TY - JOUR
T1 - ‘What did the winning candidate have that I don’t have?’
T2 - gender, politics and elections in Solomon Islands
AU - Baker, Kerryn
N1 - Publisher Copyright:
© 2018, © 2018 Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group.
PY - 2018/10/2
Y1 - 2018/10/2
N2 - Women’s political under-representation is a concern for both emerging and established democracies. In Solomon Islands, only four women were elected to Parliament in the 40 years from independence in 1978 to 2018. This article analyses the barriers to success for female candidates in Solomon Islands elections, focusing on the impact of informal institutions related to kinship, clientelism and leadership. It argues that in a context such as Solomon Islands, an emerging democracy with a weakly institutionalised party system, informal institutions play a highly influential, and highly gendered, role.
AB - Women’s political under-representation is a concern for both emerging and established democracies. In Solomon Islands, only four women were elected to Parliament in the 40 years from independence in 1978 to 2018. This article analyses the barriers to success for female candidates in Solomon Islands elections, focusing on the impact of informal institutions related to kinship, clientelism and leadership. It argues that in a context such as Solomon Islands, an emerging democracy with a weakly institutionalised party system, informal institutions play a highly influential, and highly gendered, role.
KW - Gender
KW - Melanesia
KW - Solomon Islands
KW - elections
KW - female candidates
KW - politics
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85053916029&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1080/14662043.2018.1517953
DO - 10.1080/14662043.2018.1517953
M3 - Article
SN - 1466-2043
VL - 56
SP - 427
EP - 445
JO - Commonwealth and Comparative Politics
JF - Commonwealth and Comparative Politics
IS - 4
ER -