Gender Equality and the Party Base - The women's statute and the local party associations of Alliance 90/The Greens

Parties are still male-dominated. This dominance is not only reflected in the higher proportion of male membership and the disproportionate share of male public office holders and top politicians but also in everyday party life. Women often experience exclusion from critical informal networks and leadership circles and suffer from double evaluation standards and sexist stereotypes. The extent of this situation and its underlying mechanisms have already been described frequently, but existing literature primarily refers to the professional sphere of political work. Thus, the focus is mainly on the national level and, in the case of federally organised states, the state level of parties. However, the hitherto less explored membership organisation at the basic level of a party is crucial. At this lowest party level, members are socialised, and party culture is established. In addition, the membership organisation serves as a recruitment pool both for the local level and for professionalised politics at higher levels of a governmental system. The vast majority of top politicians start at the local level first. It is a 'party's base that forms its backbone. Therefore, the paper examines the degree and conditional factors of gender equality at the local level of parties. Empirically, our paper is a case study of the German Green party. The party is of particular interest because it specifically emphasises intra-party gender equality. The party explicitly aims to offer women a platform for political participation. It implemented strict internal (quota) rules in the so-called Women's Statute as early as 1986. These provisions are the most far-reaching of any party in Germany (Ahrens et al. 2020) and apply to all party levels, including the basic level of local party branches. The paper elaborates the conditions, challenges, and successes of intra-party gender equality practice at local party units. The following questions are at the centre of our research interest: How successful is intra-party gender equality at the local level? What factors influence the practice of intra-party equality and its success? Moreover, which supporting or flanking measures are suitable for making formally fixed equality structures effective in everyday party life? Sixty-five interviews form the empirical base of the paper. They were conducted in the summer and autumn of 2020 with people active in the field of gender equality at the green party and with representatives of local green party associations.