UA : Об’єктом дослідження є ґендерна рівність в сучасній політиці Європи.
Предметом дослідження є особливості ґендерної рівності в політичному істеблішменті Європи.
Мета роботи полягає в аналізі та оцінці ґендерної рівності в політичному істеблішменті країн Європи та керівництві Європейського Союзу.
Наукова новизна одержаних результатів виникає на підставі ретельного аналізу статистики. Розраховано ґендерний індекс аналізованих країн у представлені паритету між чоловіками та жінками в політичних інституціях. Удосконалені та систематизовані данні щодо ґендерної рівності у 2022 році в країнах Європи. Узагальнено проблеми ґендерної нерівності в істеблішменті країн Європи, які зустрічаються на шляху до політичної кар’єри жінки. Розроблені рекомендації для покращення рівного представництва жінок та чоловіків в урядах країн.
Отже, зростання ролі жінок максимально пришвидшилось у ХХ ст., саме у цей період було прийнято низку документів, які допомагали закріпити ґендерну рівність на законодавчому рівні.
Проаналізувавши сучасні дані, прийшла до висновку, що з роками представництво жінок збільшується. Найвищі показники у таких країн, як Ісландія, Швеція, Швейцарія, Фінляндія, Бельгія, Австрія, Данія, Іспанія, Португалія – вище 40 %. Великобританія та Німеччина мають представництво жінок більше 30%. А в таких країнах, як Мальта, Угорщина та Кіпр представництво жінок менше 10 %. В цьому можна знайти цікаву закономірність, всі країни, в яких прослідковується активна участь жінок в істеблішменті країни мають високий рівень економіки та якість життя.
Керівництво ЄС намагається також не відставати у представлені жінок на політичних засадах. Наразі жінки в парламенті становлять 39,3%, а в Європейській комісії повна паритетність – жінки займають 13 місць, а чоловіки 14 місць.
Узагальнивши проблеми політичної участі жінок, можна виділити найголовніші: стереотипне ставлення, що жінки м’які та слабкі, нечесне просування по службі, завищені вимоги, нездатність до конкуренції, брак часу, прискіпливе ставлення, домашні обов’язки тощо.
Після аналізу країн, було розроблено рекомендації для покращення рівного представництва жінок та чоловіків в урядах країн. Наприклад, розвивати меритократичний порядок набору персоналу; ЗМІ повинні надавати рівнозначність жінкам і чоловікам-кандидатам, відмовившись від створення стереотипного зображення жінок і чоловіків; працювати з експертами з ґендерної політики та жінками правозахисних організацій; збирати та поширювати передовий досвід; переглянути нормативно-правові документи та вдосконалити їх згідно сучасних проблем; покращити імідж жінок; запроваджувати покарання за невідповідальність тощо.
EN : The relevance of the research. Currently, the issue of the relationship between the rights and real gender equality in the political establishment is attracting increased attention of the world community, being one of priority topics for the majority of developed states and political institutions. It can be stated that not only have women become an object of politics, important element of the electorate and addressee of target state programs, but they are also active and influential participants in the political process and state administration.
Unfortunately, the problem of stereotypes and false claims about the inability of women to successfully perform political duties is quite common in most European countries. This vision is not always justified and expedient, though. After all, there are many historical examples that prove the opposite.
Every year, women in the democratic countries of Europe are getting more and more involved in making socially important decisions, and currently almost every country in Europe has successful examples of female establishment. Each of these women went along a difficult path, showing their strong will and determination. Nevertheless, there are those who, under the pressure of male beliefs, abandoned their leadership abilities and political ambitions.
At present, the countries of Europe, the European Union and other political institutions are developing various instruments to ensure equal representation of both genders on the political arena with the help of social programs and political quotas. This is due to the fact that unequal representation of women and men in making state-political decisions can threaten the legitimacy of democracy, development, and fundamental human rights.
Therefore, this issue is currently of particular relevance and requires detailed research.
The research object of our master’s thesis is gender equality in modern European politics.
The research subject is the peculiarities of gender equality in the political establishment of Europe.
The aim of the research is to analyze and assess gender equality in the political establishment of European countries and leadership of the European Union.
For achieving the above set aim we are to investigate the following specific research objectives:
- to find and analyze the sources and literature on gender equality in European politics;
- to explore gender equality in the political establishment of the European countries, namely Iceland, Finland, Sweden, Switzerland, Germany, Great Britain and Spain;
- to investigate gender equality in the leadership of the European Union;
- to identify the problem of gender equality in Europe;
- to develop recommendations for ensuring gender equality.
The chronological frames of the paper cover the modern political world, starting from the 2000s; however, the research of some currently valid documents also touches upon the 20th century.
The geographical boundaries of the research cover the territory of Europe, namely the following countries: Iceland, Finland, Sweden, Switzerland, Germany, the United Kingdom and Spain.
Scientific novelty of the obtained results. Based on a thorough analysis of the statistics, the gender index of the countries under research was calculated in terms of equality between men and women in political institutions. The results show that in the countries with strong economies and high standards of living, more women are involved in making public and political decisions. It has been established that the countries that put the issue of gender equality on the agenda are closer to a quantitative parity in the state establishment due to various social programs and electoral quotas for women. It has been found that women most often play a leading role in such parties as the Greens, the Left, and the Social Democratic Party, and most often hold "softer" positions in the fields of medicine, education, environmental protection, etc. The 2022 data on gender equality in the European countries have also been improved and systematized.
The thesis summarizes the problems of gender inequality in the establishments of European countries, which women are faced with in their political careers, for instance, stereotypical attitudes that women are soft and weak, unfair promotion, excessive demands, inability to compete, lack of time, meticulous attitude, household duties, etc.
Some recommendations have been developed to improve the equal representation of women and men in national governments, e. g., to develop a meritocratic recruitment procedure; provide equality to women and male candidates in the media by rejecting stereotypical images of women and men; cooperate with gender policy experts and women from human rights organizations; collect and disseminate best practices; review regulatory documents and improve them in accordance with the current problems; improve the image of women; introduce penalties for non-compliance; develop interest at the highest level; finance parties that have member parity; establish independent gender equality institutions on a political basis; strengthen international cooperation on the issue; establish clear institutional roles and responsibilities, etc.
The theoretical significance of the conducted research is that the existing data on gender equality in the field of public administration in the European countries and the leadership of the European Union are systematized. The main documents, which laid the foundation for the existing picture of women’s representation in the political arena, are highlighted. The gender equality index is analyzed. The peculiarities of the equality policy implementation in different countries and at the level of the European Union are considered. The problems of gender inequality in the modern world are revealed. Various views of politicians and gender research experts regarding the current state of gender equality are considered. Based on the theoretical grounds, own practices can be developed to overcome the obstacles to involving women in politics.
The applied significance of the research lies in the fact that the paper was written for scientific and educational purposes. The research materials can be used in writing qualification papers and master’s theses, training manuals and textbooks as well as in teaching general and special courses such as "Modern International Relations", "Gender Equality in Political Principles", etc. Also, the materials of the paper provide for conducting further research in the field of gender equality in the establishment of the European countries and the European Union. The developed recommendations can be used by political institutions to overcome obstacles to equal participation of women and men in politics.
Conclusions. The problem of equality has attracted the attention of scholars of various views and scientific interests for many centuries. The analysis of scientific books and papers allows us to state that there is a lack of researches on the issue conducted by Ukrainian scientists that correspond to today’s realities. Most of the literature was written 5-10 years ago; therefore, to study gender equality, we mostly focused on modern foreign sources.
Having analyzed the source base, we can say that there are various data for researching the problem of gender equality in the European establishment, namely: regulatory and legal documents, reports of individual organizations, statistical data, and modern mass media works, which ensured understanding of the current state of gender equality.
It is important to note that the growth of women’s role accelerated tremendously in the 20th century. It was during this period that a number of documents were adopted that assisted in formalizing gender equality at the legislative level. In the modern world, the situation has improved significantly: women have the right to work in various fields, be equal in pay with men, but the share of women in managerial positions, state bodies or in the political sphere is quite insignificant.
Having examined the main documents representing the basis for gender equality in the European countries, namely the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the Convention on the Protection of Human Rights, the Convention on the Political Rights of Women, the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women, etc., we can conclude that women's rights were attended to and some efforts were made to provide women with the same importance in political life as men.
After the analysis of the current statistical data, we can state that Iceland, Sweden, Switzerland, Finland, Belgium, Austria, Denmark, Spain, and Portugal have the highest representation indicators – above 40%. Female representation in Great Britain and Germany accounts for more than 30%. However, in Malta, Hungary and Cyprus, the representation of women is roughly 10%.
It is determined that all the countries with active participation of women in the establishment have a high level of economy and quality of life. After all, how can a country be highly developed and economically stable if the majority of state decisions are made by men, and the interests of the other half of the population are almost not considered? Therefore, women's political participation should be supported at all levels as it has many positive consequences.
It is also established that global organizations calculate the global gender gap index to measure gender equality. According to the 2021 results, Iceland is the leader, Finland is in second place, and Norway is third. In my paper, we considered the following countries: Iceland, Finland, Sweden, Switzerland, Great Britain, Germany and Spain.
As far as Iceland is concerned, we can say that today, in the country's parliament, women hold the majority and have 33 seats out of 63. In addition, the prime minister position has been held by a woman since 2017. Moreover, at least 80% of the country's female population is employed.
In Finland, the representation of women in the parliament has increased from 75 women to 94 (47%) women out of 200 deputies within 19 years. In the country's government, 12 of the 19 ministers are also women.
As for Sweden, the representation of women in the parliament has increased from 45% to 46%. Also, 12 ministers out of 22 are women. The percentage of women in the parliament has not increased much over 22 years, since Sweden has been actively introducing feminist policies since 2000.
Analyzing Switzerland, which is the last on the list of top 10 countries with a high gender level in politics, we can conclude that the representation of women in the parliament has increased from 26% to 42% within 19 years. Also, women run three of the seven federal councils.
In Germany, the percentage of women in the parliament has increased from 32 to 34. Only men have been in the position of President, whereas there have been two men and one woman in the position of Chancellor.
In Great Britain, the representation of women in the parliament has increased from 17% to 66%. As for the ministers, 23 full members of the Cabinet and 8 more ministers are present at the Cabinet meetings. Out of the 23 members of the Cabinet, 8 members are women; so are 2 Cabinet ministers. As for Northern Ireland, the proportion of women in the Assembly has increased from 13% to 30% of the members. In Scotland, women make up 45% of the parliament, whereas in Wales, they account for 40%.
In Spain, the women’s representation in the parliament has increased from 99 seats to 154 seats out of the total 350 seats within 20 years. Also, female ministers have 14 seats out of 23, which makes women’s representation in the Council of Ministers equal to 60.9%.
As for the EU leadership of the European Union, the share of women in the European Parliament has increased from 27% to 39%. The percentage is increasing every year, and this indicator is also higher than the world average for all countries, but there have never been more women than men. As for the European Commission, the number of women has increased from 5 seats to 13 seats out of 27.
In our paper, we summarized the main problems of women’s representation in political positions, namely a lack of time, stereotypes, excessive demands, picky attitude towards women, unfair promotion, non-compliance, etc. However, the greatest problem, which is the source of other problems, is stereotypical thinking. Women are often perceived to be weaker than men.
Although many international documents were conditioned by the fact that for a long time women had been in an unequal position compared to men, they are not enough.
Due to this, we developed some recommendations to improve the situation. First, there is a need to ensure leadership and responsible engagement at the highest political level with regard to effective ensuring gender equality, enhance accountability and monitoring mechanisms for gender equality initiatives and broad adoption of gender approaches, strengthen the fact base and systematically measure progress in ensuring gender equality based on indicators of gender action and measurable outcomes. At the highest level, it is necessary to develop interest in gender equality promotion by developing a comprehensive system, such as mandatory rotation on party lists, and finance such an initiative. We should also look for the root causes of barriers, for instance, through employee surveys, take measures to improve the status of women politicians in the eyes of citizens, for example, through the mass media or awareness-raising campaigns, develop a meritocratic recruitment procedure, strengthen the international exchange of experience on gender equality, cooperate with international relations experts and women's rights organizations, etc.
Thus, currently European women are being actively involved in politics. They are getting positions of presidents, prime ministers, mayors of large cities, leaders of political parties, speakers in parliament, etc. The fact that states started to implement the ideas of equality and ensure rights of women in various spheres has resulted in more equal participation of men and women in the political process and created a material base for improving the socio-economic status of women, which greatly facilitated the integration of women into public life. Gender equality in the political arena is necessary to create a democratic system of governance, a better standard of living, quality medicine and education, and preserve our nature. Ukraine is only trying to join European values and freedoms, therefore the experience of European states will serve as an example and motivation for Ukraine to develop gender equality in the political establishment of our country.
