Status of Women’s Citizenship
and
Democratic Politics in Canada
Jane Jenson
Département de science politique
Université de Montréal
www.cccg.umontreal.ca
Inter-American Commission of Women
Second Hemispheric Forum Women’s Full Citizenship for Democracy
18-21 July 2012
Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic
outline
1. Citizenship regimes – a conceptual
approach
2. Canada’s citizenship regime – a genderbased assessment on three dimensions
 Access
 Rights
 Belonging
Citizenship 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
PRACTICES OF ACCESS AND THE
QUALITY OF POLITICAL DEMOCRACY
Access to political democracy
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.
BUT
• Formal rights do not provide
equal access to elected office in
these first-past-the-post systems.
•
Canada is only #40 on the Interparliamentary Union’s ranking.
•
Still no “critical mass” at any level
of government.
•
Very few practices of quota.
Democratic politics – the numbers
% female
House of
Commons, 2011
Provincial
legislatures,
2010
Municipal
politics
Federal Cabinet
Provincial
Cabinets
25%
25%
24%
Assessment
“…women experience
nearly equivalent
levels of
underrepresentation at
all three levels of
government”*
26%
30%
*E. Tolley, “Do Women ‘Do Better’ in
Municipal Politics?” Canadian Journal
of Political Science, 44: 3, 2011.
Why this under-representation?
•
Less a problem of leaders …
•
•
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 women’s
movement in electoral
politics.
Cabinets generally “overrepresent” 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).
But 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.
RIGHTS & THEIR
DISTRIBUTION – THE QUALITY
OF SOCIAL AND ECONOMIC
DEMOCRACY
Significant 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.
But 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.
Despite a right to non-discrimination
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 antidiscrimination legislation and
equal rights provisions … there is
still a significant income gap
between men and women.”
Due to both retirement incomes
and earnings.
Women and Men's employment
part-time, by age
2500
2000
45 +
1500
25-44
1000
15-24
500
0
women
men
Approach 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 UNICEF’s 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
Globe & Mail 4 July 2012
Today's modern parent: Daycare
poor, with little to save
For women, limited access to ECEC means:
•
•
•
Part-time work
Informal care, and worries about quality
High-cost care, and inability to pay.
Social 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
Canadian 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 women’s 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 women’s health and wellbeing as well as their current
earnings and future income.
THE BELONGING DIMENSION
OF THE CANADIAN
CITIZENSHIP REGIME.
INTERCULTURAL RELATIONS
Aboriginal 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.
•
Marginalisation continues in
Aboriginal communities –
poverty, inadequate housing,
tainted water, ill-health, suicide,
etc.
•
In particular, there is an ongoing 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 Women’s
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.
Reasonable 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