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Resilience Hypnosis audio from Sukhis workshop

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Reducing Stress & Anxiety Hypnosis audio. Enjoy !

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'The Danger of a Single Story' Ted Talk by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie. This video talks about the effects and consequences of stereotypes.

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Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie: The danger of a single story | TED

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Development Programme Presentation for 2024 VP

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Síolta Chroí - Regenerating People and Wider Nature

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Síolta Chroí is a center for regenerative eco-awareness and education and offers a range of potentially transformational courses and experiences.

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Collective 2: 'Hope in a Changing Climate' with Síolta Chroí

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Collective 2: 'Hope in a Changing Climate' with Síolta Chroí

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'Hope in a changing climate', the documentary by John D. Liu will be a point of discussion in the 2nd Collective, which will be led by Gareth from Síolta Chroí. Please watch this in advance of the workshop

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Hope in a Changing Climate - by John D. Liu (2009)

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Marginalization

In free, democratic societies, we have a lot to be happy about. We may have good schools and hospitals, a vibrant economy built on good infrastructure, and the freedom to choose who represents us. But even in such a society, not all members have the same access to the opportunities, services and benefits. This inequality is also called marginalization, and it exists even in the strongest, wealthiest countries in the world.

Marginalization definition: what does it mean?

Marginalization, also called social marginalization, occurs when a person or groups of people are less able to do things or access basic services or opportunities. It's also sometimes referred to as social exclusion.

Are you able to send your kids to good schools, and are they free or affordable? If you become ill, is it easy for you to see a doctor and get treatment? Do you have the same chances as everyone else to get a job and build a career? Schools, access to healthcare, employment-these are all areas where people may not have equal opportunities, and this causes marginalization. But marginalization can also come from everyday inequalities, like whether you live in an area with good, safe roads or access to public transit, or if buildings are equipped for a disability you might have.

What is the cause of marginalization?

All societies are built by those in power. In a democracy, the people get to pick who gets the power to shape our societies, but it is still the case that important policies and decisions will be effected by a select few. And the further one is from these people, the greater chance there is that their needs will be ignored. Think about minority groups. Even in democracies, they often struggle to gain equal access to schools, jobs, or even housing opportunities that would allow them to live in new communities.

What types of marginalization exist in a modern society?

Marginalization exists in multiple forms, and against many groups of people. But there are three main types of marginalization: social marginalization, economic marginalization and political marginalization.

People who are socially marginalized don't have the same social opportunities as others. They can't go to the same clubs, reasonably access the same shops or services, and they often even live in segregated, socially excluded communities. This commonly affects ethnic minority groups, and it is often a lifelong marginalization that affects generations of the same family.

Economic marginalization means that people do not have the same chances as others to contribute to and benefit from the economy. They don't have the chance to get a good job, or couldn't attend a trade school to equip them with the skills to enter a certain sector. They may struggle to make enough money to live a decent life, or to access critical healthcare if they fall ill.

Political marginalization means that some groups of people are not able to participate democratically in the decision-making process. If you do not have a seat at the table, it is very hard to get your voice heard. And when we already struggle to do that, it means politicians have a very easy time continuing to ignore your needs and focus all their attention on the needs of the majority.

These forms of marginalization are broad, and they are very often interlinked. If someone is socially marginalized, it is very likely that they are also economically and politically marginalized. And it can be very hard to break out of this on your own. The barriers that we've set up in life, for example certain education qualifications for employment, make it very difficult to overcome marginalization in one area and avoid it in another.

Marginalization examples from life

Marginalization affects myriad groups of people, but there are degrees of marginalization. Some groups, like senior citizens, may face similar causes for marginalization in many countries, while a certain minority ethnic group may face increased stigmatization and marginalization in one country or region but not, or far less so, in other countries.

That said, there are several groups in today's western democracies that continue to face marginalization, or the threat of it, to degrees beyond the majority population. LGBTQI people are still fighting for the same rights as straight people in many European countries. In Poland, they are still targeted by hate groups and the media and ignored, if not openly antagonized, by the government.

Senior citizens are at high risk of marginalization because their decreasing mobility, and increasing need of care, make it more difficult to participate in society and make their opinions heard. Many live in a segregated home with other elderly citizens, a member of this small community but almost entirely removed from broader society.

Ethnic minorities are also at high risk of marginalization. The recent Black Lives Matter protests in the United States and elsewhere happened because black people are still marginalized in so many countries, and the governments simply are not fixing a broken system. In Europe, the Roma face extreme marginalization, forced to live in separate communities without basic utilities, or forced to attend certain schools.

Persons with disabilities are often marginalized. Physically, it may simply be more difficult to get out and do things-go to a workplace, a gym, the theatre. Or they might need expensive care that their government doesn't provide for. And while buildings are increasingly equipped-often by force of law-to handle common disabilities, it is probably quite difficult for you to think of even three disabled politicians running your country. In other words, they are underrepresented in government, as is true with other groups mentioned. And this puts them more at risk of being marginalized.

One group that's making strides to increase its representation in government is women. Although women are still a minority in houses of parliament across Europe, their share of seats is increasing and many countries have been or are led by women. But women are still marginalized. Generally, they're expected to oversee domestic duties and child-rearing. This makes it more difficult to develop careers and become financially independent. Things like unequal parental leave and expensive child daycare make it more difficult for women to avoid being marginalized.

How does marginalization affect society?

Marginalization affects society by making it a less equal, stable, and enjoyable place to live in. By effectively excluding some people from society, we are all deprived of the work, talent, thoughts and culture that they could share with the rest of us. That makes all of us worse off.

And marginalization probably drives crime. This is not just from marginalized people who might fall into petty crime to make ends meet. It's also the often more violent crime against those who are already marginalized, for reasons that are absurd. It is increasingly common in countries where populist authoritarian governments use marginalized groups as scapegoats for the problems of the majority. Authoritarian politicians and their allies in the media do their best to make white Americans feel that their jobs are threatened by people who migrate from Central America; politicians in Hungary and Poland spread hatred against people who migrate and LGBTQI persons who they portray as a threat to the culture and tradition of white Christians. These myths are perpetuated by some politicians and parts of the media to the point that it drives some people to violence. But at the very least, it entrenches stigmas and stereotypes and makes it even more difficult for someone from these groups to participate in society.

How do we address marginalization?

Marginalization must be addressed by changing the systems and practices that perpetuate it. This means that the government must do more to see that the benefits of society can be enjoyed by everyone. Are resources, like water, electricity and fuel, distributed in a fair manner across the entire country? Do all communities in need of infrastructure investment have the same chance of getting it? Is the state making good education and quality healthcare equally available to all communities?

Do you want to learn more about marginalization?

We also need to have a hard look at how free and fair elections are in our country. Even in democracies, there are certain mechanisms, attitudes, or even regulations that make it more difficult than it should be for minority groups to have their say in politics. So we need to work to ensure that our system of choosing our representatives produces a government that is truly representative of the people.

But change also needs to come from each of us as individuals. We need to change attitudes so that we create more support for things like feminism and civil rights. This means we need to teach these things to our children, and not hide dark chapters of our history like colonialism or slavery. The better people understand what happens when people lose their rights, the more likely they are to support systems and practices that prevent that from happening.

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What is marginalization? What to do if you are marginalized?

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What does marginalization mean? How does it appear in modern societies? How does it affect people? How can we deal with it?

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Critical Analysis of Overseas Volunteering 

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Critical Analysis of Overseas Volunteering 

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Have you ever volunteered abroad?

From students and young professionals to retirees, nowadays everyone seems to be trying to make a difference in communities around the world.

But what are these efforts really achieving? Do they help - and if so, who benefits?And if they cause harm, what can we do to make things better?

All important questions, as volunteering abroad is characterized as one of the biggest growth areas in the booming youth travel industry, which is valued at an estimated $173 billion.

The industry is also coming under increasing fire, owing to questions about the sustainabilityof volunteer efforts, reports of inappropriate care and service, and unintended impacts to economic and social systems in the communities that host them.

That's all balanced against a clear upside for volunteers beyond their altruism: training in hard and soft skills, exposure to experiences not seen at home and - of course - an opportunity to travel.

I saw this dynamic play out during my time as a junior resident and volunteer in the early 2000s, working with a group of health professionals and studentson an annual excursion to provide care to Haitian economic migrants in the eastern Dominican Republic. A friend of mine who had previously volunteered in the country had been asked by a local hospital to organize the group so they could set up mobile clinics, using secondhand school buses to visit village schoolrooms and churches.

What I saw left me unsettled, leading to a decade of research and advocacy to encourage greater responsibility in volunteering abroad.

Some incidents that occurred during my volunteer stint were relatively mild. We knew, for example, that patients would feign symptoms to obtain free pain killers and multivitamins, which we ended up giving them anyway. I now recognize what a bad practice that was. Patients were being dishonest to take advantage of the volunteer enterprise, and the medications given were not without risks: In excess, acetaminophen can cause liver damage.

Another time, in the absence of clear instructions, villagers used a medicated shampoo as an ingredient in broth instead, rendering the shampoo ineffective and the broth inedible.

Other incidents were more concerning. I remember seeing some of the volunteer physicians on the team occasionally prescribing less-than-optimal antibiotics to some patients that would not be used for the same condition at home. The justification they provided wasthat "some antibiotic was better than none."

Most disconcerting was the group of U.S. surgeons who visited the community to provide tubal ligations as a family planning measure. The women they saw were already members of a marginalized community and were now being treated by doctors who did not speak their language but held a certain intangible authority over them - and who, we later learned, may not have fully explained the permanent nature of the procedure to the patients during the consent process.

My experience with skilled professionals who chose to volunteer reinforces some of the broad criticisms leveled against such efforts over two decades, in certain sectors.

In addition, many other concerns arise about volunteers who lack skills or training and act beyond their capacity. Pippa Biddle's sentinel piece in 2014, which first raised many of these criticisms, highlighted that she had no real skills that could be helpful during her own volunteer experience:

"Sadly, taking part in international aid where you aren't particularly helpful is not benign. It's detrimental. It slows down positive growth and perpetuates the 'white savior' complex that, for hundreds of years, has haunted both the countries we are trying to 'save' and our ... own psyches."

Since then, other critiques of international volunteers - skilled and otherwise - have appeared across media outlets. A sampler over the years: 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017 and even a 2018 op-ed that bills itself as a "response to critiques of critiques."

These critiques certainly aim to change hearts and minds through education and awareness. But have they succeeded in turning the tide?

I take a different view. Working in public health, I've seen firsthand that telling people not to do something usually fails miserably. Risky behaviors such as binge drinking, smoking or casual unprotected sex often continue despite well-crafted, well-intentioned messages.

Road safety efforts in the early 1970s show what can be done in moving away from education alone. At the time, there were approximately 50,000 road fatalities each year in the United States.

Safety advocates had two crucial realizations: first, that cars were probably here to stay, and second, that simply telling people to "drive safely" would not, in and of itself, achieve that behavior.

The focus thus turned to shaping conditions to improve road safety, with notable success. This included better engineering of vehicles (e.g., seat belts, air bags) and roads (e.g., reduced speed limits, improved lighting and tall-wall barriers); stricter laws and enforcement (e.g., lower blood alcohol limits) and the provision of alternatives (e.g., improved transit and cycling infrastructure).

When it comes to volunteering, there are parallels. Contemporary criticisms simply saying "don't go, it's bad" have had limited success in ending such endeavors. A paradigm shift is needed. If we accept that, like cars, volunteering is probably here to stay, I would propose that two questions should be asked of any proposed volunteer endeavor:

1. What is the problem to be solved, and does volunteering actually help?

2. If it does help, how can volunteers actresponsibly and effectively?

A paper that I helped publish proposes a comprehensive approach to moving beyond simple awareness and criticism. Programs at a minimum should ensure their work conforms to the direction of local partners and that volunteers are selected through a stringent, skills-based application process and prepared through extensive pre-departure training once accepted.

There would need to be monitoring, evaluation and accreditation of volunteer programs by an authoritative body that could highlight outstanding efforts and name and shame those that fall short of the bar.

We should also address the motivations for volunteering. Having a volunteer experience on a resume shouldn't be an automatic bonus when applying to a professional school but rather something to explore, starting with the question: What exactly did you do?

The ultimate goal should be to ensure that these well-intended volunteer efforts responsibly achieve positive, objective change while making it impossible at best, or uncool and unpalatable at least, for any volunteer (regardless of skill level) to haphazardly conduct tubal ligations or hand out random antibiotics.
Dr. Lawrence C. Loh is adjunct professor at the Dalla Lana School of Public Health at the University of Toronto. He previously served as director of advocacy and partnerships with The 53rd Week, a nonprofit based in Brooklyn, N.Y., that focuses on improving short-term volunteering.

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OPINION: Volunteering Abroad Is Popular And Problematic. Let's Fix It

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Have you ever volunteered abroad? From students and young professionals to retirees, nowadays everyone seems to be trying to make a difference in communities around the world. But what are these efforts really achieving? Do they help - and if so, who benefits?And if they cause harm, what can we do to make things better?

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A read for those of you who may be studying Engineering, or for anyone else who might be interested!

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How do we remove the legacies of colonialism from engineering? Engineer Adedotun Adekeye explores this question in a new two-part series

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How to Outsmart Your Own Unconscious Bias 

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How to Outsmart Your Own Unconscious Bias 

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How to Outsmart Your Own Unconscious Bias | Valerie Alexander | TEDxPasadena

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A Vision for Community Wellbeing in Cork City

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A Vision for Community Wellbeing in Cork City

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The 2024 Olympics have only recently concluded and lingering thoughts of athleticism linger in our minds. ".....The “it” I am referring to is the social construct that depicts black athletes as physical specimens with natural ability and white athletes as witty and hardworking. The success of black athletes is often undermined by the notion that much of their ability comes naturally to them...."This article discusses the harmful narratives that exist within sporting commentary and beliefs.

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September Collective: Tues 10/9/2024 from 7pm-7:45pm.

ZOOM LINK - Please Register in advance: https://us02web.zoom.us/meeting/register/tZEufuipqzosGNM-6rqVB2Gn8Bp50SikoGdj

This months discussion will revolve around the idea of Green Colonisation and the erosion of indigenous cultures that is occurring, in an attempt to mitigate the climate crisis.  The prompts for this month are the following:

A 'small flower' that holds great significance to an indigenous tribe, is referenced several times throughout the podcast. This flower stands in the way of mining certain metals which are a vital piece of the 'move to electric'- the transition that is labelled as the solution to all of our problems. The question is raised of the importance of such a small flower, which begs the questions:

What truly is the difference between the current world and the one in which current development and environmental targets that we are striving to meet have been achieved?

Who are the decision makers in the fight against climate breakdown and who should be ?

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Ernest Scheyder | Mining The Cobalt, Lithium, Copper & Rare Earths To Electrify The Economy

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Episode · The Geopolitics & Power Podcast · 🎙️: https://curiousworldview.buzzsprout.com/shareCurious Worldview Podcast - #170 w/ Ernest Scheyder On AppleCurious Worldview Podcast - #170 w/ Ernest Scheyder On Spotifyhttps://atlasgeographica.com/ernest-scheyder/Ernest Scheyder runs directly towards the impossible trade-offs of mining in the ‘War Below’...The electrification of the economy is on the one hand very good. It means we can move away from consuming the carbon rich oil into our atmosphere… but it also means that we are going to…

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Niamh speaks about the importance of being critical of the SDG's whilst not 'throwing them out'. The conversation moves onto the great paradox that exists within the SDGs; That is, striving for economic growth whilst attempting to achieve environmental sustainability (contrasting 'sustainable' and 'development') Where do you think the balance is in all of these factors? Is there a balance that can be struck? How critical should we be of current environmental efforts and what is the alternative?

In recent years, both national and international eyes have pointed at our food systems and farmers. The IFA has recently reiterated that they cannot meet the climate targets that the Irish government has set out, stating that many farmers are struggling to survive. New reports on the worsening quality of Irish water due to poor waste management and agricultural run off also indicate that whilst the The article by Changwanda et al. Examines the consequences of climate change on farmers in Southern Africa, as drought and crop failure force communities into increasing poverty. How do we balance the needs and voices of farmers around the world, where must there be compromise?

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Chona Mwemba / EPA - EFE

A record-breaking drought, fueled by the El Niño weather pattern, has caused widespread crop failure and national emergency declarations in Zambia, Malawi, and Zimbabwe. Without harvests of maize, the staple food, millions in the region are facing a severe hunger crisis.

Esnart Chongani boils five small pumpkins over firewood outside her home in Makoka, a village in Zambia's Chongwe District, not far from the capital, Lusaka. She tests to make sure they're tender, drains the water, which she will save for later, and then carefully divides them into 12 portions as her family sits down for lunch. It's a healthy dish, but there's scarcely enough to go around, and this is the only meal any of them will eat today.

Chongani, 76, isn't used to rationing. She's the proud owner of a seven-acre farm that she has worked on for decades. Ordinarily, her family harvests more than two tons of maize in April. But this year, southern Africa was hit by its worst mid-season dry spell in over a century, and for the first time in her life, they have harvested nothing.

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"I cannot remember anything like this," says Chongani. "People are so hungry they are stealing food. The generosity of our community has disappeared, and people are too hungry even to attend church. One of our sons works at a rose farm, and we beg him to buy us food. But it is never enough.

"If we survive until the next harvest, it will be by the grace of God."

A World Weather Attribution study found that El Niño - a recurring phenomenon that brings unusually warm waters to the Pacific Ocean and disrupts weather patterns around the world - was the key driver behind the record-breaking drought. Between January and March, when the rains usually fall on Chongani's farm, heat waves and temperatures 9 degrees F. (5 degrees C) above average devastated southern Africa.

The region can scarcely handle the current reality, yet there are serious concerns that events like these are getting worse.

Zambia, Zimbabwe, and Malawi each declared national disasters as crops failed in a region where 70 percent of smallholder farmers rely on rainfed agriculture for their livelihood. Food prices have risen up to 82 percent in some drought-affected areas, while water scarcity has also impacted livestock and destroyed farmland. According to a United Nations report, more than 18 million people are now in need of urgent humanitarian assistance, with food insecurity levels set to increase dramatically during the regular lean season that typically starts in October. This year, the lean season could begin as early as July as provisions are depleted.

Analysts working for the Famine Early Warning Systems Network said that southern Africa, typically a net exporter of maize - the region's staple food - would have to import 5 million tons to meet demand.

El Niño ended in April as the Pacific Ocean cooled, but this offers little reprieve. Drought has pushed southern Africa to its limits, and the rains won't come again until October. The region can scarcely handle the current reality, yet there are serious concerns that events like this are getting worse.

A 2021 assessment report by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) found no clear evidence that climate change had impacted the strength of El Niño-Southern Oscillation (ENSO) events, which include the cooling La Niña phase as well. However, a 2023 study led by scientists from Australia's CSIRO agency, using the latest generation of climate models, found that greenhouse gas emissions were likely making strong ENSO events more frequent and severe, with models showing a "human fingerprint" from 1960 onward.

"We're estimating at around a 10 percent boost in El Niño and La Niña magnitude," explains Michael McPhaden, a senior scientist at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and a coauthor on the study. "That doesn't sound like a lot, but what it translates into is that the strongest events are becoming stronger, and these are the most destructive and hurtful."

McPhaden emphasizes that while this link is "likely" rather than certain, there is "very strong evidence" that even if ENSO events themselves stay the same, global warming can still amplify their impacts, as has happened this year around the world.

"A warmer atmosphere holds more moisture, so when ENSO events lead to conditions that favor enhanced precipitation in a particular region, it can rain even harder," he said. "Likewise with drought. It's easier to dry out the soil in a warmer climate, so a severe ENSO-related drought can become an extreme drought."

Some communities are eating grass to survive, while 17 Malawians were hospitalized after eating poisonous tubers in desperate hunger.

This is bad news for southern Africa, a region that is forecast to suffer the harshest impacts of climate change. Robert Vautard, co-chair of the IPCC working group that assesses the physical science basis of climate change, said that in scenarios with around 2 degrees C of warming by 2050, mean precipitation will decrease in southern Africa alongside increasing droughts. But he noted that some parts of the region will experience more extreme precipitation, with more intense cyclones expected over the eastern portion of southern Africa.

In the past two years, Malawi has suffered back-to-back climate disasters - one from too little rainfall and one from too much. Nearly 9 million people in the country are currently food insecure after the compounding impacts of El Niño and Cyclone Freddy, the strongest tropical cyclone ever recorded, which brought six months of rain in just six days in March 2023, and caused flooding and landslides that killed 1,200 Malawians and ruined 440,000 acres of farmland. Some communities are eating grass seed to survive, while 17 Malawians were hospitalized in April after eating poisonous tubers in desperate hunger.

Last December, Malawi's Ministry of Agriculture issued mitigation advice ahead of El Niño, such as using organic fertilizer to improve soil moisture retention. Malawi, like its neighbors, depends heavily on maize, a water-hungry crop, that is the staple food and is typically eaten at every meal. But this time, the government also instructed farmers to plant early-maturing and more drought-resistant crops alongside their maize.

Yet immense poverty, exacerbated by recent disasters, means many farmers lack the financial resources to invest in the seeds and equipment needed to respond to such instructions.

"Most farmers cannot do what the government says, they just rely on God," said Steve Makungwa, a senior lecturer at Lilongwe University of Agriculture and Natural Resources in Malawi. But even those who had the capacity to respond were unable to contend with El Niño.

"The crops were growing well, but after some weeks the dry spell began, and the maize and cowpeas dried up," says a farmer.

Ellen Chikadza, 48, a subsistence farmer from Balaka, a township in southern Malawi, is a member of the Rural Women's Assembly, a self-organized network of rural women that helps subsistence farmers adapt to climate change by demonstrating climate-smart farming techniques and providing seeds for more resilient crops. She did just as the government advised, but her crops were unable to handle the drought.

After the storm, Malawi's farmers face a precarious future. Read more.

"I planted pigeon peas and cowpeas alongside my maize, and I also applied an organic manure mixture we made from maize bran, ash, and dung" she says. "The crops were growing well, but after some weeks the dry spell began, and the maize and cowpeas dried up."

Undeterred, Chikadza uprooted her wilted maize and tried planting sweet potatoes and soybean seeds. But the potatoes soon dried up, and the soybeans yielded only premature pods. "Out of the four crops I planted this year, only the pigeon peas have survived," she said. "But they will still need water to ripen. We still need rain."

Climate-smart techniques like those employed by Chikadza and championed by the World Food Programme have had success building climate resilience in communities, but up against the most ferocious weather, they can be ineffective.

Peter Johnston, a climate scientist at the University of Cape Town, says these low-cost adaptations are still important, as they increase a farmer's resilience threshold during extreme weather events. "But if the [weather] event veers beyond that threshold, it's over."

To prevent this from happening, Johnston champions the merits of anticipatory action, a new way of approaching climate hazards where social or environmental triggers - such as a low rain threshold being breached during the first months of a rainy season - can help governments recognize where and when communities might need extra support. Officials could then quickly allocate extra resources, such as providing farmers with cash payments or early-maturing seeds, preventing the need for humanitarian aid later.

Studies by the Food and Agriculture Organization have shown that every dollar invested in anticipatory action can create a return for farming families of more than $7 in avoided loss and added benefits. Such actions are clearly cheaper than the crippling recovery costs of climatic disasters, but still require investment in sophisticated early-warning systems, data modeling, and providing the needed assistance. Support from the international community will be crucial in getting such schemes off the ground and avoiding future humanitarian crises.

People are running out of options. Hunger is forcing them into lines of work that lead to more environmental destruction.

At the U.N. climate conference in Dubai last December, advocates for developing countries won a major victory as world leaders unanimously agreed to set up a climate reparations fund. Through this "loss and damage" fund, wealthier, high-polluting countries would compensate the poorest nations that contribute the least to global warming but are being hit hardest by its impacts. Zambia, Zimbabwe, and Malawi each hope to be among the first to withdraw from the fund.

"We need this money yesterday," says Julius Ng'oma, National Coordinator for the Civil Society Network on Climate Change, a network promoting disaster risk management in Malawi. "We've suffered so many climate-related damages. A huge amount of money is required for us just to recover, let alone adapt."

But six months after the Dubai conference, major questions remain over how the fund will work and where the money will come from. There are also uncertainties over what criteria will trigger access to the fund. Attributing southern Africa's drought to El Niño could exclude affected countries from receiving aid for climate change damages, and so the findings of studies of the drought's causes may be crucial.

But the complex nature of attribution science feels detached from those suffering on the ground. People are running out of options. For now, hunger is only forcing them into lines of work that lead to more environmental destruction.

Families from Kandulu village in southern Malawi's Mangochi District have given up on their farms after drought ruined their crops. With prices on the rise, and in desperate need of food, they've turned to cutting down trees, one of the few guaranteed ways to earn a living in a country where nearly every household relies on firewood and charcoal for cooking and heating. While deforestation itself causes around 10 percent of global warming and tree cutting for charcoal is illegal in Malawi, they've been left with little choice.

Without warning: A lack of weather stations is costing African lives. Read more.

Stalubi Chimbalanga, 42, and his friends cycle for three hours from Kandulu to the forests on Magomero mountain, and three days later they return with bags of charcoal tied to their bikes. By 8 a.m. they've sold it all and made enough money to buy maize for a week.

"We know it's illegal, and we know it's bad for our environment," says Stalubi. "But we have no other way of living."

Jenipher Changwanda is a Malawian journalist who specializes in gender reporting for the Centre for Collaborative Investigative Journalism. Freddie Clayton is a British journalist who covers climate, the environment, and public health. He has written for The Economist, New Lines Magazine, and the Pulitzer Center on Crisis Reporting More →

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How an El Niño-Driven Drought Brought Hunger to Southern Africa

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A record-breaking drought, fueled by the El Niño weather pattern, has caused widespread crop failure and national emergency declarations in Zambia, Malawi, and Zimbabwe. Without harvests of maize, the staple food, millions in the region are facing a severe hunger crisis.

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There has been a lot of conversation surrounding the upcoming visit to the White House for St Patricks Day. Public criticism has erupted calling for the Irish government to scrap its diplomatic efforts with the US government who are infamously backing the Israeli military. Michael Martin however is maintaining that efforts to persuade the US government to withdraw are best achieved through conversation and engagement. What do you think? Is boycotting powerful? Is it better to maintain pleasantries and try to change leaders minds through collaboration and negotiation?

April the 5th is International Day of Consciousness. In an era of globalisation and constant access to world politics, how do you manage the weight of conscience whilst also preserving optimism and well-being? How will we as a society look back at this genocide and the roles we played in allowing/fighting it?

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1. The emergence of “new left” (Green and radical left) parties radically altered women’s representation on the left, with research finding that these parties in particular promote gender equality as a core part of their ideology (Keith and Verge 2018).' What are your thoughts on this? Do you believe that in an effort to gain more voters, these 'Mannerparteien' may go a step further and adjust their ideologies?

2. Using recent various female political figures as examples, how do you see this use of the female figure playing out across the West?

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INTRODUCTION

Radical right populist (RRP) parties are often described as Männerparteien. They are predominantly led by and represented by men (Mudde Reference Mudde2007). Gender gaps are also evident among the RRP parties' electorate, with women making up a smaller share of party supporters compared with men (e.g., Coffé Reference Coffé and Rydgren2018; Reference Coffé2019; Givens Reference Givens2004; Immerzeel, Coffé, and van der Lippe Reference Immerzeel, Coffé and van der Lippe2015; Spierings and Zaslove Reference Spierings and Zaslove2015). Although male-dominated, RRP parties are increasingly including women as MPs and leaders. For example, the Swiss People's Party (SVP) sent 11 women (17% of their parliamentary party) to the National Council in 2015, nearly doubling the number of women elected in 2011. High-profile women also lead (or have recently led) RRP parties, including Marine Le Pen in France, Siv Jensen and Sylvi Listhaug in Norway, and Alice Weidel in Germany.

Given that RRP parties have traditionally held very conservative views on the role of women in society, what accounts for this increase in women's representation? In this paper, we examine the conditions under which RRP parties elect more women MPs. We argue that a driving force behind increasing numbers of women among the party's parliamentary delegation stems from the RRP parties' substantial gender imbalance among voters. We advance a new theory of strategic descriptive representation that brings together insights from the fields of gender, voting behavior, and party politics: parties use an increase in women's descriptive representation (the number of women in office) as a tool to appeal to a broader set of voters, in addition to or as a substitute for standard programmatic tools of party competition. In the case of RRP parties, we argue that electorally struggling parties with a deficit in women's support seek to elect more women MPs as a way to improve their support among women voters. Increasing the number of female faces becomes a tactic-one that is perhaps less costly than programmatic change-to court an undertapped constituency.

To test this argument, we develop the most comprehensive dataset to date on women as MPs, women as party leaders, and gender differences in voter support across Europe and over time. Our pan-European dataset includes 187 parties in 30 countries from 1985 to 2018. We find that, among RRP parties, the interaction of a male-dominated electorate and electoral threat predicts higher proportions of women MPs. Analyses including all parties across the party system reveal that this interaction is largely unique to RRP parties.

The results of this paper expand our understanding of the RRP party family. Challenging the existing narrative of these parties as male-focused, our findings show that women are seen as a possible resource to an RRP party. But unlike the claim that RRP parties use women's representation as a "standardization" tactic to better comply with broader norms of gender diversity (Erzeel and Rashkova Reference Erzeel and Rashkova2017; Mayer Reference Mayer2013)-a prediction which is more consistent with electorally successful parties-we argue and find that RRP parties are most likely to use the strategy when they are both losing votes and lacking women voters. In making this claim, this paper reconciles the current discussion of RRP parties as Männerparteien with the evidence that women voters can be an important, albeit overlooked, constituency for them, as was the case with the German Nazi Party (NSDAP; Boak Reference Boak1989). Given that RRP parties have become central political actors across Europe and have been included in national governments, their embrace or rejection of women representatives has important ramifications for gender representation at the elite and mass levels.

This paper also advances our knowledge about party competition in general. While the literature is dominated by a discussion of programmatic tactics for vote or seat maximization, our work emphasizes the importance of descriptive representation as a political and electoral tool. Such strategy allows the party to attract new voters without necessarily altering core issue positions and therefore, alienating existing voters. Building on the insights of previous work on women's representation in parties (e.g., Erzeel and Rashkova Reference Erzeel and Rashkova2017; Kittilson Reference Kittilson2006; Valdini Reference Valdini2012), our paper is the first to identify gender gaps in party support and overall electoral success as key variables in explaining women's representation. We examine how RRP parties employ the tactic of strategic descriptive representation as a means of gaining women voters, but the paper and its theory have implications for all types of parties facing electoral declines and searching for untapped pockets of future voters.

We start by reviewing the existing literature on why women MPs are elected. We then propose the theory of strategic descriptive representation and spell out its implications for RRP parties' increase in women representatives. Third, we describe our new comprehensive time-series, cross-sectional dataset on women MPs, party leaders, and voter-base gender gaps. Next, we discuss the results of our analyses for women's representation across RRP parties, along with robustness checks. Fifth, we introduce two case studies to assess the plausibility of our strategic argument and illustrate its effect on candidate selection decisions. Sixth, we explore to what extent our argument of strategic descriptive representation translates to other party families in Europe. We conclude by discussing the implications of our findings and future extensions of the work.

WHY DO PARTIES ELECT WOMEN? IDEOLOGY, ORGANIZATION, AND WOMEN ACTIVISTS

Figure 1 demonstrates this puzzle of variation in women's representation across party families in Europe from 1980 to 2018. Green/New Left parties maintain the highest share of women over this span of time. Despite an ebb and flow, both Social Democratic and Conservative parties make gains over time and end up following on the heels of the Green/New Left party family. In contrast, the RRP party family has among the lowest percentage of women MPs of all party families during this period. Yet, since the mid-2000s, women have made strides in the RRP party family. By the end of the 2010s, RRP parties have the same proportion of women MPs as Christian Democratic parties. As we discuss later, there is also variation within the RRP party family, with some parties becoming more gender inclusive over time than others.

To explain the proportion of women among a party's MPs, party-level analyses have suggested three sets of factors: party ideology, party organizational structures, and women's activism within the party. First, party decisions on gender equality within party ranks may reflect the party's larger ideology about the role of women in society. Early research on party-level variation in descriptive representation often found leftist parties to be more likely to adopt voluntary gender quotas and to have more women among their slate of MPs than centrist or rightist parties (Caul Reference Caul1999; Kittilson Reference Kittilson2006; Kunovich and Paxton Reference Kunovich and Paxton2005; Lovenduski and Norris Reference Lovenduski and Norris1993). The emergence of "new left" (Green and radical left) parties radically altered women's representation on the left, with research finding that these parties in particular promote gender equality as a core part of their ideology (Keith and Verge Reference Keith and Verge2018).

However, in recent years, the relationship between leftist parties and gender inclusion appears more tenuous. Conservative parties have often highlighted "women's interests" although not necessarily from a feminist perspective (Celis and Childs Reference Celis and Childs2012). O'Brien ( Reference O'Brien2018) finds that references to gender are equally salient for Christian Democratic and Social Democratic parties, albeit in different ways. And parties such as the British Conservative and German Christian Democratic parties have promoted women MPs under certain conditions (Childs Reference Childs2008; Childs and Webb Reference Childs and Webb2012; Wiliarty Reference Wiliarty2010). Figure 1 shows that Conservative parties in Europe now boast the third-highest share of women in the party on average, ahead of the more centrist Liberal and Christian Democratic party families.

Second, studies have indicated a relationship between party organizational structures and women's descriptive representation, but the results are mixed. Some comparative research suggests party centralization enables women's gains among MPs (Aldrich Reference Aldrich2020; Kittilson Reference Kittilson2006). However, there is also evidence of the opposite relationship. Kenney ( Reference Murray2013), for example, finds decentralized structures to be more conducive to women's election. Similarly, Fortin-Rittenberger and Rittenberger ( Reference Fortin-Rittenberger and Rittenberger2015) find that more inclusive selectorates, not centralized processes, lead to more women MEP candidates in European parliamentary elections.

Third, women's activism within the party is an important force for change. In particular, women among the party leadership and women's party organizations play a positive role in pressing for more women candidates (Caul Reference Caul1999; Childs and Kittilson Reference Childs and Kittilson2016; Kunovich and Paxton Reference Kunovich and Paxton2005; although see Tremblay and Pelletier Reference Tremblay and Pelletier2001).

Although the existing literature has been successful in accounting for general trends in women's representation and differences between parties, important puzzles remain. One such puzzle is the underrepresentation of women in the RRP party family. As starkly demonstrated by Figure 1, the RRP party family stands out for its lowest level of women MP representation for much of the 1980-2018 period. Though this could be dismissed as consistent with their ideology and reputation as Männerparteien, the party family has seen a significant increase in their share of women MPs in the 2000s, across plurality and proportional systems alike, and despite maintaining their extremist authoritarian ideology.

A second puzzle is highlighted by Figure 2: there is significant variation within the RRP party family, with some parties-Italy's Northern League, France's National Front/National Rally, and the Danish People's Party, for example-increasing their share of women in the party substantially over time, whereas others do not. This variation also cannot be accounted for by the country- or party-level explanations dominant in the literature. For example, while national gender quotas have become more popular across Europe over time, the systematic opposition of RRP parties to quotas reduces their explanatory force for differences between parties. Although there is some variety in the ideology of RRP parties, they all share the broad ideological elements of nativism (anti-immigrant and nationalism), authoritarianism, and populism (Mudde Reference Mudde2007) considered anathema to gender equality. Finally, although there has been an increase in the number of women party leaders among the RRP party group, their singular role in explaining an increase in women MPs does not seem straightforward, as RRP parties with women leaders both have a comparatively high proportion of women MPs (e.g., the National Rally in France) and low proportion of women MPs (e.g., Alternative for Germany [AfD] in Germany).

A THEORY OF STRATEGIC DESCRIPTIVE REPRESENTATION

Putting the factors of electoral loss and the often-overlooked gender differences in voter support at its core, we posit that parties embrace women as MPs when they need to increase their vote share and women are currently underrepresented among their voters. An increase in women's descriptive representation is thus seen as a tactic for broadening a party's electorate in order to attract previously untapped women voters and remedy the party's vote stagnation or decline. As theorized by Pitkin ( Reference Pitkin1967), descriptive representation taps one dimension of political representation, calibrating the degree to which a representative body mirrors the composition of the society it serves. Our theory of strategic descriptive representation is less focused on gauging the quality of representation and more aligned with the ways women's presence can be deployed as a tool in a party's kit to bolster their electoral trajectory.

Beyond recognizing this voting pattern of women supporting women, there is evidence that parties employ strategic descriptive representation. For example, in times of heightened electoral uncertainty, parties are also more likely to adopt gender quota laws to increase their support among women voters (Murray, Krook, and Opello Reference Murray, Krook and Katherine2012; Weeks Reference Weeks2018). Party competition for women's votes also motivated tactical decisions by political elites in the United States in the era of the suffrage movement (Teele Reference Teele2018). Valdini ( Reference Valdini2019), specifically, discusses how established (largely men) party gatekeepers strategically calculate that having more women representatives can benefit parties' less-than-positive images and gain them support from women voters in upcoming elections.

Evidence from case studies reveals some of the dynamics behind decisions to promote more women for office. One strategy is for women in party leadership to use polling data about deficits in support from women to push to elect more women MPs. This tactic was particularly effective in the British Labour Party in the 1990s and has found some effectiveness in elections since then for both the Labour and Conservative Parties (Childs and Webb Reference Childs and Webb2012; Eagle and Lovenduski Reference Eagle and Lovenduski1998). Campbell ( Reference Campbell2016, 594) sums up this dynamic stating, "critical actors are important but they are most successful when they are able to claim that they can bring women voters with them."

Although parties have multiple methods for increasing their electoral support, altering the gender composition of their parliamentary delegations is a relatively low-cost-if not necessarily costless-tactic. Adding more women as MPs is a highly visible and symbolic step, and the information is easily accessible even to uninformed voters. In addition, we suggest that it could be less risky than other constituency-expanding appeals, such as moderating stances on core issues or diversifying their issue offerings. Research suggests that voters in advanced democracies do not discriminate against women candidates-even radical right populist voters. For example, in a recent survey experiment, Saha and Weeks ( Reference Saha and Weeks2020) show that United Kingdom Independence Party (UKIP) voters are no less likely to support ambitious women than men candidates. Previous research also finds that if right-wing party leadership perceives the issue of diversity in representation as important for electoral support, they may be willing to risk losing some local activist support (Sobolewska Reference Sobolewska2013). Increasing the number of women MPs is a tactic that can be pursued, at least initially, without requiring any coterminous programmatic shifts-dilution of the party message-that may drive away existing voters. To paraphrase Donno and Kreft ( Reference Donno and Kreft2019, 726), expanding women's representation in the party "represents a 'quieter' strategy of preemptive cooptation."

In sum then, we expect parties' electoral fortunes and gender gap to drive their decision to increase the number of women MPs. Figure 3 presents a visual summary of the main argument, using a table of scenarios and predictions for each situation. The left column considers incentives when the party attracts a low male/female (M/F) voter ratio (the voters are not men-dominated). It shows that parties have little reason to change their level of women's descriptive representation when they already do well among women voters (whether they face an electoral threat or not). Indeed, those women-dominated parties losing votes might actually have an incentive to increase their percentage of men MPs to attract underrepresented men voters. The right column considers those parties with men-dominated electorates (high M/F voter ratio), and here, opposite hypotheses emerge depending on the party's electoral vulnerability. In the bottom-right cell, when a men-dominated party faces an electoral threat, the party ought to seek new electorates-specifically, the untapped women's vote. Strategic inclusion (Hypothesis 1a) is the logical tactic. In the top-right cell, when a men-dominated party is doing well, we predict it will double down on the exclusion of women in the party ("strategic exclusion," Hypothesis 1b). In this scenario, success may be derived (or perceived to derive) from a party's men MPs. Women are not needed to gain votes.

WOMEN AND MÄNNERPARTEIEN

Second, accompanying this voter-base gender gap has been a gender imbalance among party MPs and leaders. RRP parties have typically been led by men, with women traditionally underrepresented as party leaders. The imbalance extends to parliamentary representatives where, as Figure 1 revealed, RRP parties have consistently elected among the lowest percentage of women MPs of any party family in Europe. Although there have recently been some significant developments in women's roles in these parties, as the current leadership of Sylvi Listhaug of the Norwegian Progress Party, Marine Le Pen of the French National Rally and Alice Weidel of the German AfD show, these women are noticeable because they are exceptions to the male-dominated leadership pattern. An implication of this condition is that strategic descriptive representation would not be an effective tool for those parties that already elect significant shares of women, such as Green parties and many Social Democratic parties. Indeed, Social Democratic parties may have already used this strategy effectively in previous decades. It is likely that there is some threshold of women's descriptive representation, beyond which parties are less likely to envision additional strategic gains from adding women.

Third, most RRP parties' organizations tend to be highly centralized. Strategic descriptive representation is only likely to be effective in party organizations where elites can successfully control candidate nomination and placement on lists. This rules out parties with highly decentralized candidate selection procedures and parties that have democratized their procedures in recent years by implementing primaries (Hazan and Rahat Reference Hazan and Rahat2010). Although we lack comprehensive cross-national, time-series data on candidate selection procedures across parties and countries, decentralized candidate selection is widespread across other party families. For example, in Belgium the majority of parties use decentralized candidate procedures with the exception of the Flemish Interest and the French-speaking Greens (Weeks Reference Weeks2018).

The described conditions suggest (a) that RRP party leaders have the ability to increase shares of women candidates in winnable positions, (b) that their parties could benefit electorally from attracting more women voters, and (c) that the expansion of women MPs might prove a useful means to achieve this goal. This latter point is further reinforced by the finding that women voters might be more reluctant than men to vote for extremist parties based on perceived negative social cues (Harteveld et al. Reference Harteveld, Van Der Brug, Dahlberg and Andrej Kokkonen2015). The presence of women representatives in RRP parties may help to reduce such concerns about RRP parties' outsider status.

Indeed, other strategic options to appeal to women voters on the basis of gender would not prove as effective for RRP parties. Research by Harteveld and Ivarsflaten ( Reference Harteveld and Ivarsflaten2018) reveals few gender differences in policy preference over immigration, meaning that the RRP reinforcing their current anti-immigration position is unlikely to yield additional women voters (see also Mayer Reference Mayer2013). Finally, despite the possible claim that an outreach to women voters might not be perceived to be credible by a RRP party given the conservative ideas about gender equality of many RRP parties (De Lange and Mügge Reference De Lange and Mügge2015; Mayer Reference Mayer2015; Mudde Reference Mudde and Kaltwasser2015), various RRP parties have modernized their views on gender equality issues. In particular, efforts have been made by some voices on the radical right to link existing anti-Islam platforms to liberal feminist stances-a trend referred to as femonationalism (Farris Reference Farris2017). Specifically, some northern European RRP parties have cloaked their campaign against Islamic practices toward women (e.g., forced marriage, honor killings, headscarves) as a call for greater gender equality and tolerance of LGBTI rights (Akkerman Reference Akkerman2015; De Lange and Mügge Reference De Lange and Mügge2015; Mayer Reference Mayer2013; Mudde and Kaltwasser Reference Mudde and Kaltwasser2015). This may appeal to more feminist-minded women (and men) voters, although Celis and Childs ( Reference Celis and Childs2020) point out that RRP parties are using "gender equality as a weapon against an alleged "Islamization" of Europe" (97).

In summary, given the gender gap in votes and representation, women are an obvious electoral target for RRP parties to broaden their electorate. We expect male-dominated RRP parties that are losing votes or have hit an electoral plateau to have strong incentives to elect more women MPs (H1a). By contrast, electorally successful male-dominated RRP parties have little incentive to alter their vote-getting men-focused approach and should elect fewer women (H1b).

DATA AND METHODS

To test our hypotheses, we created the most comprehensive dataset to date on women as MPs, women as party leaders, and gender differences in voter support across Europe and over time (Weeks et al. Reference Weeks, Meguid, Kittilson and Coffé2022). The data used in our models include 187 parties in 30 Western and Eastern European countries from 1985 to 2018. Of these, 22 RRP parties are included from 19 countries.

Dependent Variable

Our dependent variable is the proportion of women MPs at the party level following a given election. The coding of this variable is based on verified information from parliamentary websites and electoral commissions, supplemented with data from the European Journal of Political Research "Political Data Yearbook" and secondary sources, when necessary. Ideally we would also analyze time-series cross-national candidate data, but this is not available. Examining the percentage of women in the parliamentary party allows us to capture party efforts to get women elected by placing them in winnable seats. Because evidence suggests that parties not committed to equal gender representation often place women candidates in uncompetitive districts or uncompetitive spots on party lists (Jones Reference Jones2004; Tavits Reference Tavits2010), it is likely that we are, if anything, underestimating the full effect of the explanatory factors on women's representation as candidates and thus, biasing our results against finding support for our theory.

Explanatory Variables

We are interested in the effect of RRP parties' electoral performance and their ratio of men to women voters (the M/F voter ratio) on the descriptive representation of women MPs. Few studies systematically examine gender differences in support for RRP parties, even fewer investigate how these differences have changed over time, and none examines how these gaps might condition party behavior. We measure overall electoral fortunes as a party's change in vote share since the last election lagged.

Gender differences in voter support are measured as the ratio of the percentage of men respondents who report voting for a party to the percentage of women respondents who report voting for the same party. These percentages are derived from the Comparative Study of Electoral Systems (CSES), and where or when not available, we rely on the European Election Study (EES) and the European Social Survey (ESS). We prefer CSES data because the survey asks about respondents' electoral behavior in the then-current national parliamentary election context. Although it is retrospective ("who did you vote for"), it is also the most temporally proximate measure available (and the M/F voter ratio measure we use is then lagged). If data from both EES and ESS are available for the same party, we take the value from the survey conducted closest to the election year. In all surveys, respondents identify the party they voted for (excluding "don't know," "don't remember," and spoiled ballots) in the last election. For countries with mixed member systems, the results for the party list survey questions are used. For pure proportional representation systems, we use the party list question, while the candidate party question is used for candidate-based elections. We applied poststratification demographic weights for all data.

Figure 4 displays gender differences in voting behavior by party families between 1985 and 2018 across Europe. The figure presents the M/F voter ratio, with 1 indicating an equal proportion of men and women voters, a score higher than 1 revealing a higher proportion of men than women voters, and a score lower than 1 indicating a lower proportion of men than women voters.

Figure 4 reveals the variation in gender gaps in voting across party families and time. The RRP party family stands out with the largest overrepresentation of men among voters of all parties (the RRP party mean is 1.9, or nearly 2 men voters for every woman voter). As a party family, RRP parties have experienced the largest deficit in women's votes. Since 1980, that gap narrowed before increasing again around 2010. In recent years, the gender gap in RRP parties is again falling, but the party family remains the most male-dominated of any party family. Figure A2 in the Appendix presents the gender gaps in voting for the RRP parties included in our analyses over time.

Based on the existing work on women's representation, we also include a number of variables as controls. To capture the electoral climate in which women candidates are being elected, we include a measure of the electoral system (Proportional Representation and Modified Proportional Representation, where Majoritarian/SMD is the reference category), a continuous measure for district magnitude, and dichotomous variable measuring whether a country has national-level gender quota laws or not. We also include the lagged percentage of women MPs in the country's parliament as an indicator of country-level context for women's representation and to test for the idea that RRP parties' behavior is being driven by the pressure to meet the gender diversity norms of "standard" parties (Erzeel and Rashkova Reference Erzeel and Rashkova2017; Mayer Reference Mayer2013). To account for the role of party characteristics in the election of women MPs, we gathered and coded a dichotomous variable capturing whether the RRP party had a woman leader at the time of the last election or not; this data extended Greene and O'Brien's ( Reference Greene and O'Brien2016) data on women party leaders by 10 countries and 77 parties to a total of 30 countries and 187 parties. In light of O'Brien's ( Reference O'Brien2015) idea that a party's governmental status may modify its incentives to elect more women, we include a dichotomous variable coded 1 if the party was in the governing cabinet following the previous election and 0 if not.

Some previous research suggests that party centralization may benefit women's election (Aldrich Reference Aldrich2020; Kittilson Reference Kittilson2006). Our research design, focusing on RRP parties, largely controls for this factor because most RRP parties have highly centralized organizations, often built around strong authoritarian and charismatic leaders (Mudde Reference Mudde2007). Similarly, our focus on RRP parties controls for party ideology. Lastly, we also include a time trend and a variable distinguishing Western and Eastern European countries to account for any broad cultural and political disparities across the regions. Table A2 in the Appendix presents summary statistics.

MULTILEVEL ANALYSIS

We estimate multilevel random intercept models (using R version 4.1.2.) to test the effects of electoral success and gender gap on the proportion of women MPs in RRP parties. Unlike ordinary least squares models, these models allow us to account for the nested nature of the data, with parties nested within countries (Gellman and Hill Reference Gellman and Hill2007). Table 1 presents multiple models: Model 1 includes only direct effects of our two focus variables, and Model 2 includes an interaction term between electoral success and M/F voter ratio, to investigate our expectations that the proportion of women MPs will be higher among those RRP parties facing both an electoral loss and a large gender gap. Subsequent models add controls to the interaction: Model 3 includes a time trend, Model 4 adds party-level covariates, and Model 5 adds national-level covariates. The different models allow us to test whether our main findings hold with the inclusion of various party and context-control variables.

As can be seen from Models 2-5 in Table 1, we find that the interaction of lagged gender gap in voter support and vote change is statistically significant and in the expected negative direction across all models: when RRP parties are struggling electorally (negative vote change) and have disproportionately more men voters, they have a higher percentage of women MPs compared with parties not facing both conditions.

To more easily interpret the findings of this interactive story, we plot the marginal effects of M/F voter ratio on the percentage of women MPs as it varies by level of electoral success in Figure 5. Following the logic of strategic descriptive representation, we find support for Hypothesis 1a: the effect of the M/F voter ratio on the proportion of women in the party is positive and significant when the party faces electoral losses (vote change is negative). This positive significant effect emerges for levels of vote change of -3 percentage points and lower. At the same time, when RRPs are doing well (vote change is positive and greater than or equal to +1), we see the opposite: the effect of the M/F voter ratio is negative and significant. Consistent with Hypothesis 1b of strategic exclusion, when RRP parties are gaining votes despite having disproportionately more men voters, they have a lower percentage of women MPs.

In order to translate our results into meaningful quantities of interest (King, Tomz, and Wittenberg Reference King, Tomz and Wittenberg2000), we calculate the conditional predicted values of the dependent variable-percentage of women MPs-for parties that are gaining versus losing votes, across different M/F voter ratios. For example, when a RRP party has a men-dominated electorate (M/F Voter Ratio of 2), the predicted value of women in the party is 14% if the party is gaining votes (when Vote Change is +5) but 20% if losing votes (when Vote Change is -5). As expected, we see the opposite when a RRP party is women-dominated (M/F Voter Ratio of 0.5): the predicted value of women in the party is 21% if the party is gaining votes (when Vote Change is +5) and 14% if losing votes (when Vote Change is -5).

In summary, the evidence suggests that, for RRP parties, the conditions of electoral change and a men-dominated electorate lead the party to respond with strategic increases in women's descriptive representation in times of threat and an abandonment of (or at least no increase in) women parliamentarians in times of electoral success. These findings paint the picture of an RRP party family searching for new electoral strategies when old tactics fail, and doubling down on existing tactics when proven effective.

The results from Table 1 also indicate the continued importance of some structural variables identified by past work. We find support for the claim that parties have higher levels of women representatives when there is a national norm for having a large proportion of women in the parliament. We also find that legislated gender quotas are borderline significant ( p = 0.06) in the expected positive direction. Consistent with the results of the party-level analyses of O'Brien ( Reference O'Brien2018), we do not find that the measures of institutional permissiveness-district magnitude and proportional representation-have a significant effect on women MPs in RRP parties, nor do women leaders increase women in RRP parliamentary parties. Moreover, the addition of these variables does not alter the explanatory strength of the strategic descriptive representation factors.

ROBUSTNESS CHECKS

To ensure that our findings are not the result of model misspecification, we also estimate models that use ordinary least squares. The main findings are robust to these alternative specifications (see Appendix Table A3). The marginal effects plots ( Figure 5 and Figure A3) reveal an outlier for M/F voter ratio, which is most likely due to survey sampling issues (niche parties, like RRP parties, often having few supporters to begin with). To check that extreme values in M/F voter ratio due to survey sampling issues are not biasing our results, we rerun the analysis excluding M/F voter ratio values over 10; the results continue to hold (see Appendix Table A4, Model 1). One concern is that the results could be an artifact of good electoral scores, rather than strategic incentives of parties. For example, if a RRP party was doing poorly, it might decide to reach out to the median voter; if this tactic is successful in attracting more votes and gaining more seats, then the election of more women who are placed further down the list could be unintended. We note that if this were the case, we would expect to see more women elected when the RRP party does well overall, but we do not see this. Table 1 Model 1 shows no evidence of an effect of electoral change on the share of women in RRP parties on its own. An additional analysis of the most inclusive model ( Table 1 Model 5), but with no interaction term (see Table A5 in the Appendix), finds the same result: being electorally vulnerable alone does not increase levels of women MPs within RRP parties.

Another alternative explanation is that RRP parties might not experience electoral threat, but be motivated to increase gender diversity to combat their outsider reputation. If this is true, we should see RRP parties (perhaps especially those with highly male-dominated electorates, more likely to be seen as extremist) increase women's representation in the party independently of electoral threat. We find no evidence of this in either Table 1 Model 1 or Table A5 in the Appendix. The gender gap in voting is only significant when combined with electoral change, in line with our theory.

CASE STUDIES: ARE RRP PARTIES STRATEGIC?

The quantitative results are consistent with our strategic descriptive representation theory and run counter to alternative hypotheses. To increase our confidence in the strategic nature of our finding of increased women MPs under conditions of electoral threat and a gender gap in voting, we consider the parties' motivations. In this section, we turn to illustrative case studies. Although space limitations prevent us from providing the comprehensive qualitative analysis necessary to fully investigate the causal mechanisms driving party strategies, the brief descriptions we present help to assess the plausibility of and strategic logic behind our observed statistical relationships (Lieberman Reference Lieberman2005). These illustrative cases also allow us to highlight different presentations of the candidate selection and placement decisions behind the election of more women.

Following Seawright and Gerring ( Reference Seawright and Gerring2008) and Lieberman ( Reference Lieberman2005) for regression models yielding results consistent with theory expectations, we examine two "typical" cases that are well-predicted by the statistical models-the SVP in Switzerland in 2015 and the Party of Freedom (PVV) in the Netherlands in 2017. In both cases, the alternative hypotheses investigated here are not supported; neither country had a nationally legislated gender quota implemented before the election in question (or at all); both parties were lacking women party leaders; and, based on the socialization argument about gender equality norms (e.g., Erzeel and Rashkova Reference Erzeel and Rashkova2017), any increases in women MPs should have followed electoral success. Rather, the key conditions behind the strategic descriptive representation theory-a gender gap in voting and electoral threat-are present, with the PVV facing a more dire situation than its Swiss counterpart. Relying on primary and secondary resources, including news articles and candidate list position data, we see evidence in both cases of RRP party campaigns using women MP candidates-either in greater numbers or higher list positions-as a strategy to explicitly target women voters.

Switzerland 2015: "Swiss Girls Vote SVP"

The SVP has long been considered a Männerpartei, mainly represented and elected by men. And yet, in 2015, following an electoral loss in 2011 and faced with a significant gender gap (M/F ratio of 1.3), the SVP engaged in deliberate tactics to appeal to this undertapped female constituency. Under the centralized party organization led by Toni Brunner (Buhlmann, Zumbach, and Gerber Reference Buhlmann, Zumbach and Gerber2016; Mazzoleni Reference Mazzoleni, Pallaver and Wagemann2012), the SVP ran more women (82 candidates, 10 more than in the previous 2011 election) and built an advertising campaign around these women candidates. As shown in Figure 6, the Party indeed "decorated its campaign with women" (translation, "What do You Guys Have?" 2015). The message behind "Swiss Girls Vote JSVP [the Youth wing of the SVP]" was simple: (young) women should vote for the SVP because its candidates looked like them. As noted in Figure 6, gone was the SVP of "only old, shaggy men."

In addition to increasing the number of women candidates, the SVP put them in winnable positions (Gilardi Reference Gilardi2015b). In 2015, the share of SVP women candidates (19%) compared with elected women MPs (17%) was nearly 1 to 1 for the first time; it had ranged from 1.7 to 3.5 candidates per elected women MP in the five previous elections. Like this national campaign, regional SVP campaigns also revealed deliberate strategies to attract women voters. In the canton of Solothurne, for example, the SVP nominated an all-women's list and founded a women's section one month before the election. Local party president Silvio Jeker claimed that the SVP had, "a good basis to now gain a foothold with women," while then local party vice president Christine Rütti said in a speech to party members, "we need more middle-class women." As a result, the women's share of elected SVP MPs rose by six percentage points from the previous election, reaching 17% of the delegation. With this election, the SVP also closed their gender gap in voter support. In fact, analysts credited the SVP's vote share gains in 2015 explicitly to an increase in women voters (Foppa Reference Foppa2015).

The Netherlands 2017: "Geert's Angels"

The Dutch PVV Party also exhibited an election strategy targeting women voters with women's faces in 2017. Geert Wilders has been head of the PVV since he founded the party in 2006 and maintains strong control over candidate selection as leader (De Lange and Art Reference De Lange and Art2011). He has a reputation as being calculating and media-savvy-and one of the "most strategic" politicians out there. In 2017, the conditions were ripe for the party to pursue an inclusive form of strategic descriptive representation. The PVV had lost votes in the previous 2012 parliamentary elections (10.1% compared with 15.5% in 2010), and they faced a high gender gap (M/F voter ratio of 1.58) in their electoral support. In line with our theory, in 2017, the PVV presented a party list top-heavy with women MP candidates: the prized second and third spots on the list were both occupied by women. Wilders announced the party list with a photo shoot of the top three candidates: himself flanked by the two women, Fleur Agema and Vicky Maijer. The news made the front page of the largest Dutch daily, De Telegraaf, with the headline, "Geert's Angels" ( Figure 7). Wilders himself acknowledged that the placement of the women was part of a tactic to draw a broader electorate to the PVV. In an interview with De Telegraaf, he said, "The supporters of the PVV range from low to highly educated, from man to woman, from native to immigrant."

In contrast to the Swiss SVP's strategic inclusion tactic, the PVV did not increase the share of women candidates on the list: in 2012, 28% of the candidates were women, compared with 26% in 2017. But more women were placed higher on the list in 2017, and two of the top three candidates were women. The party's strategy was also markedly different from that pursued by the PVV five years earlier when the PVV did not emphasize women in their campaign or media coverage. This de-emphasis is further evidence of their 2012 strategic exclusion tactic consistent with our theory's predictions for an electorally strong (vote gain = 10% from 2006 to 2010), male-dominated (M/F = 1.25) party. As a result of the greater prioritization of women candidates on the party list in 2017, the share of women MPs increased from 20% in 2012 to 30%. The 2017 inclusive strategy also seems to have worked in terms of attracting women: in 2017, 45% of the party's voters were women, versus 40% in 2012, and the PVV's vote share increased by about 3 percentage points.

DO ALL PARTIES EXHIBIT STRATEGIC DESCRIPTIVE REPRESENTATION OF WOMEN?

Having identified strategic descriptive representation as a tool employed by RRP parties, we might ask to what extent RRP parties are unique in employing strategic descriptive representation. To test the bounds of the generalizability of our argument, we replicate our models of women MPs using the full dataset of all European parties. We consider the effect of our key variables both with all parties pooled ( Table 2) and within each party family individually ( Table 3). The results suggest that the strategy of gender-based descriptive representation is not universally employed by all parties. As shown in Table 2, the coefficient of the interaction between lagged vote change and M/F voter ratio is in the expected direction but does not reach statistical significance in any model. This insignificant relationship is further confirmed by the marginal effects plot presented in Appendix Figure A4.

However, more nuanced conclusions emerge if we disaggregate the analyses by party family. In Table 3, we replicate the most complete model of women MPs for each party separately. Although the interaction between M/F ratio and vote change is not statistically significant for most families, the interaction has a negative and significant coefficient for the Christian Democratic party family, suggesting a similar conditional effect of electoral success and gender gap in voter support on their percentage of women MPs as among the RRP parties; this conclusion is reinforced by the marginal effect plot Figure A5 in the Appendix. However, further consideration of the values of their M/F ratio variable indicates that their dilemma is not about how to recruit women voters. Because the Christian Democratic parties face no relative paucity in women voters (they have an average M/F ratio below 1, placing them in the left half of Figure 3), the interaction effect means that they take an opposite tack when electorally vulnerable. Consistent with the need to recruit undertapped constituencies, they pursue a higher percentage of men MPs. The Christian Democratic approach may well then be one of the strategic descriptive representation of men.

CONCLUSION

We build on the existing literature on party strategic behavior to answer this question by identifying the conditions under which RRP parties are most likely to use strategic descriptive representation and by testing our argument with novel cross-national data. We argue that electorally weak political parties fundamentally seek out untapped constituencies. For weak parties lacking women voters, bolstering women's descriptive representation becomes a relatively low-cost tool for broadening their electorate and increasing their vote share. Based on data from 22 European RRP parties in 19 countries from 1985 to 2018 and qualitative evidence of party tactics of the Swiss SVP and Dutch PVV, our analyses find support for this strategic story. In other words, women's representation in RRP parties increased neither because parties' decisions reflect broader societal change nor because improving the quality of political representation is a normative good. Instead, parties made a strategic calculation that increasing women is electorally useful.

Our paper makes several empirical and theoretical contributions. First, the paper introduces a new dataset, expanding our knowledge of women's roles as party leaders, MPs, and voters. These data allow us to understand the changing characteristics of RRP parties, both in contrast to other party families and in relation to their RRP colleagues. As highlighted in this study, we now have time-series data to support the case-based findings of the substantial gender gaps in RRP party votes. With this information, we are able to not only trace gender differences in voter support for RRP parties over time, but we can advance the work on gender gaps by examining how they condition party behavior.

Second, we develop a comprehensive theory of the conditions under which parties engage in strategic descriptive representation. We suggest that RRP parties seeking to tap into a new female constituency are not limited to engaging in costly programmatic shifts along their dominant issue axis or in the addition of a new issue. Of course, the new women MPs may bring their own policy ideas and priorities, eventually diversifying the party platform, but this effect is secondary and delayed in time, and may not be as visible to existing voters as a purely programmatic strategy to attract different voter bases.

Our study has potential implications beyond Männerparteien. First, the utility of strategic descriptive representation is not limited to this party family. In theory, any party that needs to broaden its electoral support, while simultaneously suffering from a deficit in women's votes could look to promote more women for parliamentary office. Our extension of the analyses to all European parties reveals that Christian Democratic parties similarly see gender as a tool for bolstering their electoral fortunes, in their case, using men to counter their women-dominated electorate. For other party families, many of the key conditions for strategic descriptive representation by gender appear to be absent. For instance, Green and Social Democratic parties have relatively high proportions of women voters and MPs already. In such parties with more gender egalitarian ideology and high representation of women voters and MPs, there is less room to maneuver in attracting more women voters and electing more women. Additional qualitative research, including interviews with party leaders, MPs, and candidates, would help to further confirm the reasons why some party families are more likely to use strategic descriptive representation than others. Second, our findings raise another question for future studies: are the women elected as part of strategic descriptive representation qualitatively different from those elected under other conditions? In a party's effort to attract women voters while at the same time reducing men's opposition to such a strategy, perhaps these women candidates are more likely to toe the party line, be members of the party leadership dynasty, or young and attractive, as the SVP campaign materials ( Figure 6) suggest (Bernhard Reference Bernhard2018).

While the current study focuses on gender, we might expect to see strategic descriptive representation used to target other untapped groups in the electorate. Parties that struggle to gain support from younger voters may choose to elect more young people as their MPs. Similarly, in line with the rise of homonationalist appeals by RRP parties linking the protection of LGBTI citizens to campaigns against Muslim immigrants (Spierings Reference Spierings2021), we might see parties promote LGBTI candidates to attract similarly identifying voters. While there are some notable examples of LGBTI RRP leaders (e.g., Alice Weidel and Pim Fortuyn), future research should systematically investigate the extent to which strategic descriptive representation is leveraged by RRP and other parties to appeal to a variety of underrepresented groups beyond women.

In addition to broadening the investigation of the limits of a descriptive representation strategy, this paper also raises questions about other dimensions of strategic representation tactics. Future research could add strategic substantive representation (representing the interests or preferences of certain groups) to the study of strategic representation. Just as increasing visible images of gender equality may lead more women to support a party, a similar vote gain to a male-dominated electorally threatened RRP party could result from its shift in emphasis toward issues that are attractive to women. Questions about the relative effectiveness of descriptive versus programmatic gender equality among RRP parties as well as the lasting implications of each for the quality of women's representation are a subject for future work.

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When Do Männerparteien Elect Women? Radical Right Populist Parties and Strategic Descriptive Representation | American Political Science Review | Cambridge Core

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When Do Männerparteien Elect Women? Radical Right Populist Parties and Strategic Descriptive Representation - Volume 117 Issue 2

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