Women and Politics in East and Southeast Asia

Women’s descriptive representation in East and Southeast Asia remains lower than global average. Apart from Timor-Leste and Taiwan, no country has achieved the 30 percent “critical mass” of women parliamentarians—a number seen as the minimum proportion necessary to influence policies. East and Southeast Asia is a diverse region where, unlike in South Asia, the rise of powerful women leaders came about only in recent decades. With the rise of prominent women leaders, such as Corazon Aquino, Megawati Sukarnoputri, Yingluck Shinawatra, Park Geun-hye, and Aung San Suu Kyi, studies on dynastic or familial ties have become more prominent, and political science and area studies journals now publish frequently on gender and politics in Asia. Previously, qualitative, descriptive work based on historical archives, ethnography, or elite interviews has dominated. With more cross-country and public opinion data sets, however, quantitative studies have flourished. Similar to those dealing with the Global North, theories to explain the supply and demand of women in politics in Asia include: (1) international factors and diffusion theory, (2) women’s activism and mass movements, (3) institutional designs (e.g., quotas, electoral systems, candidate selection, party politics), and (4) culture and religion. Beyond the literature that theorizes how women engage in politics, another body of literature explores the experiences of women in politics. Who wins in elections? What are the experiences of women candidates and politicians? What are the barriers to substantively representing women? Findings demonstrate that highly educated, professional elite women win elections, while women in cabinet tend to hold “soft” and lower profile portfolios. Moreover, many prominent female state and party leaders come to power through their connection with prominent male leaders. The experiences of female politicians also differ depending on the level of politics, namely, local or national level. The status of women’s representation is further impacted by the regime type. A striking anomaly is the higher number of women politicians in authoritarian, one-party states than in established democracies in the region. Yet do authoritarian regimes with high numbers of female representatives better serve women’s interests? What is the relationship between women and democratic revolutions? In the Philippines, Taiwan, and South Korea, women’s activism and women leaders played key roles in democratic revolutions. More research is needed on assessing women’s substantive representation in both regimes. While it is important to examine politics through the lens of gender, it is equally important to understand how gender inequality intersects with ethnic minority and religious identities. Thus far, few researchers have adopted intersectional approaches in examining how women in politics can be disadvantaged by multiple sources of oppression.