Electoral Gender Quotas and Democratic Legitimacy

Countries and parties across the globe now apply gender quotas when selecting candidates for legislative office. Quota critics argue that these policies degrade democratic legitimacy. We examine whether quotas diminish democratic legitimacy, and whether this effect is moderated by the strength of quota policies. Using survey experiments, we compare the legitimacy-conferring effects of both quota-elected and non-quota-elected women relative to all-male groups to a sample of over 12,000 citizens in eleven democracies. Relative to all-male political bodies, women confer legitimacy to political decisions and decision-making processes even when they are elected through quotas. Though we observe a quota penalty, wherein citizens prefer gender equality achieved without a quota, this penalty is often small (and sometimes non-significant), especially in countries that have been exposed to quota policies. When debating quotas, we should thus consider the relevant counterfactual: while citizens most prefer women’s presence without the use of quotas, they strongly prefer the inclusion of women via quotas to male dominated institutions.