Gendered Leadership in the European Parliament’s Political Groups

Abstract

The chapter analyzes how leadership continues to be gendered in the European Parliament (EP), failing to provide a level playing field for MEPs. It focuses on the leadership positions provided by the political groups of the Parliament. Political groups have grown in importance alongside the institutional development of the EP, and leadership positions within them encompass those responsible for political, policy, and administrative leadership. This chapter analyzes political leadership in terms of political group leaders and national party delegation leaders; policy leadership in terms of nominations to the key positions of committee chairs and coordinators; and administrative leadership in terms of political groups’ secretaries general. We use extensive interview material (n=123), which covers MEPs and staff and includes responses to questions about political, policy, and administrative leadership within the political groups in the 8th (2014–2019) and 9th legislatures (2019–2024). Key findings show how men continue to dominate political leadership despite the gender-equal reputation of the EP. A particular hidden gendered structure is the leadership of national party delegations, where women are significantly in the minority. Policy leadership, in contrast, is the most gender-balanced area, though the conservative European People’s Party (EPP)—the biggest political group—is a notable exception in this regard. Finally, women are underrepresented in administrative leadership of the political groups. Gendered norms and practices continue to shape the scope of action within these leadership positions and underpin the challenges involved in making the EP a gender-equal arena.

Introduction: European Parliament’s Political Groups in Turbulent Times

“…Political groups have notably different selection procedures for these positions, combining both formal rules and procedures and informal norms. Formal rules in political group statutes can make for open and transparent selection procedures and enhance equality and democracy, while informal norms-prominent in the radical right groups-induce more opaque and less democratic processes (Kantola & Miller, 2022;see Ahrens & Kantola in this volume).…”

Parliamentary Politics and Polarisation Around Gender: Tackling Inequalities in Political Groups in the European Parliament

“…Once in office, women's political careers and the quality of their representative work are shaped by the gendered inequalities in parliaments (Erikson & Verge, 2022). In the EP, extant research shows that, first, gendered leadership structures and expectations have led to women being more equally represented in policy leadership (in committee chair and coordinator positions) than in political (political group leaders) or administrative (secretaries general) leadership positions (Kantola & Miller, 2022). Second, patterns of gender-based discrimination have been identified.…”

“…The Greens/EFA group had two women serving as committee chairs, while at the GUE/NGL, it was one man. The coordinator positions were equally divided (Kantola & Miller, 2022).…”

“…It reached a near gender balance in committee chairs in 2019 (3 women 4 men), representing a significant increase from 2014 (1 woman and 5 men). However, the coordinator positions remained male-dominated (82% men) (Kantola & Miller, 2022). The fact that it remains strongly conservative on gender issues explains much of the lack of progress in gender equality in the EP, for example, the lack of gender equality measures and gender mainstreaming in economic policy (Elomäki, 2021); the structural weakness of FEMM (Ahrens, 2016), its lagging behind in gender-balanced leadership (Kantola & Miller, 2022) and the lack of support for measures tackling sexual harassment within the parliament (Berthet & Kantola, 2020).…”

Mobilization against Sexual Harassment in the European Parliament: The MeTooEP campaign

“…The research material also reported instances where the Bureau tried to silence MeTooEP by informally calling the organizers of an event, in which MeTooEP was invited to speak, in order to block their intervention (S&D staff 8:12; S&D staff 2:33), in view of protecting the Parliament's notoriety (Author, 2020). As a result, the Secretariat and Bureau, both gendered institutional bodies (Kantola and Miller, 2022), constrained MeTooEP both passively -'inertia'and activelyby silencing the campaign. (Ahrens, 2018) Lastly, elected Members of the European Parliament (MEPs) and their political groups were two key institutional bodies for MeTooEP as they helped and empowered it.…”