Women’s participation in the public domain under human rights law : towards a participatory equality paradigm shift

Abstract

This chapter explores how human rights law has contributed to the shift towards participatory gender equality by legitimating the adoption of quotas and parity mechanisms to ensure women’s equal participation in decision-making. Since the adoption of CEDAW, human rights law has moved away from formal equality notions that simply affirm women’s equal political rights. Instead, we see growing endorsement of substantive equality doctrines that validate the adoption of gender quotas, initially as temporary special measures to ensure women equal opportunities, and, more recently, as permanent measures targeting the gender-balanced composition of an ever-expanding range of public and private governance bodies. The chapter explores how human rights law connects this participatory turn to issues of pluralism, calling attention to the need for public bodies to represent the full diversity of the population, and calling on state parties to increase the participation of women from ethnic minorities, indigenous groups, and religious minorities.