Moving from Formal to Substantive Equality
Alternatives to Gender Quotas: The Canadian Experience
Senator Fortin-Duplessis shared her perspective on Canada’s progress towards equality for women and their improved situation in society. She explained that when she began her career in municipal politics, she was the first woman elected to the city council of Sainte-Foy in the province of Quebec. It was in 1981 – during the last century – but still only 33 years ago, she pointed out. She ran in the 1984 federal election with 212 other women candidates. Only 27 of them were elected. “Think about it,” she said. “The first woman was elected to Canada’s parliament in 1921. More than 63 years later, we still made up only 9% of members of parliaments.”
The landscape has changed significantly since then – in 30 years, the number of women elected has nearly tripled. In Canada’s last federal election in 2011, 76 women were successful, and women now hold nearly 25% of seats in the House of Commons.
We haven’t achieved parity yet, but
what is remarkable is that Canada
has managed to increase women’s
presence in parliament without
having to resort to legislation.
She explained that Canada has chosen to examine why women are missing from the political, public, and even social spheres. Rather than addressing the symptoms, government resources are directed to the root causes of the problem. In other words, energy has been focused
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