Feminism and the Third Way: a Call for Dialogue

Abstract

There are now more than 100 women in the British parliament, as a direct result of special measures taken by the Labour Party to achieve a better gender balance. By introducing all-women shortlists for the selec¬tion of candidates in roughly half of the key ‘winnable’ seats in the 1997 General Election, Labour raised the proportion of women in the house from 8 to 16 per cent. There are also more women in the Cabinet than ever before — a consequence of Labour’s introducing a quota system in elections to the Shadow Cabinet while the party was in opposition. The fact that women have been elected to more than one in three seats in the Scottish parliament and Welsh assembly is thanks to Labour’s policy of ‘twinning’ constituencies, with each pair selecting a male and female can¬didate. In 1999, women accounted for 48 per cent of all Labour members of the Scottish parliament and 50 per cent of all Labour members of the Welsh assembly.