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The political consequences of Quota & Reservation Schemes

Female Political representation and political participation in Indian Panchayats

 

Introduction

 

Quotas and reservations for marginalized segments of the society are a common practice around the world, although there are different viewpoints on whether such policies actually benefit underrepresented groups when given a reserved place in a political institution. Supporters of such policies argue that people will feel that they are represented in the political process by members of their own group affecting the voting patterns of people, as they become more visible (Kudva 2003, 458; Deininger et al., 33; Jensensius 2012, 374). Critics however mention that quotas can “…reduce the quality of elected politicians and lead to alienation of the rest of the electorate (Jensensius 2012, 374)”. India has a significant history regarding quotas for minorities, implementing 1950s reservations for scheduled castes in the Lok Sabha and state assemblies since the 1950s, which makes them “…the best represented groups in the country’s political system today (Jensensius 2015, 85)”.

 

An ongoing debate in the Indian parliament is about the extension of the quota system to include women and Muslims in the Lok Sabha and state assemblies. However until this day, this discussion has not led to an amendment to the Indian Constitution. A proposal was made towards the national parliament in 1996, proposing to reserve 33 percent of all seats for women (Randall 2006, 63). This Bill was however not taken over by the members of the Lok Sabha and this has remained this way until this day. However on the 24th of April 1993 the Indian national parliament ratified the 74th Constitutional Amendment Act, enabling a quota of 33 percent for women in village councils or panchayats (Rai 1999, 88). This essay will look into what such policies mean for the political participation of women in these local village councils, by asking the following question: How do female reservation policies affect female political participation in local panchayats?

 

Different studies about the role of women in local panchayats have approached the subject from a developmental perspective, arguing whether the reservation policy has either empowered or disempowered the position of women in the local context of the panchayat. Other studies have approached the topic from a democratization perspective, arguing that development and democratization should be approached together. Already in 1999, Rai argued that “…unless the issues of class – based and caste – based differences are taken seriously by women’s groups in India, the wider question of empowerment cannot be satisfactorily answered (Rai 1999, 84). What becomes clear from reading different articles, is that the quota policies have led to mixed results. Instead of comparing a few local contexts, this essay will discuss the findings of each study separately in order to find out which factors have an influence on the success of quota and reservation policies for women in local panchayats. However one of the main studied areas is the state of Karnataka, which implemented and ratified the new amendment as the first stat in India (Bryld 2001, 155).

 

The 74th Constitutional Amendment

 

The following parts of the text of section 243T of the 74th Constitutional Amendment describe the specifics of the law: (3): Not  less than one-third (including the number of seats  reserved for  women belonging to the Scheduled Castes and the Scheduled Tribes) of  the total number of seats to be filled by direct election in every Municipality  shall  be  reserved  for women and  such   seats  may  be allotted by rotation to different constituencies in a Municipality. (4)  The officers of Chairpersons in the Municipalities shall be reserved for the Scheduled Castes, the Scheduled Tribes and women in such manner as the Legislature of a State may, by law, provide.1 The text clearly stipulates that women should be represented in these village councils by a third of the seats. In addition to that, although not specified in the text above, a third of the reservations for scheduled castes should also be reserved for women. And finally the same amount of seats are also reserved for women and scheduled castes as Chairpersons. Therefore women and/or people from scheduled castes can, according to law, have significant power on the local level. Whether the theory is also backed by the practice will be discussed below.

 

Castes, Class and Party

 

Seen from an historical perspective, scheduled castes and tribes had no position in local panchayats. However through the 73rd Amendment this all changed. Traditionally the scheduled castes and tribes were dominated by the Brahmins and upper castes (Bryld 2001, 155). Although from a perspective of democratization this seems like a good step forward, in reality it is not as positive. Looking at panchayats in Karnataka, Bryld shows that the people in the councils elected miss the resources necessary for politics (Bryld 2001, 169). This reason for this is the illiteracy and inexperience of the elected, which strongest among females. Bryld even goes as so far to say that “…in many ways the devolution of power to the rural villages in Karnataka proved to be an official legitimization of the local rural elite (Bryld 2001, 170).

 

This rural elite, as Bryld shows among the villages studied in Karnataka in the study, gave 89% of all the loans to families related to the elite within the panchayat (Bryld 2001, 168). These findings of Bryld in Karnataka are also supported by the study of Jayal, who argues that the decentralization process of panchayats has led to a bad devolution of power as the responsibilities between the panchayats and the state are not clearly divided (Jayal 2006, 26). This is one of the reasons that, according to Jayal, that women do not feel represented by the panchayats and that for example only 15% of women in Madhya Pradesh believed in the system of the panchayats (Jayal 2006, 27). When looking back to Karnataka, the low level of trust in the system can perhaps also be due to inequality between women: 66% of women representatives in Karnataka were from higher castes (Jayal 2006, 20). Perhaps education then is the solution for marginalized groups.

 

According to Dunning and Nilekani the impact of ethnic quotas can even be minimal, because party affiliation is even argued to be stronger than ethnic affiliation when resources need to be divided (Dunning and Nilekani 2013, 54). Dunning and Nilekani are skeptical about the quota system, saying that it has not solved the problem of inequality along caste lines in India (Dunning and Nilekani 2013, 54). Data from the Census of India shows that the level of rural poverty among Scheduled Castes in relation to the rest of society actually grew in India, from 14.6 to 19% (Census of India, Singh 2009; in Dunning and Nilekani 2013, 54). With their study they show that the decentralization process of the local panchayats does not help solve inequality and often helps the status quo, like reported in the studies of Jayal and Bryld.

 

 

The political participation of women

 

Despite the inequality that remains for castes in local village councils and the inexperience of women, both Jayal (2006) and Kudva (2003) argue that women have become more visible through their political participation. “Similarly, the participation of women in panchayats, as much as their frequent exclusion from the actual proceedings in these bodies, has created an awareness of alternative roles and a more positive self-image than that of internalized over a lifetime of patriarchally defined gender identity. The participation of women in panchayats is certainly one mechanism through which such change can take place, and the strategic gender interests of women advanced (Jayal 2006, 32)”. Additionally it leads to a change in the household relationships between men and women, at least for some women (Deininger et al. 2015, 47). Another study by the World Bank shows how women presidents perform in the local village councils, about which they are fairly positive and show that the women are often not influenced by people from their caste or class to participate. Although the inexperience remains an issue, the study expects this to become better in the future (Ban and Rao 2008, 526).

 

Conclusion

 

There is hope for female political participation in local panchayats. Although there are some starting problems, the participation of women does tend to lead more dedication of resources to ‘women’s interests’. However the fact remains that their position in society does not improve through their political representation, as the role of panchayats in the distribution of resources remains small (Jayal 2006, 28). At the same time there is the issue of inequality between women themselves, which first needs to be solved in order to really make an impact. A piece of policy often is not the only solution. For the future the question remains whether female political participation will be extended to higher levels in politics. The 108th Amendment to the constitution is still pending, which would reserve a third of seats in the Lok Sabha for women.1 The fact that this process takes quite a long time also gives credit to the remark of Rai in 1999: Could it be that enhanced representation of women in the national parliament spells a far greater and immediate challenge to the gendered status quo within the party political system? The panchayats while symbolic of grass – roots democracy in India, have never been resourced well enough to be important to the political processes in Indian politics (Rai 1999, 88). As the other studies show, this is still the case.

 

 

Literature

 

Ban, R. Rao, V. 2008. Tokenism or Agency? The Impact of Women’s Reservations on Village Democracies in South India. Economic Development and Cultural Change 56 (3): 501 – 530.

 

Bryld, E. 2001. Increasing Participation in Democratic Institutions Through Decentralization: Empowering Women and Scheduled Castes and Tribes Through Panchayat Raj in Rural India. Democratization 8 (3): 149 – 172.

 

Deininger, K. Songqing, J. Nagarajan, H.K. Fang, X. 2015. Does Female Reservation Affect Long – Term Political Outcomes? Evidence from Rural India. The Journal of Development Studies 51 (1): 32 – 49.

 

Dunning, T. Nilekani, J. 2013. Ethnic Quotas and Political Mobilization: Caste, Parties, and Distribution in Indian Village Councils. American Political Science Review 107 (1): 35 – 56.

 

Jayal, N.G. 2006. Engendering local democracy: The impact of quotas for women in India's panchayats. Democratization 13 (1): 15 – 35.

 

Jensenius, F.R. 2012. Political Quotas in India: Perceptions of Constituent Political Representations. Asian Survey 52 (2): 373-394.

 

Jensenius, F.R. 2015. Mired in Reservations: The Path – Dependent History of Electoral Quotas in India. The Journal of Asian Studies 74 (1): 85 – 105.

 

Kudva, N. 2003. Engineering Elections: The Experiences of Women in Panchayati Raj in Karnataka, India. International Journal of Politics, Culture and Society 16 (3): 445 – 463.

 

Randall, V. 2006. Legislative Gender Quotas and Indian Exceptionalism: The Travails of the Women’s Reservation Bill. Comparative Politics 39 (1): 63 – 82.

 

Rai, S.M. 1999. Democratic institutions, political representation and women’s empowerment: The quota debate in India. Democratization 6 (3): 84 – 99.

 

http://www.thehindu.com/news/national/womens-reservation-bill-the-story-so-far/article6969294.ece (accessed May 12th 2016.

 

http://indiacode.nic.in/coiweb/amend/amend74.htm (accessed May 12th 2016)