Egypt’s Electoral Labyrinth Undermines Women’s Political Representation

The current electoral labyrinth in Egypt continues to pose a significant challenge to creating a just and all-inclusive political system. Despite the myriad electoral reforms and constitutional amendments passed in the past four years, women continue to play a minor role in the decision-making process in postrevolutionary Egypt. The new constitution unveiled in early 2014 lacks a constitutional provision or a quota system that would guarantee equal political representation for women; this will negatively impact women’s ability to exert influence in the political arena. Most of the success stories for women’s political representation in the Middle East and North Africa region come from countries with strong quota or established party systems, and neither of these conditions exists in Egypt. Furthermore, the newly introduced constitution,¹ and the election law² (Law 202) — recently declared unconstitutional³ by the Supreme Constitutional Court⁴ — will likely lead to greater fragmentation and ineffectiveness of the party structures in Egypt. This, in turn, will further limit opportunities for women’s political representation.

In contrast to the Tunisian context where women’s groups played a pivotal role in establishing gender parity in all aspects of the decision-making process throughout the drafting of the postrevolutionary Tunisian constitution, women’s rights activists and political groups in Egypt marginally contributed to the drafting the 2014 constitution due to their internal and ideological schisms.⁵ Despite the undeniable contributions in the early part of the 20th century of Egyptian women⁶ who advocated for a feminist agenda, demanded increased freedoms and put an end to the British occupation in the country,⁷ women’s movements witnessed a severe regression over the last few decades due to widespread state repression, onerous control of civil society organizations by the state, limited funding and the rise of Islamic fundamentalism. These developments have forced women back to the private sphere, and most importantly, have significantly limited their presence in the decision-making arena. It comes as no surprise that the two Egyptian Constituent Assemblies tasked to draft the Egyptian constitution in 2011 and 2013 had merely 6 and 10 percent women, respectively –– with little or no consultation with major women’s organizations in the country. In sum, the lack of a unified feminist agenda coupled with the overwhelming resistance to the inclusion of a legislative quota for women have led to the absence of a provision that would guarantee equal political representation on the national and subnational levels in the constitution.⁸

According to the new election law,⁹ Egypt’s next parliament — to be elected within months — will comprise 567 seats¹⁰: 420 seats will be directly elected in single-member districts (via plurality system); 120 seats will be elected through closed lists; and 27 seats (5 percent of the total) will be directly appointed by the executive. A provisional quota system — to be implemented only for the upcoming parliamentary elections — is expected to secure 56 seats for women (out of the 120 closed-lists seats). In addition, Egypt’s National Council for Women announced¹¹ last December that President Abdel-Fattah el-Sissi promised to appoint women to 14 of the 27 directly appointed seats. Thanks to these legislative reforms and electoral maneuvers, women will be able to secure a minimum of 70 seats in the House of Representatives — about 12 percent — in addition to the seats that they might acquire through direct elections running as individual candidates.

While deemed an improvement compared with Egypt’s first postrevolutionary People’s Assembly¹² — where women won merely 10 of the 508 contested seats, mainly due to the fact that female candidates were placed at the bottom of the electoral lists¹³ — the current situation does not indicate a major leap for women’s political representation compared with former President Hosni Mubarak’s regime.¹⁴ First, the shift back to the single-member electoral system (about three-quarters of the electorate) will favor candidates with strong state and family ties — including well-known figures in Mubarak’s regime — and further weaken political parties. Female politicians in Egypt face many hardships running as individuals in single-member districts, such as the prevailing societal bias against female candidates, lack of financial resources, and limited campaign management skills and political expertise. Furthermore, political parties in Egypt are highly fragmented and ineffective. There are presently about 97 political parties with different names yet indistinguishable variations in terms of ideology and electoral platform. The fact that political parties are only allowed to compete as parties on the closed lists¹⁵ will unquestionably lead to further fragmentation and ineffectiveness¹⁶ as well as diminished roles for women in these parties. Finally, most of the success stories for women’s political representation in the Arab world have occurred in countries with a strong quota system (Jordan and Algeria) or strong political parties (Morocco and Tunisia), and Egypt has neither.

As we find ourselves well into 2015, there is no indication that the current electoral system will lead to empowering Egyptian women in the decision-making process. The fact that women’s issues were not on the agenda of policymakers in transitional Egypt will continue to leave its imprint on women’s political rights for decades to come. Fortunately, the political scene is ripe for women to seize the opportunity to push for genuine change and for more active roles in the political arena, especially after the fall of former President Mohammed Morsi’s regime and the considerable regression of Islamism in the country. However, this will only be possible if women’s groups and feminist organizations are able to put their differences aside and work together on producing a unified, coherent agenda to advance the political and social rights of women across the country. Finally, increased cooperation and coordination among national and regional women’s organizations would be critical for the success of their efforts to promote women’s issues and push for genuine changes.

[1] International Foundation for Electoral Systems, Elections in Egypt: The Electoral Framework in Egypt’s Continuing Transition: February 2011 – September 2013, IFES Briefing Paper, October 2013, http://www.ifes.org/Content/Publications/White-Papers/2013/Elections-in-Egypt-The-Electoral-Framework-in-Egypts-Continuing-Transition.aspx.

[2] Law 202, issued on Dec. 21, 2014, outlines the distribution of seats among governorates and electoral districts. The most recent ruling of the SCC was mainly against the seat allocation and delimitations introduced in this law: https://www.elections.eg/images/pdfs/laws/Constituencies2014-202.pdf.

[3] “Egypt court declares part of election law unconstitutional,” The Associated Press, March 1, 2015, http://www.wsj.com/articles/egypt-court-declares-part-of-election-law-unconstitutional-1425203708.

[4] SCC based its ruling on the fact that the allocation of seats among governorates as well as the delimitation of electoral districts and boundaries across constituencies as stated in Law 202 are contradictory to Article 102 in Egypt’s 2014 constitution and the ensuing Article 4 of Law 46 of the House of Representatives.

[5] It is notable that the constitutional committee had only five women out of 50 members.

[6] Margot, Badran, Feminists, Islam, and the Nation: Gender in the Making of Modern Egypt (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1995).

[7] Thomas Phillip, “Feminism and Nationalist Politics in Egypt,” in Lois Beck and Nikki Keddie, eds., Women in the Muslim World (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1978).

[8] According to Article 180, “Women are granted one-quarter of the seats in elected local councils,” which is far from being equal representation based on gender equality.

[9] Ibid.

[10] The 2011 People’s Assembly had 508 members: 498 men and 10 women.

[11] “Government Institution to Pay Fees for Female Candidates in Parliamentary Election,” Daily News Egypt, December 24, 2014, http://www.dailynewsegypt.com/2014/12/24/government-institution-pay-fees-female-candidates-parliamentary-election/.

[12] The lower chamber is now called the House of Representatives instead of the People’s Assembly according to Law 46, issued in 2014. This same law also abolished the Upper House (Majlis Al-Shura) in Egypt.

[13] The previous Islamist-dominated People’s Assembly (PA) was also elected based on a mixed electoral system, with two-thirds of the assembly elected through proportional lists (46 proportional party lists) and one-third (83 members) elected through individual lists. The SCC ordered the dissolution of the People’s Assembly in June 2012, ruling it as unconstitutional. The ruling was based on the facts that the existing electoral structure favored political parties to compete for seats in the elections (mainly the Islamist ones) and that individual candidates did not get an equal chance to compete.

[14] The last PA under Mubarak’s regime had 64 females out of 444 seats (about 15 percent).

[15] Individuals are also allowed to run on party lists according to Law 46. There are four national constituencies/districts for the closed lists, and each has either 15 or 45 seats. The 45-seat lists must include a minimum of nine Copts, nine workers or farmers, six youths, three members with disabilities, three members who live abroad and 21 women (these categories may overlap). The 15-seat lists should include a minimum of three Copts, two farmers, one member with a disability, one member living abroad, two youths and seven women. A closed list wins if it receives more than 50 percent of the votes, in contrast to the proportional representation lists in the elections for the 2011 People’s Assembly.

[16] Ahmed Morsy, “Individuals Before Parties in Egypt’s Elections,” Carnegie Endowment for International Peace Middle East Analysis, July 15, 2014, http://carnegieendowment.org/sada/2014/07/15/individuals-before-parties-in-egypt-s-elections/hfy2.

Marwa Shalaby, Ph.D., is a fellow for the Middle East and the director of the Women’s Rights in the Middle East Program at the Baker Institute. Her work focuses on comparative politics and research methodology, with a concentration on Middle Eastern politics, democratization, and gender and politics.

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