Why aspirational targets will fail - Women's Agenda

Why aspirational targets will fail

Publically at least, our political leaders are united in their acknowledgement that we need more women in politics. Watching the escalating debate in Canberra this week, it appears that what remains a mystery to most, is how we achieve more women in these roles.

The Opposition Leader has set a 10 year target to reach 50/50 women in the Labor Party, and hopefully this will also be reflected in any future Labor Cabinet or Shadow Cabinet. Minister Christopher Pyne has stated that more effort is needed to attract women to political careers, but that the ‘merit’ principle needs to remain sacrosanct.

The Parliamentary Secretary to the Treasurer, Kelly O’Dwyer believes that soft targets will help to focus energy and thought. Shadow Minister Kate Ellis welcomed the 50/50 target set by her leader and Minister Michaelia Cash has once again reinforced that while she supports targets, she will not support legislated quotas, as they ‘wont drive cultural change’.

Our parliaments should represent the communities they serve, and 51% of the Australian community are women. We know from a substantial evidence base that among the many benefits of having more women in parliament are;

– Policies are more likely to address the needs of both men and women
– Girls report having more ambition and greater hope for their own future
– Unpaid work starts to be shared more equally between men and women

Special measures are needed to drive change. Quotas (legislated by government) can take a range of forms, legislated candidate quotas, legislated political party quotas or reserved seats for women. Then there is also the model of political parties having voluntary targets.

The World Economic Forum publishes an annual ranking of the best countries to be a woman. If we look at the top 10 countries, not one of them have got to where they are, without the introduction of a special measure in their parliaments. Nine out of the ten countries have quotas in place, and the tenth, Denmark, had voluntary targets in place twice but has since removed them on the belief that they now have consistent flows of female candidates and leaders. There is no evidence to suggest that progress can be made without dedicated, special measures which seek to redress the history of inequality faced by women. There is absolutely no evidence of ‘unqualified, un-meritorious’ women obtaining these roles. Quite the opposite in fact.

The difference between a ‘quota’ and a ‘target’ is simply one of consequence. If a quota is not met, there is some form of punishment – a political party de-registered, or told they have 6 months to address the gap, or a fine in some countries. In some places, targets too have consequences. Failure to meet a target can result in a reduction of remuneration for leaders, or a change in leadership or a ‘notice to show cause’. Where targets have accountability measures built in, they work. The problem with targets, is that too often, leaders announce them, enjoy all of the praise they receive for having realised there is a problem and then do nothing different to change the outcome.

Targets can drive change in individual organisations, where the leadership have strong accountability measures in place and where they are consistently prioritised. However, not all leaders do prioritise this issue, and the informal ‘targets’ haven’t worked in the last 5 decades, so why are they likely to now?

If you are serious enough about your target that you have built in accountability measures and consequences for not reaching the target, then in fact – you support a quota system, rebranded. If what you are resisting is a ‘penalty’ being applied, then perhaps in fact you aren’t so committed to achieving the target?

On the issue of ‘merit’, the current debate makes a fundamental assumption – that all of our current leaders started from a level playing field and have reached their roles through an objective assessment of their skills and knowledge. In reality, of course, this isn’t the case. Biases exist in our society and education system that may encourage men into political careers more than women. The pre-selection process can be ruthless and is of course a game of who you know, who they know and who will back you. It is no wonder that the current opaque system delivers us a majority of white, middle-aged men.

Merit is a subjective process. It is some combination of past experience, future potential and organisational fit. What we know from all of the research, is that in assessing future potential, people are more likely to preference candidates who behave, act and think like they do – ruling out diverse outcomes. When it comes to fit, I imagine it is hard to demonstrate ‘fit’ in our current major parties unless you are willing to conform to the behavioural norms demonstrated in question time. Perhaps rather than hiding behind the ‘merit principle’ we should accept that a flawed merit system has delivered us very few women in Cabinet and an overall female representation in parliament of 29.2%. Continuing to rely on the same system will continue to reinforce the same outcome.

With regards to the issue of how to affect cultural change, I agree with Minister Cash, that no single strategy will work on its own and that to affect lasting change, cultural and structural change will be needed. That being said, there is no evidence of major cultural change campaigns working, without legal backing and ‘consequences’ for non-compliance. Consider our attitudes to seatbelts or smoking. Not wearing a seatbelt and smoking were commonplace and despite awareness raising campaigns, behaviour did not shift. Legislative requirements and financial penalties, together with awareness and attitudinal change, drove the change. Cultural change on something as deeply held as gender inequality without legislative support and financial penalties, will not work.

If we are serious about getting more women into politics, then I agree with Sharman Stone – we need to look at the structure of politics and make fundamental changes. 26 weeks per year away from your home and 3-4 hours a day of immature, aggressive posturing and showmanship in question time I imagine puts off a lot of amazing men and women from entering political office. And that is before we start considering the way we treat female leaders and the public commentary about every aspect of their lives, dress and family.

Australia has been talking about needing more women in parliament for decades. What we actually need is strong leadership and special measures which will address the biases that exist in the current processes. We need to attract more women into politics, and then we need to ensure that they have equal opportunity to contribute and lead. This will involve having some fundamental conversations about values and respectful behaviour with our current pollies.

Quotas or targets with real accountability measures may both work – but without either, we will still be having this conversation long past 2025.

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