Introduction: Gender Reforms, Electoral Quotas and Women’s Political Representation in Taiwan, South Korea and Singapore

In the last two decades, more than 118 countries and political parties around the world have introduced gender quotas to guarantee women’s political representation. While the study of gender quotas and electoral systems is an exciting field, few studies have focused on East Asia. Why do traditionally male-dominated parties engage in gender reforms? Have gender reforms improved women’s political representation and participation? To address these questions, this introductory article offers an overview of the electoral rules, gender quotas, and candidate selection methods adopted in three broadly similar cases with different outcomes in Taiwan, South Korea, and Singapore. Taiwan and South Korea introduced mixed electoral systems and legislated candidate quotas to improve women’s legislative representation at the local and national levels. Singapore resisted legislating gender quotas while the ruling party voluntarily introduced a party quota in 2009. These gender equality strategies have brought slow and uneven results. Based on qualitative and quantitative methods as well as survey and electoral data, this paper offers new evidence showing why the effects of electoral systems and quota strategies are not automatic or mechanical, but dependent on the degree of party system institutionalization, electoral competitiveness, legal enforcement, and social-cultural attitudes toward women.

导言：台湾、韩国及新加坡的 性别改革、选举配额和女性政治代表

关键词： 性别配额，保留席位，选举体系，政党，候选人遴选，女性，东亚和东南亚。

过去二十年间，世界上有超过一百一十八个国家和政党引入了性别配额制度以保证女性得到政治代表。尽管性别配额和选举系统是一个激动人心的的研究领域，但很少有研究关注到东亚。为什么传统上男性主导的政党会进行性别改革？性别改革是否促进了妇女的政治代表和政治参与？ 为解答这些疑问，本篇导论概述了台湾、韩国和新加坡这三个大体相似的个案所分别采用的选举规则、性别配额及候选人遴选方法及其不同结果。台湾和韩国引进了混合选举体系并立法规定候选人配额，以提高妇女在地方和国家立法机构的代表比例。新加坡拒绝对性别配额进行立法，但执政党在2009年主动实行了党内的配额制度。这些性别平等策略取得了缓慢而不均衡的效果。利用定性和定量方法以及调查和选举数据，本论文提出新的证据，表明选举体系和配额策略为何不会自动或是机械地产生效果；其效果取决于政党体系的制度化程度、选举竞争程度、法律执行力以及社会和文化中对待女性的一般态度等因素。

Translated from English by Li Guo