In recent years, the level of women's political representation in Ukraine has been improved, particularly, due to gender quotas introduced in the election legislation. This was emphasized by the Head of the Council of Europe Office in Ukraine Steen Nørlov during a special interview within the framework of the V Ukrainian Women's Congress, held in Kyiv on 15-16 September 2021.
"We see a greater representation of women — it moved from 15-18% to more than 30% at the regional and local levels — and that is the direct consequence of the change of the Electoral code", said the Head of the Council of Europe Office in Ukraine.
"As you know, women in Ukraine are the majority of the population, so obviously there should be more women in the Verkhovna Rada. We think that there is room for this — all experience from Europe and other countries shows that in order to promote this participation we need more legislative efforts — in other words more quotas — to break the curve", said the Head of the Council of Europe Office in Ukraine.
Responding to questions about women on leading positions in the lists after elections, giving their seats to men, Steen Nørlov stressed that such situations could be changed through changes in political culture — the level of women's representation in politics should be greater, this also concerns their visibility in the media.
At the same time, according to the Head of the Council of Europe Office in Ukraine, increase in women’s participation and representation after the local elections in Ukraine is really a success story:
"In some party lists, the representation requirements of 30% of women might not have been met, but we can already talk about how to implement the existing changes in a more efficient manner."
