Gender Equality in National Politics: The Views of Australian Male Politicians

Abstract

Studies of gender and politics have typically been studies of women and politics. In contrast, this paper places men at the centre of its inquiry by drawing on interviews with 15 current federal male politicians. Of concern is exploring the ways in which men conceptualise the question of gender equity in the Australian parliament. Three frameworks are identified in the men's narratives. These are that the parliament is a masculinised space but that this is unavoidable; that the parliament is now feminised and women are advantaged; and that the parliament is gender neutral and gender is irrelevant. It is argued that collectively these framing devices operate to mask the many constraints which exist to marginalise women from political participation and undermine attempts to address women's political disadvantage as political participants. The paper concludes by highlighting the significance of the paper beyond the Australian context and calling for further research which names and critiques political men and their discourses on gender and parliamentary practices and processes.

Notes

¹A central premise of this article is that the study of women and politics needs to continue to broaden its focus. This is not only in terms of what knowledge it generates but how it generates that knowledge. While we have used just interviews in this study there is a range of empirical tools that have been usefully engaged in studies of women politicians that could be similarly employed in understanding more about male politicians as gendered beings. This includes documentary analysis of Hansard and media reports and participant observation of parliamentary question time and of politicians in their electorates.

²The relatively small sample size should also be considered in light of the fact that the interviews were being conducted with politicians, people who are used to and enjoy talking about themselves (Gray 2004; Jones 2006; Seidman 2006; Sprague 2005), information can be relatively easily obtained. As Morse (2000) has argued when this is the case, then fewer participants are needed.

³The Liberal Party was formed in 1944 as an anti-Labor force. It won office in coalition with the Country Party (as the Nationals were previously called) in 1949–72, and then with the Nationals in 1975–83 and then from 1996–2007.

⁴Such views would seem to continue to dominate Coalition male thinking as during the 2007 federal election campaign two senior Coalition men suggested that Julia Gillard was not a suitable candidate as she was ‘deliberately barren’ and another suggested a woman should not run in the federal electorate of Leichardt(Heffernan 2007; Sawer 2008; Vaile 2007).

⁵There has been an increase in women's political representation in Australian local government in recent years. Following the most recent round of elections nearly 30% of all local government positions were held by women and 15% of mayoral positions (Ryan, Pini and Brown 2005).

⁶This view has been given currency since Julia Gillard became Deputy Prime Minister and Julie Bishop, the Deputy Opposition leader since the 2007 federal election. Numbers of male politicians have indicated that parliament is no longer gendered male if these two women can become ironically deputies in their parties (Sawer 2008).

⁷The parliamentary child care centre opened in 2009 and this has further demonstrated for some men that the parliamentary institution has changed from one needing a bar to one requiring a child care centre.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Mary Crawford

Mary Crawford has completed her PhD on ‘Gender and the Australian Parliament’ from which this paper is drawn. She is currently a Visiting Scholar at Queensland University of Technology and an Adjunct Fellow at Southern Cross University. Barbara Pini is in the Curtin Business School and is the author of Masculinities and Management in Agricultural Organizations Worldwide. Hampshire, England: Ashgate, 2008.