Title: Status of Women
1Status of Womens Citizenship andDemocratic
Politics in CanadaJane JensonDépartement de
science politiqueUniversité de
Montréalwww.cccg.umontreal.caInter-American
Commission of WomenSecond Hemispheric Forum
Womens Full Citizenship for Democracy18-21 July
2012Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic
2outline
- Citizenship regimes a conceptual approach
- Canadas citizenship regime a gender-based
assessment on three dimensions - Access
- Rights
- Belonging
3Citizenship regimes
- Moving beyond T. H. Marshall more than rights
- Practices of access and the quality of political
democracy - Rights their distribution the quality of
social and economic democracy - Patterns of belonging intercultural relations
4Practices of access and The quality of political
democracy
5Access to political democracy
- BUT
- Formal rights do not provide equal access to
elected office in these first-past-the-post
systems. - Canada is only 40 on the Inter-parliamentary
Unions ranking. - Still no critical mass at any level of
government. - Very few practices of quota.
- Canada had relatively early enfranchisement.
- 1982 constitutional guarantee Every citizen of
Canada has the right to vote in an election of
members of the House of Commons or of a
legislative assembly and to be qualified for
membership therein. - Women have embraced electoral democracy a
positive gender gap in voting behaviour exists
since the 1980s.
6Democratic politics the numbers
- Assessment
- women experience nearly equivalent levels of
underrepresentation at all three levels of
government - E. Tolley, Do Women Do Better in Municipal
Politics? Canadian Journal of Political Science,
44 3, 2011.
female
House of Commons, 2011 25
Provincial legislatures, 2010 25
Municipal politics 24
Federal Cabinet 26
Provincial Cabinets 30
7Why this under-representation?
- Less a problem of leaders
- Cabinets generally over-represent the
percentage of women in the legislative caucus. - Than the result of institutional practices of
nomination and the turnover patterns - success rates of men significantly higher than
women, as the party draws closer to power OR
slides into trouble (with the exception of the
New Democratic Party).
- The main cause the very decentralised
institutional arrangements for nominations. This
is a clear limit set by the electoral system. - Coupled with the declining interest of the
womens movement in electoral politics.
8But what about all those party leaders and prime
ministers?
- 3 provincial Premiers 1 Territorial leader 4
Leaders of the Opposition. - BUT, nonetheless
- The phenomenon of the sacrificial lamb or
lost-cause candidate has been displaced towards
the leadership of parties. As leaders, women
are often set up to fail. - The closer to power, the smaller the likelihood
the party will call on a woman to lead.
9Rights their distribution the quality of
social AND economic democracy
10Significant guarantees of civil rights and
anti-discrimination exist
- Section 15 of the Canadian Constitution
- (1) Every individual is equal before and under
the law and has the right to the equal protection
and equal benefit of the law without
discrimination and, in particular, without
discrimination based on race, national or ethnic
origin, colour, religion, sex, age or mental or
physical disability. - (2) Subsection (1) does not preclude any law,
program or activity that has as its object the
amelioration of conditions of disadvantaged
individuals or groups including those that are
disadvantaged because of race, national or ethnic
origin, colour, religion, sex, age or mental or
physical disability.
11But in reality, limited capacity to enjoy these
rights
- Example of a significant democratic deficit
- control over reproduction a civil right but
little real access - 1988 Supreme Court decision struck down law
setting conditions on therapeutic abortions. - In the name of security of the person.
- But standoff between federal government (funder)
and the provincial governments which refuse to
guarantee this medically necessary service. - Result is only 1 in 6 hospitals provide services
and many regions have no service at all. - And this despite public opinion
A 2011 poll
52 say I support the right of women to make choices about their own body
18 personally opposed to abortion BUT recognize the right of individuals to make their own choices.
Only 8 want abortion to be illegal.
12Despite a right to non-discrimination
- Due to both retirement incomes and earnings.
- A 21 gender-based income gap.
- The Conference Board of Canada The principle of
equality of opportunity is one of the basic
tenets of human development. research shows
that, despite decades of anti-discrimination
legislation and equal rights provisions there
is still a significant income gap between men and
women.
13Approach to social care is a major gap in the
Canadian citizenship regime
- Child care
- The labour force participation rate of mothers
with children under 6 had more than doubled since
1976. - 2 of every 3 mothers with children under age 3
are employed. - 70 of those with children aged 3 to 5 are
employed. - In international comparisons, Canada has fallen
farther and farther behind most other affluent
countries, ranking according to UNICEFs 10
benchmarks at the very bottom. - Childcare Resource and Research Unit.
- 2009. Early Childhood Education and
- Care in Canada 2008. Toronto.
- Quebec is an exception
- For women, limited access to ECEC means
- Part-time work
- Informal care, and worries about quality
- High-cost care, and inability to pay.
Globe Mail 4 July 2012
Today's modern parent Daycare poor, with little to save
14Social care for the vulnerable elderly is a
gendered story
- The good story rising life expectancy and
closing gap between women and men (as men catch
up). - But all these years are not problem-free.
Women Men
Life-expectancy 82.0 76.9
Years of good health 70.8 68.3
15Canadian public policy for social care
- Relies heavily on informal care provided by
family and friends to meet the needs of seniors
living with health vulnerabilities, often spouse
or other family members. - The policy focus is on providing incentives for
those caring informally more than to increase
formal services, whether in the public or
voluntary sector.
- Threats to womens well-being carers as well as
those needing care are multiple. - Women are taking on new and extra work, even when
they are elderly themselves, providing nursing
and other care to their elderly spouse. - Daughters and daughters-in-law are often juggling
paid work and elder care, sometimes with child
care responsibilities as well. - Absence of respite services as well as inadequate
supplies of home care and services is taking a
toll on many womens health and well-being as
well as their current earnings and future income.
16The belonging dimension of the Canadian
citizenship regime. Intercultural relations
17Aboriginal women. Doubly disadvantaged
- Indian Act, which grants status, incarnated
patriarchy. - Long-standing discrimination on the basis of
- gender loss of status due to out marriage
- (women) and a break in the patrilineal
- succession (their children).
- Aboriginal women marrying out became white.
- Provision finally overturned by court decision in
1985, after intervention of the United Nations
Human Rights Committee finding Canada in
violation of the International Covenant on
Political and Civil Rights. - After 1985, /- 100,000 reclaimed community
rights. - Nonetheless, could not fully overturn the
patriarchy encouraged - by the Indian Act and its century of effects.
18- Marginalisation continues in Aboriginal
communities poverty, inadequate housing,
tainted water, ill-health, suicide, etc. - In particular, there is an on-going crisis of the
missing women and violence in general - Self-reported violent victimisation among
Aboriginal women was almost three times higher
than the rate of violence reported by
non-Aboriginal women.
- March 2012 Native Womens Association of Canada
(NWAC) and the Canadian Feminist Alliance for
International Action (FAFIA) at the
Inter-American Commission on Human Rights,
calling for a national inquiry into the
disappearances and murders of Aboriginal women
and girls in Canada by the Government of Canada.
19Reasonable accommodation an on-going debate
among women
- Concerns about how to recognise cultural
difference in societies committed
simultaneously to gender equality and
multicultural values. - Courts have established principle of reasonable
accommodation. - But issues remain, for feminists and the broader
society - 2003 religious arbitration in Ontario
- 2007-08 Bouchard-Taylor Commission
- in Quebec