The descriptive political representation of women in Scottish Local Government: barriers to candidature

It is well-documented the political and structural barriers to female descriptive representation in politics and legislatures (see Lovenduski, 2005). Women remain under-represented at every level of government in the UK (Home Office, 2011). This paper adds to the body of research by exploring the political representation of women at local government level. In particular the locus of Scottish local government adds to the debate where single transferable voting, introduced in 2007 as a form of proportional representation, was supposed to increase the number of female councillors yet women remain under-represented (Kenny and Mackay, 2012). The research involved a survey of councillors in three local authorities, which represented the median in terms of the percentage of female councillors in Scotland, as well as secretaries of political parties and female political activists. The research findings suggest that the main reason for the lack of descriptive representation of women in Scottish local government is the incompatibilities of their councillor role with that of caring and family roles. Thus, the paper will argue that domestic role incompatibilities are a function of party political institutional barriers and suggests ways to address the under-representation of women in political life.