Gender Parity: A Case for Fair Voting and Party Rules The United
States trails behind ninety-one countries for women's
representation in its national legislature. Ranking behind most
industrialized democracies, women fill a mere eighteen percent
of U.S. Congressional seats. Many factors contribute to the
level of descriptive representation (representation that
reflects the electorate) present in a state's government. Two
striking influences on representation are structural and
institutional: the electoral system in place and the party rules
employed. Women tend to gain more seats in national legislatures
when countries use fair voting (proportional representation),
particularly when fair voting is used in tandem with either
gender quotas or internal rules to promote women's
representation. Fair voting systems rely on multi-seat
districts, which create more incentives for parties to nominate
women and for individual women to choose to run. Of the top
twenty counties for women's representation, nineteen use a f