Repositioning African women in politics: From critical mass to critical acts

abstract Affirmative action has been implemented through the African Union’s (AU) gender agenda to attain women’s political empowerment and to achieve gender justice goals both within the AU and by member states. Accordingly, quotas are used as the fast track means to ensure the increase in representation and participation of women in politics to achieve agreed gender parity and mainstreaming policy goals. Literature, particularly in relation to Africa, has tended to focus on the increased ‘quantity’ of women in political institutions rather than turning critical attention to the quality of change experienced as a result of women’s political participation and representation. The article asks what does it mean for African women to participate in the institutions of political decision-making? Drawing from interviews with gender policy makers and implementers at the AU, the article examines the ways in which political representation (critical acts) may have no more than symbolic value, instead of moving towards substantive representation in which women’s political actions have consequences and weight. It questions the ways in which women are hindered from substantive participation, including through being subtly undermined and marginalised, for example, through body-shaming or bringing aspects of their private lives under scrutiny in ways their male counterparts rarely are. The article considers the importance of the AU’s gender policy as a means to advance women’s political participation on the continent and raises the problem of feminist advocacy which has the potential to tokenise women in politics. Within the AU, and outside of it, women continue to advocate for women’s political empowerment in and through this influential regional body, whose gender policies inform those of the rest of the continent.