Women’s representation in the Italian parliament and the role of parties: a contingent ‘equality’?

As a result of the 2013 elections, the rate of women in the Italian parliament reached 31.3%. This result, which has generally been welcomed as a promising step towards greater gender equality in Italian politics, is, however, largely due to the electoral success of the Partito Democratico – the only Italian party to have introduced gender quotas – which obtained 47.7% of the seats in the House of Deputies. Accordingly, the increase in the number of female MPs in the current legislature might not be due to a process towards a general recognition of the value of gender equality in politics, but, on the contrary, may be seen as a contingent result depending on the specific attitudes towards women’s representation of the different parties in the majority. Assuming that parties are the gate-keepers in access to political offices, this paper attempts to compare the behavior of the main Italian parties in the promotion of female candidates. The proportion of women in parties’ electoral lists, however, is not the only, nor the main factor in attesting parties’ attitudes to promoting or limiting women’s representation. This is due to the peculiarity of the Italian electoral system, a PR system with a majority bonus and closed electoral lists. The chance of a candidate gaining a seat in parliament is thus mainly determined by her positioning within the electoral list. This study compares the main Italian parties in terms of patterns of positioning of female candidates within electoral lists in the last three elections (2006; 2008; 2013) and tries to ascertain whether a general trend towards gender equality in politics can be detected or whether any increase in the degree of women’s representation is instead tied to the electoral success of specific parties.