All-Women Shortlists: Myths and Realities

Gender quotas have emerged globally as a key solution for improving women's political representation. Yet in Britain-where they take the form of all-women short-lists (AWS)-they remain contentious, both within and outside political parties. We identify nine common criticisms of AWS in the British context, related to candidate recruitment and selection, party and voter support and the effectiveness of 'quota women' as politicians. Using qualitative and quantitative data, we find that these objections do not hold when subjected to rigorous empirical analysis, suggesting that quotas do not pose a threat to 'merit' at any stage of the political process.