were concerned with the issue of survival. The woman who became
the first Governor of Oregon had a son who had some disabilities and was not accepted by the mainstream school
system, and she was very adamant that her son should get the possible education. And so she lobbied and she campaigned
against the school authorities, both the local level and in her State and found in doing so, that other people
saw her as a leader and when she had won that battle they said, we'd like you to lead us in the other battles.
And so adversity and that crucible of struggle can very often be one of the most important ways that generates
leaders. And we've seen this with men, many male leaders who have emerged this way. And I think women often because
they have to struggle for the survival of their families, can be extremely passionate advocates in the political
arena.
So thank you for letting me get a personal word in edgewise. Thank you for your contributions. Clearly we could
spend a whole week talking about nothing but this issue of participation, but let's think of this as a start. You've
identified some very, very important dynamics and I hope that they will helpful to you when we put our heads together
with the other groups.
Oh, the final point I was going to make about quotas, is that this issue also relates to the issue of electoral
systems, which is the subject of another discussion we had here, because again, in my country, in the Unites States,
in Britain, we have what we call a first past the post system, which makes it much more difficult to create quotas.
The party list system makes it much easier to incorporate women or other minorities to be elected, because then
people vote for the party and they don't have this problem of saying, we're not ready to vote for women and she
gets defeated. And so it is very difficult in a country like the United States or Canada to do quotas, although
parties make particular efforts, they raise funds to support women candidates, but the social barriers are dropping,
particularly because of the success of women at local levels of government.
But it is an interesting thing to think about when we think about the design of our constitutional structures,
the design of our electoral systems. The actual impact can be enormous on the complexion of the legislative body
that results. So that's something else to think about. Anyway, thank you and let's continue on now with the discussions.
Thank you.
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