Elizabeth Evans’ express purpose is to explore why the Liberal Democrats have so few women MPs. Her answers are vital to the future of the Liberal Democrats as a major force in British politics. This is a well-timed and exceptional feat of research. It looks in depth at a particular aspect of a political party, a party which was at one time a colossus on the British political stage, redolent with figures like Gladstone and Lloyd George, giants who passed through Downing Street. Then, abruptly, in the early part of the twentieth century, it all but collapsed, not least because...

The Liberal Democrats are the UK’s third party at Westminster: they currently have fifty-seven MPs, less than 10 percent of the House of Commons. Despite the fact that they are currently in coalition government with the Conservatives, their third party status is reflected in the relative lack of attention paid to the party, hence less is known about the party’s organisation, policies and personnel compared to the Labour and the Conservative parties. The representation of women by the Liberal Democrats is further marginalised in extant studies and commentary. Following the 2010 general election, men made up 87.7 percent of the...

To understand the Liberal Democrats’ response to women’s descriptive representation one must also understand the ideology and organisation of the party. Analysis of these institutional factors will allow us to assess the extent to which a masculine ethos pervades formal rules and informal values. This is important, because party rules and values help determine the party’s response to women’s lack of descriptive representation (Lovenduski, 2005). This chapter establishes the milieu within which women and feminists can seek to influence debates surrounding women’s descriptive representation within the Liberal Democrats. Three key arguments are explored: ideological tensions between Liberalism and feminism regarding...

Research has highlighted that a feminist presence is often critical to bringing about gendered changes within political parties, particularlyvis-à-viscampaigns for women’s increased descriptive representation (Childs, 2004; Lovenduski, 1993, 2005; Perrigo, 1996; Young, 2000).¹ This chapter explores the extent to which feminists and feminist attitudes are influential or marginalised within the Liberal Democrats, a party which, as the previous chapter has argued, has a masculine bias embedded in its culture, organisation and ideology. To do so, the chapter addresses four themes: the level of feminist presence within the party; attitudes towards issues surrounding women’s descriptive representation; the perceived effectiveness...

Political parties repeatedly cite the low number of women who put themselves forward for selection as an explanation for women’s descriptive under-representation. In short, they argue, it is a problem with supply and not demand, the latter of which signifies at least some form of discrimination at the point of selection. Norris and Lovenduski’s appropriation of the supply and demand model for analysis of political recruitment has become a key tool for the exploration of the descriptive under-representation of women in politics (Norris and Lovenduski, 1995). The model is based upon competing and often interlinked supply and demand-side explanations for...

The substantive representation of women refers to the representation of women’s interests. This chapter considers how and in what ways the party substantively represents women. Whilst previous research has highlighted the importance of looking at who acts, or claims to act, for women, this analysis of the Liberal Democrats also provides a useful case study for exploring the substantive representation of women by men. From a normative feminist perspective, the Liberal Democrats’ substantive representation of women raises some difficult questions. Namely, if the evidence shows that despite having a persistently low number of women MPs the Liberal Democrats are substantively...

According to Pitkin, symbolic representation emphasises the meaning that a representative signifies to those being represented (Pitkin, 1967). To date, symbolic representation, in its traditional sense, remains a relatively under-studied concept amongst feminist political scientists. There are a few US-based studies exploring the impact of women’s candidature and presence on women’s interests, political efficacy and activism, although these studies disagree about the impact of women’s symbolic presence (Atkeson, 2003; Lawless, 2004). Most existing research on women’s symbolic representation in politics has tended to adopt a more wide-ranging approach to analyse the media’s representation of women (Childs, 2004, 2008a; Norris, 1997c;...

Despite the equal opportunity rhetoric, the party is an institution embedded in a masculine ethos and ideology. This is illustrated by the dominance of one sex in key roles throughout the organisation, juxtaposed with a ‘gender blind’ ideological approach to equality and a poor record of selecting and electing women. The lack of women in senior and influential positions in the party, a noted masculine ethos within the party, a poor track record on electing women MPs, and a somewhat faltering approach to increasing the number of women MPs are the key findings from a gender analysis of the party....