Workshop
Details
In order to boost female participation in politics, the Konrad Adenauer Foundation in Brazil, in partnership with the Teonônio Vilela Institute and the PSDB Women's secretariat, held a course for PSDB pre-candidates - 2024 elections. After all, in terms of international rankings on women's political participation, regardless of the methodology used, Brazil ranks very poorly and worse than many countries that are considered harmful environments for women and girls. When we analyze this world and Brazilian scenario, we realize that very few Brazilian women have managed to reach and lead relevant committees such as the Constitution and Justice, Budget, Finance and none have become president of the Senate or the Chamber of Deputies. At municipal level, with elections taking place next October, women represent only 18% of politicians.
By increasing the number of women in politics, women in decision-making spaces tend to generate concrete results that benefit other women. Data shows that 69% of town halls headed by women have public policies aimed at this public and 55% of mayors have a secretariat made up of more than 40% women in their team. This means that simply having women elected is not enough, but on the other hand, women's rights will not be achieved without women elected to demand and implement these rights.
Women have to deal with numerous challenges in order to participate on equal terms with men in the various spheres of activity. They are passed over for training in political education with party resources, their candidacies are often only accepted when there is a benefit for men, they do not receive adequate campaign funding and, when elected, they are boycotted or pressured to nominate and transfer their political capital to male leaders.
By working in the area of political education, our aim is to promote and foster a more participatory democracy. In this way, we offer the opportunity for more women to prepare for election campaigns for the positions of mayors, deputy mayors or councillors in their municipalities. In addition to a packed auditorium for two intense days of activities, we also had the participation of countless women who followed the course live from their homes. Among the highlights of the training, the national president of the PSDB made a point of attending, paying tribute to the future candidates of his party. And among the speakers, there were experts from various fields of knowledge: all of them focused on pointing out the central points of preparing an election campaign. The participants were able to deepen their knowledge of the Brazilian political system, electoral legislation, learn new techniques on how to gain projection using the different social networks, aspects of the communication of a political campaign, accountability and ethics in rendering accounts, the challenges of fake news or political disinformation, among other subjects.
To talk about the impact of political gender violence, which has a negative impact on women's political participation, representatives of Brazilian national politics with extensive experience in campaigns and working within political parties gave their testimonies and presented an overview of the low number of women in the electoral process and, even more limited, the number of women who hold public office. Discrimination against women in Brazil is widespread and they need to have a secretariat for women with a strong role within the parties, so that they feel respected and have their rights guaranteed.
Health and education are priority agendas for women across the country, as Brazilian society still strongly expects women to be primarily responsible for caring for family members (whether children, the elderly or the sick). In this way, women's personal and professional lives tend to be compromised and largely dependent on the provision (or not) of public policies that serve their family interests. It is therefore a priority if we are to have a more democratic society that we encourage more women to act in the different spheres of power and, to this end, to take part in electoral campaigns.
