Femeile în spațiul politic din România postcomunistă: De la „jocul” politic la construcția socială

Abstract

The article investigates the political mechanisms specific to contemporary Romanian politics and political parties, as well as those social representations related to gender roles and the definition of family that have contributed to maintaining a low level of women participation in Romanian politics after 1989. In a first part, it sets the conceptual context through a review of the main theoretical approaches for the political representation of women, with an emphasis on gender studies’ cognitive dimension. Second, it connects a quantitative evaluation of women’s presence in the Romanian post communist parliament with a qualitative analysis of public (i.e. mass media) discourse of the rejected legislative proposal to introduce gender quotas in various political and social processes. The author finds that, beyond the dynamics of political elites’ recruitment and the functioning of the political “game”, the ideological options and social representations that emphasize the differences between men and women, as well the central role of family in building gender roles play an essential part in maintaining a low number of women within the Parliament.