Women in the Kyrgyz Parliament: Past Experience and Opportunities of New Electoral Process

Abstract

Dr. Ibraeva will speak about important moments of lobbying special measures to support women in politics and approved list of measures in the electoral legislation. The presentation will also seek to answer the following questions: what can be the outcomes of new electoral party system introduced for the first time in Kyrgyzstan? In what way the used opacity procedures to recruit women into parties can impact the results of forthcoming parliamentary elections? Has the history of development of political parties as closed man’s clubs basically ended in Kyrgyzstan? Can the introduction of special measures to support women, youth, and ethic groups be regarded as progress or a way for failure? How do authorities and regimes formulate “natural” categories of gender and age? What is the difference between age and gender representation in the elective lists of political parities? What is socio-demographical portrait of current female-candidates proposed by political parties? How many new female candidates do we see in the current election campaign? Which of potential female politicians will remain behind the 2007 elections and why? In conclusion, Dr. Ibraeva will picture all forms of resources owned by the female candidates, and describe scenarios of how the party leaders can use the female political resource.