Factors Affecting the Political Participation of Women’s Parliamentary Quota Beneficiaries in Zimbabwe Democratic Governance

The election of women into parliament feeds into the global discourse of women’s participation in politics. It further responds directly to the United Nations sustained clarion call for gender parity through the integration of women into political and leadership positions. This call, as currently reflected in the Sustainable Development Goal number 5, is justifiably amplified by the Zimbabwe’s National Development Strategy 1. While it has been noted that women have made significant strides into politics, both globally and locally, there still remains some structural constraints which continue to hold them back from either fully participating or being elected into parliament. This paper explores the various structural and social systematic challenges that limit the election of women into parliament as a part of the democratic governance in Zimbabwe. The study therefore, in particular, highlights women’s parliamentary quota beneficiaries’ experiences in national politics of Zimbabwe through a qualitative methodology, using interviews. Findings indicate that challenges that affect women’s parliamentary quota beneficiaries’ election include: territory marking by seated members of parliament, politics of entitlement, a hostile androcentric political milieu, unfair media representation of female politicians, negative societal perceptions of women politicians, difficulties in juggling family and public roles, lack of education and a low female self-concept. Using Dahrendorf’s Conflict Theory, the paper analyses the pervasiveness of these factors and how they systematically work against gender parity in politics. It considers the different concepts of positions, roles and groups showing how all these work towards the exclusion of women in politics. It is concluded that political systematic challenges limit or prevent the movement of women from quota beneficiaries to seated/elected members in the parliament of Zimbabwe. Additionally, women politicians still struggle with work-life balance which further limits their full participation in political activities that may lead to their election into parliament.