Paper-11 Module-4

Defining Political Participation.

Personal Details.
Role Name Affiliation
Principal InvestigatorProf.SumitaParmar University of Allahabad
Paper Coordinator Prof. Chandrakala MGS University Bikaner
Padia
Content Writer/Author Ms. Manisha Misra Asst. Professor,
(CW) Vasanta College, Varanasi
Content Reviewer Prof. Chandrakala MGS University Bikaner
(CR) Padia
Language Editor (LE) Prof.SumitaParmar University of Allahabad

(B) Description of Module

Items Description of Module

Subject Name Women’s Studies
Paper Name Women, Governance & Politics
Module Name/ Title, Defining Political Participation
description
Module ID Paper-11 Module-4
Pre-requisites Some awareness of the political processes of the country
Objectives To show the nature of political participation of women
Keywords Participation, feminism, election, representation

DEFINING POLITICAL PARTICIPATION

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Studies Women’s Political Participation: Theories and Debates- Unit-II – Defining Political Participation
 Introduction
Meaning of ‘Political’ According to Aristotle (Politics, 1), 'Man is by nature a political animal'. The
term 'political' is inextricably linked to the phenomena of conflict and cooperation. The activity
through which people make, preserve and amend the general rules under which they live is known as
politics. The study of government, the state and politics, the application of empirical theory and
scientific methods to the analysis of political matters comes under the gamut of ‘political’. There are
several views on politics. It is considered as :-
1. The art of government
2. As public affairs
3. As compromise and consensus
4. As power and the distribution of resources
Disagreement about the nature of political activity is matched by controversy about the nature
of politics as an academic discipline. One of the most ancient spheres of intellectual enquiry
reveals that politics was originally seen as an arm of philosophy, history or law.
Its central purpose was to uncover the principles upon which human society should be based. It
is essentially social activity, inextricably linked on the one hand, to the existence of diversity
and conflict, and on the other to a willingness to cooperate and act collectively. It is better seen
more as a search for conflict resolution than as its achievement, as not all conflicts are, or can
be, resolved. There is considerable debate about the realm of 'the political'. Conventionally,
politics has narrowly been seen as embracing institutions and actors operating in a 'public'
sphere concerned with the collective organization of social existence. However, when politics is
understood in terms of power-structured relationships, it may be seen to operate in the 'private'
sphere as well.

The shorter Oxford English Dictionary defines politics as 'the art and science of government'
and as 'that branch of moral philosophy dealing with the state or social organism as a whole'. In this
tradition of thought, 'politics' and 'the political' are linked to public life, the state; and political parties.
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 But there is widespread recognition of broader and more historically and culturally variable
connotations. Vicki Randall identifies the common ground in its relationship to scarce resources and
conflict over their distribution. She differentiates the concepts of politics as activity and as relationship.
In relation to the arena of public life, feminism has been concerned to expose the gendered nature of
political activity, and to win full political participation for women. Basically, feminism is a political
project to understand and therefore to change women’s inequality and exploitation.

Understanding Participation
Participation is the involvement and consultation of those affected by decisions in the process of
decision making. Involvement may include a right to elect representatives, to vote on issues, to
campaign and canvass, to decide matters, to veto etc. Participation is related to one's status, education,
occupation, income and membership of organization. Participation by both men and women is a key
cornerstone of good governance. Participation could be either direct or through legitimate intermediate
institutions or representatives. It is important to point out that representative democracy does not
necessarily mean that the concerns of the most vulnerable in society would be taken into account in
decision making. Participation needs to be informed and organized. This means freedom of association
and expression on the one hand and an organized civil society on the other hand. The idea of this
participation, assumes greater importance in a democratic system which, indeed, demands it. In
International Encyclopedia of the Social Sciences, H. McClosky defines participation as "the principal
means by which consent is granted or withdrawn in a democracy and rulers are made accountable to
the ruled."

However, in case of female participation, one can find a severe political apathy. Women have remained
marginalized and disadvantaged group throughout the globe. The sphere of world politics is no
exception to it. J. Ann Tickner, one of the “Scholar-come-Mother Thinker” of the feminist stream of
International Relations, is surprised by non-recognition of women’s participation and less number of
women active in this sphere. Women are not only excluded as active political participators and
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 researchers but also as subjects of study. In the practical political arena, the supremacy of men and
subjection of women exist in most of the societies. After the adoption of democracy in the 20th century
by most of the countries in Asia, Africa and Latin American Continent, there is some progress in
women’s participation in politics. Still, this is not satisfactory.

Studying Political Participation :-

One of the most important ingredients of every political system is 'Political Participation'. It is a
known fact that political power in every society is monopolized by a few selective persons. By
involving the common people in the affairs of the state, political participation fosters stability and
order by reinforcing the legitimacy of political authority.

A society in which a major part of the population is denied any participation whatsoever, is
likely to be highly vulnerable. That is why even in modern non-democratic political systems, the idea
of political participation seems to be well-established. A modern fascist or a modern dictator,
notwithstanding whatever power he is free to exercise; will certainly try to cloak his arbitrary decisions
with the veil of a mass approval secured through some forms of political participation by the people.
This, however, does not mean that the rate of political participation is always high in modern stable
democracies. Indeed a democracy like the U.S.A. reveals a rather poor rate of political participation in
comparison with the corresponding rates in other democracies like Australia, New Zealand, Great
Britain and the Scandinavian countries.
Women's empowerment and their active participation on the basis of equality in all spheres of life,
especially participation in politics, governance, in the decision-making process and policy-formulation
are vital for the overall development of society. Let us first of all understand what do we mean by
political participation in order to spotlight the problem of women's under-representation in politics.
Participation in electoral processes involves much more than just voting. Political participation derives
from the freedom to speak out, assemble and associate; the ability to take part in the conduct of public

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Studies Women’s Political Participation: Theories and Debates- Unit-II – Defining Political Participation
 affairs; and the opportunity to register as a candidate, to campaign, to be elected and to hold office at
all levels of government. There is no such thing as a free choice in politics. People’s preferences are
influenced and conditioned by the social and political context in which they live. One can distinguish
three kinds of political participation: Voting, Electoral campaigning and Non-partisan lobbying-
particularly on local community affairs or even particularized contacts with officials to achieve some
personal benefit.

Political participation denotes a series of voluntary activities which have a bearing on the political
process that involves issues like the selection of rulers and the various aspects of the formation of
public policy. These activities are –
1) Voting at the polls
2) Supporting possible pressure groups by being a member of them
3) Personally communicating directly with legislators
4) Participation in political party activity, thus acquiring a claim on legislators and
5) Engaging in habitual dissemination of political opinions through word-of-mouth
communications to other citizens.

Milbrath's classification tends to show that political participation basically is of two types – active and
passive. This distinction is a necessary outcome of the most common fact that political participation in
every society has a cost that involves time, energy and resources.
Political participation may further be classified in terms of its purpose as instrumental and
expressive. Instrumental political participation is essentially directed to the achievement of concrete
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 goals like securing a party victory or the passage of a bill or just a rise in one's status or influence.
Expressive political participation does not aim at the realization of any concrete goal. It is concerned
with some immediate satisfaction or a mere release of feeling. Thus, some vote not because they are
really interested in the political results flowing from the elections or any material gain for themselves,
but because they just have a feeling of satisfaction in exercising their voting right. In actual practice,
however, instrumental participation often gets mixed up with expressive participation.
In case of women, there is a huge vacuum between procedural and substantive participation of
women in politics. The question arises as to what are the reasons for lack of substantive participation of
women? The reason behind the insufficient participation of women in electoral politics, both at citizen
and elite levels, is the male domination in the family and patriarchal mindset of society. In this system,
in “him” was vested the authority to represent his family’s interests in the “outside” world. The
opponents of women’s suffrage argue that how could it be possible for a woman to have an opinion,
separate and different from that of her husband.
1.4 Defining political participation
Verba and Nie define political participation as behavior designed to affect the choice of
governmental personnel and/or policies.
They exclude passive forms, civil disobedience and political violence, efforts to change or
maintain the form of government, behavior outside the sphere of government, behavior mobilized by
the government and unintended political outcomes.
Barnes, Kase et al. (1979) define Political Participation as "all voluntary activities by individual
citizens intended to influence either directly or indirectly political choices at various levels of the
political system."
It is their contention that a conceptualization of political participation must include protest and violence
to present an adequate view of politics in the United States and Western Europe.

Nelson defines Political Participation as an "action by private citizens intended to influence the actions
or the composition of national or local governments."
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 Firstly, it includes illegal and violent actions intended to influence the government.
Secondly, attention can be focused on the form of government.
Third, the definition includes political action by the urban poor which is mobilized or manipulated by
others. To Nelson, most political participation by the poor is at least partly prompted and more or less
successfully guided by elites or middle-class groups. Much political participation combines an element
of manipulation by others with some degree of independent choice and judgment. This is particularly
true with respect to the poor, dependent, and insecure.
Broadly, political participation can be understood as behavior influencing or attempting to influence
the distribution of public goods (roads, schools, health centers provided by government).
Concept of Political Participation
Essential variables working behind political participation can be categories as:
a) Psychological
b) Social and
c) Political
Psychological Variable :- Political participation tends to meet one's psychological needs of
overcoming loneliness. Politics may offer to the lonely man, new opportunities for association with
others. It is the conscious psychological grounds of political participation.
Participation may also be attributed to unconsciously operative psychological elements. For
example, political participation is likely to provide relief to a man's intra-psychic tensions growing
mostly at the unconscious level and generated either by a conflict of his impulses or by a conflict
between his impulses, on the one hand, and his mental control mechanisms, on the other – the external
background of this conflict being provided by either the familial sphere or the social sphere. Men are
always psychologically motivated by a kind of power-seeking. The needs for self-esteem are to a large
extent gratified by political participation.
Social Variable – An individual's social environment contains diverse elements that have a clear
bearing on the nature and extent of his political participation. The most important among these
elements are education, occupation, income, sex, age, residence, mobility, religion, race and group
influence. Political participation is relatively high in case of the better educated, members of the higher
occupation and income groups, male members of the society, settled residents, urban dwellers and
members of voluntary associations. People holding higher occupations usually reveal a greater
willingness for participation. The manual or clerical workers who usually have to work long regular
hours and who have less security in their work cannot be expected to have a high political
participation.
Extensive data from various countries like the U.S.A., Great Britain, Italy, France, Germany,
Mexico, Sweden, Norway and Japan confirm that men participate more than women who are found to
be more conservative, less liable to heterodoxy, less well-informed about political issues and public
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 figures, give less attention to the diverse points of view and, therefore, have less interest in politics.
Sometimes, women's major pre-occupation with home and family may account for their low
participation. Women are more submissive to the general culture that usually emphasizes moral,
dependent and politically less competent images of women which, in effect, reduce their partisanship
and sense of political efficacy and, thus fix for them a less active political role.
Generally, life conditions of the middle age, including property ownership, increased family
responsibilities, acceptance of group status and more homogenous social environment, tend to promote
greater political participation.
Political Variable - Political participation is not natural; it has, in fact, to be learnt. An individual
derives an important part of this learning from the members of the group to which he belongs and it is
in this way that group membership especially the membership of voluntary associations – increases a
person's political interest.

http://www.unwomen.org/en/what-we-do/leadership-and-political-participation/facts-and-figures
If the political map of a country is too large, if the machineries of political communication do not
properly function, people are likely to develop somewhat a feeling of remoteness that seriously affects
the rate of their political participation. On the contrary, the more open is the competition for power in a
society and the more open is the competition based on established and accepted forms of procedure;
the greater will be the tendency to participate.

http://www.openthemagazine.com/article/nation/kejriwal-is-no-match-for-me

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 The government's effort to encourage and instruct the potential voters is also a factor to count, although
this kind of effort is more to be found in the newly independent territories like India rather than in the
established democracies of the West. Among all the political influences or participation, the party is
surely the most important. Since, it is a very significant vehicle for conveying the wishes of the people
to the government. Party campaigns have a great impact on political participation.
However, women’s experiences and ideas about politics are rarely admitted in the mainstream
discipline. In International context, Cythia Enloe has put up the question, “Where are the women”?
Women are often underrepresented in formal politics, as heads of state or representatives in parliament.
The women’s movement has pursued the goals that range from the sanction of women suffrage to an
increase in the number of women in responsible positions in public life .The concept of women
empowerment especially in the field of politics has achieved momentum in view of certain women
reaching new heights in state administration. Some have performed well in industrial management and
span of research. One can find few cases in high administrative politics. Although, this has encouraged
new thinking but what about the real practices? Gender inequality is in itself a form of violence which
contributes to the insecurity of all individual. Prof. J.Ann Tickner expresses her concern, “Why are
there so few women in my discipline of International Relations?’’ The disciples such as International
Relations focus on the ‘high politics’ that is related to diplomacy, war and statecraft and gives
emphasis on the world of statesmen and soldiers, who were male. Until very recently, and still in many
states, women are prohibited from securing the commanding levels.

Concluding Observations
Political participation is any action (or inaction) of an individual or collectively by individuals who
intentionally or unintentionally oppose or support changes or maintain some features of a government
or community. At most, awareness is a precondition for political participation. It is an action at the
national or local level that supports or opposes state structures, authorities, and decisions regarding
allocation of public goods.
Participation is an indication as well as a condition of women's status and power. It is a vital
requirement for influencing the decisions, for promoting women's rights and development. A direct and
effective participation helps to enlarge the freedom of women as it is the process to empower them.
The representation of women in a political system is a good test of its claims to democracy. The
women's liberation movements that began in the 1960s were, in many countries, ambivalent about

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 formal political representation. However, by the end of the twentieth century women's movements,
were active to secure equality of representation throughout the world.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Women_in_government

Suffrage campaigns over right to education, to paid work, to equal pay, to personal dignity and
security, to sexual autonomy were also concerned about the inclusion of women's interests in policy-
making. Later movements for representation in legislatures and assemblies were movements for
presence that challenged political arrangements and sought to insert women's interest into policy-
making by ensuring they were amongst the policy-makers. Since the nineteenth century women's
movement, activists have demanded state action on a range of issues that include anti-discrimination
policies, anti-violence policies, reproductive rights, childcare and political equality. Making women
more vital to government concerns is partly about electing and appointing more women to public office
that is descriptive representation. It is also about incorporating women's concerns into the policy
process, that is, substantive representation. Whilst increasing women's descriptive representation may
lead to the inclusion of women's concerns, it is only one of the several ways of enhancing women's
representation.
Coral Cohn takes us inside the world of strategic planners, who were mostly men and examines
their modes of discourse, which she describes as loaded with masculine imagery. It is difficult for
anyone involved in national security planning to express ideas marked as “feminine” ( for instance, a
preference for negotiations over coercive threatening). Women have always been active agents in
international politics; their participation has more often taken place in non-governmental settings such
as social movements rather than in inter-state policy making.

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 If we have to break the current political stalemate, we have to change the mindset, keeping in
view the gap between the myth and reality of women’s participation in politics.
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