Why 2024 was a bad year for female politicians
11:37 Share

This BBC podcast is supported by ads outside the UK. Over the past two decades, women have been taking more and more seats at the political table. Around the world, they've been winning more places in parliament, and some have risen to the very top, becoming the elected head of state in countries from Brazil to New Zealand to Liberia. But this year, that progress ground to a halt. In 2024, nearly half the world's population had elections, and the result saw women taking a collective step back.

In 60% of countries that voted this year, the number of women in parliament fell. In India, the US, France, Portugal, Indonesia, South Africa, and 21 other countries, new parliaments now have fewer women than outgoing ones. With so many different countries, contexts, and political intricacies at play, it's hard to define why women performed poorly this year. But on today's episode, we're going to look at some of the reasons behind the decline.

I'm William Lee Adams, and you're listening to What in the World from the BBC World Service. ♪

Our population correspondent, Stephanie Hegarty, has been working on this analysis and she's here to tell us more. Stephanie, hi. Hi, thanks for having me. So before we dive into the numbers, can we first talk about what's at stake here? Why is it important that women get elected to office? So aside from basic fairness, you know, that young girls and young boys should have the same opportunity,

and opportunities in life. There's some good research and good evidence that suggests that when there's mixed diverse groups in, say, a boardroom, that better decisions are made in terms of better economic decisions for the company. And there's really good evidence from places like South Africa that when women are elected in 1994, there was quite a lot of

women elected when the country transitioned to democracy. And what followed was a lot of policies that really benefited women. And we also see that there's really good research done on peace deals. When women are involved in peace agreements, they tend to last longer. And this year, 2024, huge numbers of people were at the polls, in elections, and we saw a decline in female representation. Where were the biggest declines?

So interestingly, in Europe, we saw some pretty big declines. France went this year from having 215 women in parliament to 208. Portugal went from 84 women to 75. And we saw a big decrease in Pakistan as well. They had 70 women in the last parliament and only 53 in this one. But

We had 49 countries that had elections this year. We've only got the results of 46 of them, but 60% of those saw a drop. Some of them are steep declines like I just described, and some of them are just one or two fewer seats.

That is not the direction where things were going. That's a lack of progress. We're still globally only at 27% of seats in parliament being held by women. So there's a long way to go towards 50-50. And this is the first time in at least 20 years that we've seen progress going as stalling. And a number that everyone fears is zero. Are there any countries where women were voted out entirely? So we spoke to a member of parliament in Tuvalu

She was the only woman in Parliament until this year when she lost her seat and now there are none. Her name is Dr. Porkana Boram. I'm the voice of the women in Parliament. I'm the only voice.

When I didn't make it back, it's a loss for women not to have a voice. It's either me or any other woman, but it's that voice that we need to ensure that momentum in Parliament with the representation by women. I felt when I didn't make it back and no other women ran for elections,

When I realized that women won't be represented, it was a pain. So Dr. Borum told us that she lost her seat this year after she campaigned for a change in the constitution to have discrimination against women recognized and made illegal. And that campaign was successful, but she said it really hurt her political career. So Tuvalu is a tiny country of 11,000 people, but

It's really indicative of the situation across the Pacific Islands, which has the lowest representation of women in the world at about 9%. She explained in her country that it's very taboo for women to take a decision-making role in the traditional governance structure. When she went around the country campaigning for this change in the constitution and she spoke at these community meetings, she

When she sat in the center of the room, which is a place that's usually reserved for men and for people who make decisions in the community, that she felt that was really frowned upon. So there are some really deep cultural reasons there why women are not encouraged to take part in government. There's deep cultural reasons why they find it uncomfortable and why they're not willing to do it and not encouraged by their friends and family to do it. And the reasons will no doubt vary by country, by the context.

but are there any big picture reasons that you can identify that might explain this global decline?

Well, there's some commonly acknowledged reasons why it's difficult for women to get into politics. And one of the main ones is funding. Women find it harder to fundraise for their campaigns. And also, interestingly, the way systems are designed. So the system we have here in the UK is first, past, post, a majority system. And it's also the system in a lot of former British colonies. It actually makes it harder for women to progress rather than proportional representation where votes are shared out more equally in constituencies.

Women often need to be pushed to run for office and nudged and encouraged in a way that men don't. But none of these are recent phenomenon. They've been there for a long time. What we have noticed recently is this backlash to feminism or backlash to the economic empowerment of women. And then this huge increase in harassment.

online and offline of female politicians, which anecdotally we heard again and again is putting off young women from running. So from what you're saying, it sounds like this issue isn't just about winning elections. It's sort of getting into politics in the first place as well.

Absolutely. Yeah, there's huge barriers to women even running. And one of the most effective ways to counter those is to have quotas. And quotas have been really successful in Latin America. They come in lots of different shapes and sizes, but essentially it's reserving some seats and making sure that every party has enough female candidates or reserving seats, especially for women.

Latin America is really leading. So we see Mexico already has 50-50 representation in parliament. I spoke to some female politicians there, especially a senator who lost her seat this year. And she was explaining that even though Mexico has progressed so well, there are still some real barriers to women, even when they're in power. She was telling us that often it's just like a boys club.

I was often excluded from meetings where decisions were being made. I had to force my way in. Literally, I would show up uninvited. Here I am. And for me, when it's a group of men, it's like a boys' club. They don't include you in the meeting, they don't include you in the photo and they speak disparagingly. For example, one of them once told me I was where I was because of him. Because of me.

You mentioned that Latin America was seeing progress for women in politics, but what about Africa? Are there any bright spots there? Well, one of the first places to reach 50-50 representation in the world was Rwanda. That was some years ago. But in elections this year, various African countries did elect more women than before. In Namibia in particular, there were many women elected and they elected their first leader. In Ghana, in the elections this month, one more woman joined parliament. It's not a huge level of progress because...

The number there is still pretty low, but it's not backsliding as we're seeing in the U.S. or in many places in Europe. One trend we've seen in politics more broadly this year is a swing to the far right. I'm curious if that plays a role in women earning fewer seats.

In certain countries, it seems to have, but it's really hard to say that on a whole across the whole world because it's not a dynamic that's happening everywhere. And this is the problem we're trying to define why this might be happening because we've got so many different political dynamics in so many different countries and also countries with different

different attitudes to feminism, different levels of progress when it comes to women's empowerment, women's economic empowerment. But we have seen where countries have moved to the right in the US, in Pakistan, that those parties on the right have fewer women. And then we saw the opposite dynamic in the UK, where as the government moved to the left,

the Labour Party has many more female MPs and that has vastly increased the number of women in the British Parliament. Let's talk about solutions now. Are there any factors that can help ensure that women take part in politics in the first place? Quotas have been the most successful way of getting women into government.

So overall, countries where quotas are in place on average have 29% representation of women in government, whereas countries without quotas have 21%. Some of these quotas are formal, but there are also informal quotas. Here in the UK, the Labour Party put in place a voluntary quota system and it had a huge impact in terms of increasing the number of women MPs in the party. Are there any examples of countries that legislate to ensure greater gender parity?

Well, we had a big example of that this year in India where the legislation that has been on the books for years was finally passed. But it wasn't passed in time for Indian elections this year. So India actually voted in three fewer women in this parliament than in the previous one. You mentioned that there's this anti-feminist backlash here.

Is there a sense that women's gains in politics over the past two decades have in some way fermented this backlash? I guess, why are people suddenly anti-feminist? We spoke to a politician in South Korea and she explained that the backlash to her feminism was a result of the MeToo movement. So the MeToo movement spread to Korea in 2017 and lots of public figures, even politicians,

were accused of sexual harassment and some even stood down. She felt there was a real backlash to that. And now there's a very strong men's rights movement in Korea, which has been really vocal in the past few elections. And we've also seen there's been interesting research on a backlash to women's empowerment. So where women's employment has increased dramatically, that there is backlash among some men.

Again, with these global dynamics, it's really hard to pinpoint what might be the reason. What's the reason one country could be entirely different to another? Stephanie Hegarty, thank you so much for explaining that. Thank you. Goodbye.

As we mentioned earlier, nearly 3.6 billion people had the opportunity to cast a vote in elections this year. Ahead of those elections, polls often got things wrong. We actually did an episode explaining how election polls work and why they sometimes missed the mark. You can listen to that wherever you're listening to this episode now. Just hit subscribe and you'll get a new episode of What in the World every weekday, Monday to Friday.

That's all for today. Thanks for listening to another episode of What in the World from the BBC World Service. I'm William Lee Adams. We'll see you again tomorrow. Bye. Yoga is more than just exercise. It's the spiritual practice that millions swear by.

And in 2017, Miranda, a university tutor from London, joins a yoga school that promises profound transformation. It felt a really safe and welcoming space. After the yoga classes, I felt amazing. But soon, that calm, welcoming atmosphere leads to something far darker, a journey that leads to allegations of grooming, trafficking and exploitation across international borders. ♪

I don't have my passport, I don't have my phone, I don't have my bank cards, I have nothing. The passport being taken, the being in a house and not feeling like they can leave.

You just get sucked in so gradually.

And it's done so skillfully that you don't realize. And it's like this, the secret that's there. I wanted to believe that, you know, that whatever they were doing, even if it seemed gross to me,

was for some spiritual reason that I couldn't yet understand. Revealing the hidden secrets of a global yoga network. I feel that I have no other choice. The only thing I can do is to speak about this and to put my reputation and everything else on the line. I want truth and justice.

And for other people to not be hurt, for things to be different in the future. To bring it into the light and almost alchemise some of that evil stuff that went on and take back the power. World of Secrets, Season 6, The Bad Guru. Listen wherever you get your podcasts.