Are (populist) radical right parties Männerparteien? Evidence from Bulgaria

Abstract

This paper focuses on the representation of women in radical right parties and examines the often assumed relationship between the radical right and gender, namely that radical right parties are overwhelmingly ran, supported by, and representing the male part of the population. Using data from elections, party platforms, and parliamentary committees the paper asks ‘Are PRR parties Männerparteien?’ Using data from Bulgaria, we suggest that the Männerparteien argument is too simplistic and argue that in order to make a claim about representation, one needs to study both female and male MPs and across all party families. We find that while radical right parties are still primarily composed of men, an examination of the substantive representation of women’s issues, puts this relationship into question. Furthermore, we show that while men outnumber women in all political parties, both radical right women and men have been more active in women’s issues than their gender counterparts from other political parties. These findings suggest two things: one, we cannot study gender equality matters without comparing the activity of both men and women; and two, the classification of radical right parties as Männerparteien based on descriptive representation only, is too simplistic and to an extent, misleading.

KEYWORDS:

• Radical right
• gender politics
• substantive representation
• political parties
• Bulgaria

Much of the scholarship on the radical right (RR) points to the fact that these political parties are largely run, supported by, and representative of men. To that effect, the term Männerparteien has been used to describe such parties (Mudde 2007). However, beyond a mere observation, little has been done thus far to examine the actual value of this claim. The latter is especially true in terms of who and how these parties represent. With the rise of populism and radical right parties in both Western and Eastern Europe, their growing political influence in the face of the refugee crisis, and the undeniably strong leadership of female politicians in some radical right parties, the question of the relationship between gender and the radical right can no longer be overlooked. In this respect, we ought to devote more attention to questioning the raison d’être of these parties and focus our efforts on gaining deeper understanding of their leaders, supporters, and their representation. This article contributes to the representation debate, showing that classifying radical right parties as Männerparteien based solely on descriptive statistics is, one, unsubstantiated and, two, methodologically incorrect. In order to answer the question of whether radical right parties are indeed Männerparteien, one needs to examine the substantive representation of these parties’ MPs and compare it with the activity of MPs in all other party families. We do that here, with the help of the Bulgarian case.

Studying the relationship of gender and the radical right in Bulgaria contributes to the literature in a number of ways. First, it puts an often taken for granted classification of radical right parties as Männerparteien to a test, and shows that, contrary to our expectation that women-related issues are not a priority to Populist Radical Right Parties (PRRP), such issues do get addressed by MPs from the radical right. Moreover, in comparison to other (female and male) MPs, women in the radical right parties of Bulgaria have been most active on women’s issues. Second, it points out a methodological problem of comparing radical parties only with themselves or women only with other women, which we often encounter in gender politics studies. The current article illustrates the importance of ‘putting things into perspective’ by offering descriptive and substantive representation of both male and female MPs from political parties across the board and shows that Mudde’s (2007) critique towards the study of such parties and their gender composition in isolation is indeed correct. Finally, presenting original data on the overall parliamentary activity of all MPs, the study reveals that in Bulgaria, but perhaps also in most East European states, the emphasis on women’s issues remains negligible in comparison to everything else. In effect, this finding suggests that the development, implementation, and adoption of gender equality in this region of the world are still in the early stages.

The article proceeds as follows. We examine the theoretical arguments that underpin our research questions and present our hypotheses. We examine the recent rise of the radical right in post-communist Bulgaria. We present and analyse original collected data, and finally, we conclude by assessing the contribution of this study and of the Bulgarian case to the study of women in radical right parties and the gender and politics literature more broadly.

Women, populist radical right parties, and the Bulgarian case: a theoretical framework

The radical right is a political phenomenon which has gained enough public attention and remarkable electoral success in the last two to three decades to turn itself into a newly established party family (Mudde 2007; Rydgren 2005) which can no longer be overlooked whenever we are talking about party systems, representation, or the like. Despite their national varieties, parties from the populist radical right (PRR) family share three characteristics, as outlined by Mudde (2007) – nativism, authoritarianism, and populism. Nativism and authoritarianism manifest themselves in various types of nationalism that is country- and context-specific, and in the West is mostly linked to immigration issues causing pressure on domestic job markets and social provision structures. To that we can further add male domination.

The male domination is an observation that PRR parties are Männerparteien, which are predominantly led by, represented by, and supported by men (Mudde and Kaltwasser 2015). Although we know that both the membership and the support of radical right parties are largely male, scholars are still struggling to explain the so-called gender gap we find in voting for these parties. Some scholars (Givens 2004; Spierings and Zaslove 2015) have found that one of the most important reasons why people support populist radical right parties – their views on immigration – are the same for men and women, but cannot explain the gender gap. Others (Harteveld et al. 2015) have argued that although the level of nativism, authoritarianism, or discontent with democracy is similar among men and women, men consider radical right issues to be more salient than women do. Moreover, Spierings and Zaslove point out the fact also argued in Mudde (2007) that the gender gap, or the presence of women in PRR leadership and party bodies, is overemphasised when studied independently of other political parties.

Gendered ideologies are particularly important when considering the substantive representation of women (SRW) and the ways in which parties define women’s issues. Michael Kimmel (2013) offers a unique gender perspective to the study of the radical right phenomenon, arguing that extreme right parties and movements represent a reclaiming of masculinity in the context of increasing gender equality in political, economic, and social life. Women, he argues, have gained increased equality in the home and the workplace, while many straight white males are experiencing a sense of loss. Such a zero-sum perception of gender equality allows extreme right movements to mobilise supporters by playing on their perception of relative loss of status vis-à-vis women.

The relationship between women and the populist radical right, and in particular women within populist radical right parties, is a phenomenon which has thus far received very little scholarly attention. With the notable exception of Mudde (2007), questions about the role of women in leadership and representation in PRR parties remain to be studied across the board. The challenge is even greater when examining the new democracies in South-Eastern Europe, where radical right populism has experienced increasing popularity, seen in the formation and electoral success of Ataka in Bulgaria, the Slovenian National Party (SNS) in Slovenia, and the Greater Romania Party (PRM). Yet parties considered radical often have a very different outlook and discourse than their West European counterparts.

Drawing on extant literature and in an attempt to clear Mickenberg’s (2002: 361) classification of the radical right in Central and Eastern Europe (CEE) as not only resembling ‘shooting at a moving target, but also shooting with a clouded vision’, the main research question we aim to answer is: are Bulgarian radical right parties Männerparteien? In particular, we ask: What is the descriptive representation of women in radical right parties in Bulgarian parliaments? What is the descriptive representation of women among the Bulgarian members of the European Parliament (MEPs) from radical right parties? And is there a gender gap in the voter support for Bulgarian radical right parties? We expect that, as claimed by the majority of the existing scholarship on the radical right, Bulgarian radical right parties will be predominantly male parties that are (a) primarily represented by men in the national parliament, (b) primarily represented by men among the Bulgarian MEPs, and (c) are witnessing a gender gap among their voters.

The rising interest in gender studies, and women’s representation in particular (Jones 2009; Krook 2005, 2010; Phillips 1995), is coupled with a shift in focus from descriptive to substantive representation (Childs and Krook 2008; Wangnerud 2009). Focusing on the differences between the feminist and conservative idea of what constitutes the representation of women, Celis and Childs (2015) emphasise the sometimes subtle and often overlooked distinction between women’s issues and women’s interests, and highlight the need for a systematic way to evaluate what constitutes representation in the interests of women.

Despite the significant electoral success of radical right parties in recent years and an expanding body of research focusing on explaining this new phenomenon (Bale et al. 2010; Mudde 2000, 2007; Rydgren 2005), we know relatively little about gender equality within populist radical right parties and even less about if and how they represent women’s interests. While recent research has highlighted some of those questions in Western (De Lange and Mugge 2015) and non-Western democracies (Kampwirth 2010), with few exceptions (Kostadinova and Mikulska 2015; Norocel 2011, 2015; Pető 2014) former communist countries remain mostly understudied. Seeking to answer some of the questions developed in Celis et al. (2008) and Lovenduski and Guagagnini (2010) about how representation is done and who does it, we examine the level of substantive representation of women in radical right parties. To do that, we focus on answering the following questions: What and how frequent are claims made on women-related issues? Are those claims made primarily by women or men from radical right parties? Based on previous literature and the idea that radical right parties are Männerparteien, we expect that women-related issues are not a priority for PRRPs. However, given that women are more likely to be interested in raising questions concerning women’s interests, if such claims are made, we expect them to come primarily from female, rather than male, MPs.

Recent work both in gender, as well as in radical right scholarship, has shown that in order to understand gender equality and women’s representation fully, we ought to study the inclusion and representation of women, not only comparing them with that of men, but also comparing them with the inclusion and representation of women by other political parties. As Mudde (2007) points out, many scholars take female underrepresentation in PRRPs for granted, even though it is comparable to other centre and centre-right parties. This suggests that the representation of women in radical right parties cannot be studied independently, or it will lead to false conclusions. As a result, in our examination of women’s involvement in Bulgaria’s radical right, we look into how these parties compare with mainstream and other (ethnic and smaller) political parties. Do radical right parties have similar levels of descriptive representation as compared with other political parties? How do radical right parties compare with others when it comes to substantive representation of women? Based on extant scholarship and on the ideology of radical right parties, we expect that these parties have fewer women and represent women’s interests to a lesser extent than other parties. In particular, we expect this to be evident when compared with political parties of the left, which are known for their support for gender equality.

In order to examine women’s representation in Bulgaria’s radical right, we use two key concepts from the gender and politics literature, namely descriptive and substantive representation. Descriptive representation of women (DRW) is broadly defined as the number of women members of parliament in a given parliamentary group. Substantive representation of women, is a much more convoluted concept, mainly due to the lack of agreement on how to operationalise it. However, there is agreement on the fact that SRW refers to what is being done in terms of representation in the interests of women, i.e. how are women represented. Celis’ (2009) work on the subject emphasises Pitkin’s (1972) three criteria of acts, interests, and responsiveness as the building blocks of how to conceptualise SRW. For the purposes of this article, we conceive of women’s issues as questions related to women’s structural social situation (from giving birth to child-rearing), as well as questions reflecting women’s social perspective as marginalised (thus the need to overcome any sort of discrimination and inequality related to women, children, and adolescents).

Data and method

In order to examine women’s representation and the role of women in Bulgaria’s radical right parties, we employ qualitative methodology and look at parliamentary data on the number of female MPs included in these parties, as well as their parliamentary activity. The data comes from digital records of parliamentary composition and activity, which is publicly available in Bulgarian, on the national legislature website. Using the available information, we have coded all data first-hand and prepared it in an explicit manner, which allows for analysis and comparison.

To get the number of female members of a given parliamentary group, for example, we had to go through the photographs of MPs and, based on the period of their service, count the number of male and female MPs at the beginning of each parliamentary term. We decided to take the proportion of female MPs at the beginning of each legislative term, since this initial period most reflects the party’s actual stance on gender equality. To retrieve data on MPs’ parliamentary activity, we have read and coded each MP’s legislative service biography, which lists, among other things, the committees of which a given MP has been a member, as well as details on their parliamentary activity during the specific legislative term. The latter are just listed in a form of ‘questions asked’ and the date they were asked. We have had first to count these, then analyse their content and arrive at a number signifying the total number of parliamentary activities for a given MP and the number of parliamentary activities addressing women’s issues. Based on our conceptualisation of women’s issues, we counted anything related to women’s structural social situation (from giving birth to child-rearing) or women’s social perspective as marginalised (thus the need to overcome any sort of discrimination and inequality related to women, children, and adolescents) as substantive representation of women. Thus, for example, questions related to governmental action to increase childbirth and the number of schools which have cafeterias offering warm food to their students are equally considered as women’s issues, while questions related to security of schools, which we do not deem as directly related to child-rearing, are not.

The data on substantive representation of women were collected in a cross-section time-series format for all political parties represented in parliament for the last three parliaments (dating back to 2009), for both female and male MPs.¹ The specific women’s issues on which MPs have been active was also collected for both male and female MPs of parties across the board. Descriptive representation data covers the entire post-communist period and depicts the change in the number of women members of parliament over time and for all parliamentary parties.

Why Bulgaria? The relevance of the Bulgarian case can be justified with several arguments. First, Bulgaria is a good example of the differences between the PRR family in the East and the West. Second, given that the remainder of the articles in this symposium focus on the more ‘traditionally’ exploited states of Western Europe, a case from South-Eastern Europe adds a much-needed variation, which contributes to a broader understanding of the phenomenon across contexts. Third, both the representation of women and our knowledge about it for the South-East European region is very limited; hence, studying the women in Bulgaria’s radical right is a useful exercise in its own right. Finally, the Bulgarian case shows that while radical right parties may be niche parties, they are also very much subject to the strategic effects of electoral factors which govern party competition and the decisions of mainstream parties. We witness this in the establishment of additional radical right formations, which together have had a noteworthy electoral success, emphasising once again that the PRR party family should not be studied in isolation, but rather in comparison with all other political parties.

PRR in Bulgaria

Populism and radical right politics have become an inextricable part of the political landscape in Bulgaria. We argue that this phenomenon ‒ new to Bulgaria ‒ has also had an impact on by whom, where, and how women are represented. Although nationalism was always present in Bulgarian politics, including in the post-communist period, it is in the last decade that radical right parties have made a significant breakthrough, gaining parliamentary representation and establishing a permanent political presence. An ethnic Turkish minority currently constitutes 8% and a Roma minority 4.4% of the population. The Movement for Rights and Freedom (MRF) – an ethnic Turkish party – has been the third largest party in parliament and has taken part in four coalition governments. Such ethnic factors create favourable conditions for radical right parties to organise and rally against. The migration crisis is an additional factor that boosts the support for radical right parties and nationalist rhetoric. What is surprising in the Bulgarian case is the rather late appearance of the radical right compared to other East European countries.²

Radical right parties have been present in parliament since 2005, attracting 8–12% of the vote. ATAKA (Attack) was formed just months before the 2005 elections, adopting a rhetoric that was clearly nationalist, anti-elite, anti-West, and even anti-democracy. A leader-centred party with a charismatic leader, combining neo-nationalist and neo-totalitarian elements, ATAKA appealed to the disenfranchised across the political spectrum, but most importantly to those disillusioned with the transition and the transition elites. ATAKA has been characterised as both left- and right-wing, because of its mix of nationalism with welfare chauvinism and nostalgia for the communist past (Ghodsee 2008) – a feature that is rather common for the East European radical right, where nationalist discourse was long monopolised by communist parties and their successor parties.³ Although ATAKA has never been directly in government, it did receive privileged treatment and important positions in parliamentary committees in return for its support of the 2009 centre-right minority government of Citizens for European Development of Bulgaria (GERB). The short-lived 2013–2014 socialist-dominated government of Oresharski also relied on ATAKA’s support, particularly when voting on foreign policy issues and energy policy, both areas directly related to Bulgaria’s relations with Russia. The 2014 national elections proved disastrous for ATAKA due to the appearance of another radical right party, the National Front for Salvation of Bulgaria (NFSB), which absorbed a significant part of ATAKA’s votes.

The NFSB was formed in May 2011, only months before the combined presidential and local elections. NFSB uses patriotic and exclusionary rhetoric, defending Bulgarian culture, traditions, language, and sovereignty, but it is less populist and leader-centred than ATAKA. A splinter from ATAKA, the NFSB united with another nationalist party, the Internal Macedonian Revolutionary Organisation (IMRO), in a coalition named the Patriotic Front (PF) for the 2014 parliamentary elections. The PF gained 7.3% of the votes and 18 seats in parliament. Due to its more constructive and less populist stance, the PF was invited into the governing coalition headed by GERB. Although the PF holds no ministerial posts, it was given its share of governing positions, including deputy ministers. The PF has proven much more successful than ATAKA in gaining access to power, matching the success of other European nationalists such as the Austrian Freedom Party, the Swiss People’s Party, or the Danish People’s Party.

The rhetoric of radical right parties in Bulgaria clearly illustrates the differences between them and their Western counterparts. ATAKA’s rhetoric combines clericalism, irredentism, socialist nostalgia, and welfare chauvinism (Pirro 2015), and is primarily targeting national ethnic minorities. Even in the context of the current migration crisis, questions on migration remain secondary and are again seen through the prism of national ethnic minorities, i.e. Muslim migrants radicalising domestic Muslim minorities. Women’s issues are similarly articulated along such lines, in a mix of nostalgia for communist-era social provisions and welfare chauvinism that advocates excluding minorities from access to such provisions.

Radical right parties in Bulgaria attract more than just the disenfranchised and appeal to left- as well as right-wing voters, a phenomenon typical of former communist countries also labelled the red‒brown vote (Ishiyama 2009). Both NFSB and ATAKA draw support primarily from male voters (see Tables 1 and 2), who in the case of ATAKA in the 2013 elections were double the number of women supporting them. Although our data is too limited to make definitive conclusions, it shows a trend that is similar to recently reported data on the gender gap in other countries. While there is no agreement on the factors that explain the gender gap, we can argue that PRR parties in Bulgaria, similarly to many of their Western counterparts, are Männerparteien when it comes to voter support.

Table 1. Gender gap (%): national elections 2014.

	GERB	BSP	MRF	RB	PF	BBTs	Ataka	ABV	Other
Men	31	14	15	9	7	6	5	3	10
Women	34	17	12	8	4	6	2	5	12

Note:

Tables 1 and 2 show figures as percentages of total men and women who voted in the election.

Source: Alpha Research: http://alpharesearch.bg/bg/socialni_izsledvania/socialni_publikacii/socialno-demografski-profil-na-glasuvalite-v-parlamentarnite-izbori-2014.829.html (accessed 6 February 2017).

Table 2. Gender gap (%): national elections 2013.

	GERB	BSP	MRF	Ataka	DBG	Other
Men	29	24	11	10	2	24
Women	31	29	9	5	4	22

Source: Alpha Research: http://alpharesearch.bg/bg/socialni_izsledvania/socialni_publikacii/socialno-demografski-profil-na-glasuvalite-v-parlamentarnite-izbori-2013.794.html (accessed 6 February 2017).

How many women? Descriptive representation in Bulgaria’s PRR

Radical right parties have had few women MPs in the Bulgarian parliament, ranging between three and five for each parliament, and a total of 13 individual female MPs (see Table 3 for details). The percentage of female MPs from radical right parties has ranged from 11.1% to 27.3% for individual parties and from 14.3% to 17.2% for radical right parties combined. Compared to other parties in parliament, radical right parties together with the ethnic Turkish party MRF are those that consistently include the smallest number of women in their parliamentary groups, apart from small parties that make a brief appearance. This finding is consistent with previous research arguing that nationalist and ethnic parties tend to include fewer women (Vickers 2006; Yuval-Davis 1997). By comparison, the current ruling party GERB has had over 33% female MPs in the last two parliaments. With few exceptions, ruling parties in Bulgaria have been the ones to have the most women in parliament, reaching as high as 40%, and it is the ruling centre-right parties that have had the highest percentage of women ever (Rashkova and Zankina 2013). The number of female MPs from radical right parties has increased slightly in the last two parliaments (from three in the 2009–2013 parliament to five in both the short-lived parliament elected in 2013 and the current one, elected in 2014). However, compared to mainstream parties of both right and left, the radical right exhibits much less gender equality, as it has always had a smaller percentage of women than GERB (the main current right-wing party), the Bulgarian Socialist Party (BSP) (the main left-wing party),⁴ and NDSV (the main centre-right party from the 2005–2009 legislature). Hence, we can argue that in terms of descriptive representation, radical right parties remain predominantly male, and women from such parties have a marginal presence in parliament. This can perhaps be linked to previous findings which argue that radical right issues are less salient for women than for men Harteveld et al. (2015) or it may be a function of the fact that those parties are smaller and therefore do not have many women members.

Table 3. Women in parliament by party, 2005–present.

	2005–2009 parliament		2009–2013 parliament		2013–2014 parliament		Current parliament
Political party	MPs	Women MPs	MPs	Women MPs	MPs	Women MPs	MPs	Women MPs
Patriotic Front	‒	‒	‒	‒	‒	‒	18	2 (11.1%)
Ataka	21	3 (14.3%)*	21	3 (14.3%)	23	5 (21.7%)	11	3 (27.3%)
BSP/Coalition	82	15 (18.3%)	40	7 (17.5%)	84	19 (22.6%)	38	4 (10.5%0
MRF	34	3 (8.8%)	38	3 (7.9%)	36	5 (13.8%)	30	3 (10.0%)
DSB	17	4 (23.5%)	15	2 (13.3%)	‒	‒	23	1 (4.3%)
UDF	20	4 (20.0%)
Law, Order, Justice	‒	‒	10	2 (20.0%)	‒	‒	‒	‒
GERB	‒	‒	116	32 (27.6%)	97	32 (33.0%)	84	30 (35.7%)
NDSV	53	20 (37.7%)	‒	‒	‒	‒	‒	‒
BPU	13	1 (7.7%)	‒	‒	‒	‒	‒	‒
ABV	‒	‒	‒	‒	‒	‒	11	1 (9.1%)
BBTs	‒	‒	‒	‒	‒	‒	14	1 (7.1%)
Parliament total		50		49		61		48
Total women %		20.8		20.4		25.4		20.0
RR women as % of total women		6.0		6.1		8.2		10.4

Note:

*Initially, ATAKA entered parliament with only one female MP. In the middle of the term, another female MP replaced a male MP. At the very end of the term a third female MP replaced a male MP. Thus, by the end of the term ATAKA had three female MPs. Highest proportion of women per parliament is reported in bold.

Source: http://www.parliament.bg (accessed 6 February 2017).

A more interesting question than simply how many women there are is perhaps the question of who those women are. Siderov’s (the leader of ATAKA) practice of appointing women very much resembles that of Berlusconi, where looks and personal relationships, not skills, matter. ATAKA leads the score in appointing the youngest female MPs in parliament, who are also less experienced. For example, Kalina Krumova became an MP in 2009 at the age of 24, Kalina Balabanova entered parliament in 2013 at the age of 23, and Denitsa Gadzheva entered parliament in 2007 at age 24. The ‘gender balance’ of ATAKA has been amply discussed in the tabloids, calling ATAKA’s female MPs ‘Volen’s Angels’⁵ and public opinion has been similarly sceptical of the political skills of ATAKA’s female MPs.

If the representation of women from radical right parties in parliament is marginal, it is non-existent in the European Parliament. ATAKA was the only Bulgarian radical right party to send members to the EU parliament and one of the few parties to send no women at all (Table 4). By contrast, mainstream parties have been consistently represented by women, with percentages ranging from 25 to 100. GERB’s female MEPs have outnumbered male MEPs in the previous two EU parliaments. NDSV and the Blue Coalition, in turn, chose a woman to be their only representative in the EU parliament. The BSP has always included women among its MEPs, but not at levels as high as centre-right parties. Surprisingly, the ethnic Turkish party MRF, which has had low representation of women in the National Assembly, has been consistently represented by women in the EU parliament, with percentages ranging from 33 to 50. These findings indicate that it is women from centre-right parties who are most represented in the EU parliament, whereas there are no women from radical right parties. Perhaps this can be explained by the fact that, while important, parties find the European Parliament ‘second rate’ and prefer to fill these spots with some of their female members. It could also be that parties try to imitate European parties and parties in the European Parliament in terms of gender balance, which would render them more legitimate and increase the opportunity for intra-EU bargaining. In the current EU parliament, we also witness an overall decrease in female representation (from 47% in the previous parliament to 29.4% in the current) and a decrease in the number of women from mainstream parties. We note a similar trend in the national parliament, where the percentage of female MPs has decreased to 20 from 25.4 in the previous parliament. Overall, women are well represented in the EU parliament by Bulgarian parties and at higher levels than in the National Assembly.

Table 4. Bulgarian women in the European Parliament.

Number of women (total MEPs)/% women Political Party	2007–2009	2009–2014	2014‒present
ATAKA	0 (3)/0%	0 (2)/0%	‒
GERB	3 (5)/60%	3 (5)/60%	2 (6)/33%
BSP	2 (5)/40%	2 (4)/50%	1 (4)/25%
MRF	2 (4)/50%	1 (3)/33%	2 (4)/50%
NDSV	1 (1)/100%	1 (2)/50%	‒
Blue Coalition/RB	‒	1 (1)/100%	0 (1)/0%
women/BBTs	‒	‒	0 (2)/0%
Total seats	18	17	17
Total women (number/%)	8/44%	8/47%	5/29.4%

Sources: Authors’ calculations, data from the Central Electoral Commission (http://www.cik.bg (accessed 6 February 2017)) and media sources.

How much for women? Substantive representation in Bulgaria’s PRR

In order to fully understand the involvement and role of women in Bulgaria’s radical right, and to be able to answer our research question, we need also to examine how women’s interests are represented in parliament by radical right MPs. More specifically, we are interested to know whether and to what extent they represent women, what kind of parliamentary activity they participate in and whether their legislative and non-legislative actions relate to women’s issues.

Celis (2009: 97) argues that the first steps in acting for women come from approving legislation that deals with women’s issues and from broadening the political agenda with women’s issues, by introducing them during parliamentary debates. Rooting our examination in this framework, we study the parliamentary activity of radical right women in Bulgaria vis-à-vis the activity of radical right male representatives in the last three parliaments. Furthermore, we compare the activity of radical right female MPs with that of female and male MPs in all other legislative parties. Tables 5a, 5b, 6a and 6b summarise the results. The data shows that the level of activity of those women MPs is rather low. We see that the highest amount of parliamentary activity registered is by an MP from ATAKA in the 2009–2003 parliament and that reflects 36 instances of parliamentary activity, only four of which (less than 12%) are related to women’s issues.⁶ Comparatively speaking, radical right women have the lowest parliamentary activity in Bulgaria’s legislatures. The data shows that for the last three parliaments combined, RR women have recorded 165 instances of parliamentary activity versus 1753 by non-RR female MPs. And while one could point to the fact that other parties are much larger, and thus the instances of activity will naturally be greater, we also see that when we look at average parliamentary activity per female MP within each parliament, the RR women’s activity rate comes after that of BSP women (in all parliaments) and after GERB in the 2013–2014 parliament. Furthermore, Bulgaria’s RR women have been much less active than their male counterparts, who have had 793 parliamentary activities recorded for the last three legislatures. Hence, albeit disproportionate in size and often with a handful of more active MPs, it is safe to deduce that Bulgaria’s radical right women are less active in parliament, both in comparison to radical right men, and to MPs from both genders in non-radical right political parties. Interestingly, the data shows something quite different when we look at activity on women’s issues. Contrary to our expectation, and despite the low rate of activity overall, radical right women show the highest rate of activity on women’s issues amongst all parties and MPs. Data in Table 5a shows that more than 10% of RR women’s activity is on women’s issues, compared to only 6.7% for non-RR women, and 3.02% and 2.6% for RR and non-RR men, respectively. This finding is unexpected, yet not entirely surprising. We can attribute it to two related factors: the first is the fact that RR parties in Eastern Europe often espouse welfare chauvinism and are, therefore, concerned with social policy that disproportionately affects women, and the second is that women from RR parties seem to be excluded from broader debates and placed in parliamentary committees primarily dealing with issues which may be deemed closer to women’s interests, as a result of which they ‘specialise’ in these activities.

Table 5a. Bulgaria radical right women’s parliamentary activity.

Politician’s name	Political party	Committees	Parliamentary activity (total)	Activity on women’s issues
Current parliament
Kalina Balabanova	Ataka	Agriculture and Food; Corruption	15	1
Magdalena Tasheva	Ataka	Energy; Overseeing the State Energy Committee	6	0
Miglena Aleksandrova	Ataka	Transport; EU Matters; Committee for the Absorbance of EU Funds	7	2
Polina Karastoyanova	Patriotic Front	Culture; Economic Policy and Tourism	0	0
Sultanka Petrova	Patriotic Front	Agriculture and Food; Healthcare	18	5
2013–2014 parliament
Denitza Gadjeva	Ataka	Environment; Transport & Information Technology	2	0
Kalina Balabanova	Ataka	Agriculture and Food; Corruption	5	0
Magdalena Tasheva	Ataka	Energy; Investment Projects	4	0
Margarita Nikolova	Ataka	Budget; Labour & Social Policy; Children, Youth & Sport	0	0
Miglena Aleksandrova	Ataka	Culture & Media; EU Matters and Control over the EU Funds	7	0
2009–2013 parliament
Denitza Gadjeva	Ataka	Transport & Information Technology; Internal Security & Social Order	19	0
Kalina Krumova	Ataka	EU Matters and the Absorbance of EU Funds; Labour	31	5
Tzveta Georgieva	Ataka	Labour & Social Policy; Health	36	4
Total			165	17

Note:

The totals are presented in bold.

Source: Authors’ coding, data from http://www.parliament.bg (accessed 6 February 2017).

Table 5b. Women’s parliamentary activity in RR and non-RR parties compared.

Politician’s name	Party	Committees (average)	Parliamentary activity (total/average)	Activity on women’s issues(total/average)
Current parliament
Non-RR parties
30 female MPs	GERB	2.6	86/2.9	9/0.3
4 female MPs	BSP	2.3	183/45.8	18/4.8
3 female MPs	DPS	3	2/0.7	0/0
1 female MP	RB	2	10	2
1 female MP	BDC	4	1	0
1 female MP	ABV	3	3	2
RR parties
3 female MPs	Ataka	2.3	28/9.3	3/1
2 female MPs	PF	2	18*	5*
42nd parliament
Non-RR parties
32 female MPs	GERB	2.8	667/20.8	59/1.8
19 female MPs	BSP	2.9	94/4.9	7/0.4
5 female MPs	DPS	2.4	4/0.8	2/0.4
RR parties
5 MPs	Ataka	2.2	18/3.6	0/0
41st parliament
Non-RR parties
32 female MPs	GERB	3	74/2.3	2/0.1
7 female MPs	BSP	4	594/84.9	14/2
4 female MPs	DPS	2.5	27/6.8	3/0.8
2 female MPs	BlueC	3	8/4	0/0
2 female MPs	RZS	2.5	0/0	0/0
RR parties
3 female MPs	Ataka	2	86/28.3	9/3
Total (non-RR)		2.9	1753	118
Total (RR)		2.1	150	17
Total		2.7	1903	135

Note:

^* The average statistic is excluded here because only one of the MPs listed was active.

Source: Authors’ coding, data from http://www.parliament.bg (accessed 6 February 2017).

Table 6a. Bulgaria’s radical right men’s parliamentary activity.

Politician’s name	Party	Committees	Parliamentary activity (total)	Activity on women’s issues
Current parliament
Volen Siderov	Ataka	Foreign Policy; Delegation on Orthodoxy	13	0
Desislav Chukolov	Ataka	Labour; Interior Policy; Delegation of Parliamentary Assembly to the CoE	11	0
Stanislav Stanilov	Ataka	Culture; Education; Bulgarians Abroad	39	0
Ivan Dimitrov	Ataka	Youth and Sport; Security	5	1
Ilian Todorov	Ataka	Army; Corruption	24	1
Lubomir Vladimirov	Ataka	Environment; Economics; Committee against Monopolies	23	0
Nikolai Alexandrov	Ataka	Regional Policy; Budget	19	0
Yavor Notev	Ataka	Judicial; Health	2	0
Valeri Simeonov	PF	Energy; Committee for Overseeing the State Energy Committee	2	0
Boris Yanchev	PF	Environment; Economics; Committee against Monopolies	13	0
Valentin Kasabov	PF	Control over Security Forces; Corruption	2	0
Iskren Veselinov	PF	Transport; Committee for Overseeing the State Energy Committee	10	1
Julian Angelov	PF	Foreign Policy; Religion; Bulgarians Abroad	1	0
Atanas Toyanov	PF	Youth and Sport; Environment	16	2
Valentin Nikolov	PF	Control over Security Forces; Corruption	15	0
Dimitar Bairaktarov	PF	Labour; Health	6	0
Emil Dimitrov	PF	Legal; Budget; Committee for the Accountability of the Public Sector	1	0
Krasimir Karakachanov	PF	Defence; Internal Security	9	0
Krasimiar Bogdanov	PF	Foreign Policy; Education	22	3
Milen Mihov	PF	Defence; Education	7	1
Petar Petrov	PF	Agriculture; European Affairs	8	0
Slavi Binev	PF	Culture; European Affairs; Regional Policy	45	1
Slavcho Atanasov	PF	Regional Policy; Energy	10	0
Hristian Mitev	PF	Judicial; Budget	14	0
2013–2014 parliament
17 male MPs	Ataka		128	5
2009–2013 parliament
18 male MPs	Ataka		348	9
Total			793	24

Source: Authors’ coding, data from http://www.parliament.bg (accessed 6 February 2017).

Table 6b. Bulgaria men’s parliamentary activity in non-RR parties.

Politician’s name	Party	Committees (average)	Parliamentary activity (total/average)	Activity on women’s issues(total/average)
Current parliament
54 male MPs	GERB	2.5	178/3.3	12/0.2
34 male MPs	BSP	2.4	640/18.8	26/0.8
27 male MPs	DPS	3	82/3	4/0.1
22 male MPs	RB	3	575/26	20/0.9
13 male MPs	BDC	2.9	108/8.3	1/0.1
10 male MPs	ABV	3.8	170/17	3/0.3
42nd parliament
65 male MPs	GERB	2.5	685/10.5	9/0.14
65 male MPs	BSP	2.3	403/6.2	3/0.05
31 male MPs	DPS	3.3	60/1.9	3/0.1
41st parliament
84 male MPs	GERB	2.9	172/2.1	5/0.06
33 male MPs	BSP	3.2	1724/52.2	23/0.7
34 male MPs	DPS	3	190/5.6	5/0.15
13 male MPs	BlueC	3.5	736/56.6	12/0.9
8 male MPs	RZS	4.1	139/17.4	2/0.25
Total		3	5862	155

Source: Authors’ coding, data from http://www.parliament.bg (accessed 6 February 2017).

When we look at what types of debates and questions constituting women’s interests have been introduced, we notice that the largest portion of activity related to women’s interests in the current parliament discusses various aspects of child-rearing. More specifically, we observe questions on education (education for first graders), health (obligatory vaccinations), and social policy (a cap on the age of foster parents). Other issues representing women’s concerns that have been introduced during parliamentary debates are child benefits, procedures for getting birth certificates for Bulgarian children born abroad, and compliance with the UN’s recommendations on child protection. The trend is similar for the previous parliaments. The short-lived 2013–2014 parliament shows no activity from RR women related to women’s interests, but the activity within the 2009–2013 parliament again reveals an emphasis on education-related issues (although here many of the questions brought up are in relation to children with special needs, orphanages, etc.). The questions of reproduction and policies to stimulate female workers to become pregnant and give birth have also been raised. Such findings are consistent with previous research (Akkerman 2015; De Lange and Mugge 2015) which shows that PRR parties place a high priority on family issues and take a conservative stance in that domain. Unlike their Western counterparts, however, there is no evidence of specific and more liberal positions on immigration, integration, and the status of Muslim women as reported by Akkerman (2015) for Western RR parties.

At the same time, the party platforms of the two radical right party formations represented in parliament do not address women’s issues explicitly. The platform of the PF addresses the demographic situation in the country, but in relation to the higher birthrates of minorities, and stresses the fact that social security should be given as a return for labour. The coalition argues that in order to prevent maternity turning into a well-paid business, child benefits should be limited to the first two children and be abolished altogether after the birth of a fourth baby – a proposal directly targeted against the Roma minority. Education is discussed in terms of a school curriculum that nourishes patriotic values and limits diverse curricula for the minorities, in particular banning Turkish language instruction. Unemployment and the income of pensioners are of great concern, but women are not singled out as more vulnerable to unemployment and lower income levels after retirement. ATAKA’s platform (or rather its 20 points) similarly mentions the demographic crisis and the priority of health, education, and social policy. Its platform is more nationalistic and more chauvinistic on welfare and does not make any reference to women or women’s issues. This indicates that women’s issues are not a priority for either party and are subsumed by questions of nationality.

Conclusion

Returning to our original question – are PRR parties in Bulgaria Männerparteien? – we can argue that the representation of women in radical right parties in Bulgaria is limited at best. Women from radical right parties have a marginal presence in parliament, constituting a small number and percentage from their respective parties, and a small number and percentage of women in parliament as a whole. Furthermore, women from radical right parties do not figure among Bulgarian MEPs, despite the fact that most other parties have more women in the EU parliament compared to the National Assembly. Yet women from radical right parties have been the most active on women’s issues compared to women from other parties and to men across the board. However, their women-related activity is strictly focused on health, education, and social policies, and particularly on child-rearing issues. Hence, we can argue that these women espouse an essentialist view of gender, where the woman’s role as a mother and caretaker is emphasised and other roles in society are de-emphasised, or even ignored. This finding resonates with research on female activism in radical right parties by Scrinzi (2014), who finds that women activists in Front National and Lega Nord similarly focus on social and family issues. At the same time, party platforms do not mention women’s issues but discuss health, education, and social issues primarily in relation to ethnic minorities who pose a threat to the provision of such policies. Thus, we can say that women from radical right parties do make distinct claims on women’s issues, but at the same time, such claims and such issues in general are not a priority for the parties they represent. Compared to other countries in Western Europe in particular, where there have been distinct conservative claims on women’s issues, the voice of Bulgarian radical right women is much weaker and the claims they make rank lower on the priority list of their respective parties.

Our data and analysis lead to the conclusion that PRR parties in Bulgaria can be categorised as Männerparteien when it comes to descriptive representation of women. The available data on voters shows trends of a gender gap, though given the scarcity of the data, we cannot make a strong argument here. When it comes to the substantive representation of women, we find counter-intuitive data that puts into question the Männerparteien argument. While women from PRR parties are the least active in parliament overall, they have been shown to be the most active on women’s issues. We argue that there are two reasons that explain such a finding. The first is related to the status of women in PRR parties, who are seen as the authority on women’s issues within the party, but are at the same time viewed as less competent than the male party members on other issues. Hence, their parliamentary activity is constrained in scope and, therefore, more focused on women’s issues. The second reason is the ideology of East European PRR parties, which are chauvinistic on welfare and nostalgic for socialism, and thus concerned with social policy, which by definition disproportionately affects women.

Our findings show the utility of the Bulgarian case in studying PRR parties from a gendered perspective. Our study puts into question the key assumption that PRR parties are Männerparteien and it highlights the differences between the radical right in East and West and the way in which such differences impact on who, where, and how women are represented. The implications of our study are valuable for our deeper understanding of the radical right and the role that women and gender play in it. They also invite further studies to take a broader empirical scope than scholarship has done to date, in order to re-examine the relationship between gender and party ideology, and in particular provide additional evidence on the question of the perhaps changing outlook of radical right parties, once naturally assumed to be Männerparteien.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Funding

This work was supported by a Swarovski Foundation Research Grant [grant number PSP P4020-035-011].

Notes on contributors

Ekaterina R. Rashkova is Assistant Professor in the Utrecht University School of Governance. Her research interests lie in electoral and party systems and the strategic behaviour of political actors, institutions, party system development, party regulation, and gender representation. Her work compares new and established democracies and has appeared in Comparative European Politics, International Political Science Review, Party Politics, Political Studies, and Representation, as well as in several edited book volumes. [[email protected]]

Emilia Zankina is Associate Professor in Political Science and Provost of the American University in Bulgaria. Her research examines democratisation and elite transformation in Eastern Europe, populism, civil service reform, and gender political representation. She is the recipient of a number of US national grants from IREX, ACLS, American Councils, Wilson Center, among others. Her work has appeared in the Czech Journal of Political Science, Problems of Post-Communism and Representation. [[email protected]]

Acknowledgements

Part of this article was written during Dr Rashkova’s fellowship stay at the Netherlands Institute of Advanced Studies (NIAS), funded by the EURIAS fellowship programme, a Marie Skłodowska-Curie Action under the 7th Framework. The work has also been carried out with the support of a Swarovski Foundation Research Grant (PSP P4020-035-011). The author acknowledges and is grateful for their support.

Notes

1. Data on MPs’ parliamentary activity is only available digitally from 2009 onwards.

2. The Slovak National Party has been represented in parliament since 1990, the Slovene National Party since 1992 and the Hungarian Justice and Life Party since 1998. The Greater Romania Party was even part of the governing coalition from 1993 to 1995 and held parliamentary seats throughout 2004.

3. Nationalist rhetoric and ethnic homogenisation policies were prevalent throughout communist rule and were present in Bulgaria (Genov 2010), Romania (Norocel 2011), and Poland (Zamoyski 2016).

4. The composition of the current parliament provides the only exception to the PRRPs having proportionally fewer women than the BSP, since the latter lost more than half of its voter support, and hence received much fewer seats in parliament (the direct result of which is that there are fewer women taking up MP positions than in previous legislatures).

5. ‘Ангелите на Волен’ [Volen’s Angels], Lifecafe, 18 January, 2014, available at http://www.webcafe.bg/id_1656937670_Angelite_na_Volen (accessed 6 February 2017).

6. Parliamentary activity here refers to speaking in parliament – either posing a question or making a statement on a certain issue. In the article, we use the term women’s issues to encompass all policy topics that are in one way or another connected to women.