Women and Legislative Representation in Nigeria’s National Assembly: A Detailed Appraisal of the 8th Assembly (2015-2019)

This study focuses on women legislative representation in Nigeria since the commencement of the Fourth Republic (1999 to 2020). It investigates the low levels of representation of women in the National Assembly and factors that explain this. Results from the study show that the majority of female respondents indicate active interest in politics but are discouraged by factors that include prevailing gender stereotypes, cultural/religious reasons, unfavourable political environment, lack of financial capacity, electoral violence and restrictive party structures and processes amongst others. The bulk of male respondents confirm these structural biases and barriers to women’s political participation. In view of these findings, some recommendations offered include implementation of deliberate policies and legislations that target women quotas and affirmative action, elimination of structural barriers to women's participation, reducing the cost of political participation for women, reforming the electoral process, and sustained and systematic gender education.

Gendered Conflict, Gendered Outcomes: The Politicization of Sexual Violence and Quota Adoption

Sexual violence (SV) in conflict is increasingly politicized at both the international and domestic levels. Where SV in conflict is prevalent, we argue international actors perceive gender to be salient and push for a gendered response. Simultaneously, women mobilize politically in response to the threat to their security that conflict-related SV constitutes, making demands for greater representation in politics with the goal of improving societal conditions for themselves. Jointly, we theorize the pressures from above and below push governments in conflict-affected states toward adopting gender policies. We test this theoretical framework in the case of gender quota adoption. We find that states with prevalent wartime SV indeed adopt gender quotas sooner and at higher rates than states experiencing other civil conflicts and than states experiencing no conflict in the same period. These gender quotas, we further show, are not mere window dressing but actually increase women’s legislative representation.

Democratic Contradictions in European Settler Colonies

How did political institutions emerge and evolve under colonial rule? This article studies a key colonial actor and establishes core democratic contradictions in European settler colonies. Although European settlers’ strong organizational position enabled them to demand representative political institutions, the first hypothesis qualifies their impulse for electoral representation by positing the importance of a metropole with a representative tradition. Analyzing new data on colonial legislatures in 144 colonies between the seventeenth and twentieth centuries shows that only British settler colonies—emanating from a metropole with representative institutions—systematically exhibited early elected legislative representation. The second hypothesis highlights a core democratic contradiction in colonies that established early representative institutions. Applying class-based democratization theories predicts perverse institutional evolution—resisted enfranchisement and contestation backsliding—because sizable European settler minorities usually composed an entrenched landed class. Evidence on voting restrictions and on legislature disbandment from Africa, the British Caribbean, and the US South supports these implications and rejects the Dahlian path from competitive oligarchy to full democracy.

The Representation of Micro-diverse Koreans

South Korea has changed from a culturally homogeneous to a heterogeneous country through international marriages and “multicultural families.” This produces a unique kind of diversity in the experiences of families and individual persons, which may require political representation. This phenomenon of multiplicitous identity can be called “micro-diversity.” Although Korea has multicultural policies in response, its difference blind legislative representation is problematised in the process. Existing research into “descriptive representation” has explained why existing groups should be represented by members for reasons of significant historical disadvantages. These theories remain inapplicable or opposed to representing micro-diversity in Korea, where group attachment amongst micro-diverse persons is currently unclear. The paper shows, however, that potential groups are always part of representative relationships and that these are never equivalent to current constituencies. Hence, compelling norms of descriptive representation for potential groups may be articulated, which justify descriptive representation for micro-diverse Koreans.