Topic: Encouraging Political Participation by Women
Country: Spain
Delegate Name: Emma Wine
School: Roeper School
Topic page: background guide and all position papers All Spain position papers GLIMUN 2017 committees
Hello fellow delegates, Spain looks forward to working in cooperation with you all. Spain believes the lack of political participation of women is a problem of significant detriment to The Kingdom of Spain. The involvement of women in the political sphere in Spain is significant but could still be improved. Spain has the second highest percentage of female members of parliament, (behind only Sweden, with 45%.) The leader of Spain’s Congress of Deputies is a woman, Ana Pastor. Women’s representation is not as strong in other areas of the national government. As of 2014, the percentage of female members in the Spanish government was 30.77% and only 12.35% of the supreme court members are women. Most importantly, Spain’s legislature (Congress and Senate) has 40% female membership as of 2014. Spain is proud to say literacy rates, school life expectancy, and unemployment rates are identical for men and women. Spain is committed to not only promoting an increase in female leadership in the government, but also in businesses. However, there is a significant gap in women in leadership as the 2013 Active Population study reported only 30.4% of the direction and senior management positions were filled by women. We adopted a Code of Good Governance of Listed Companies which urges companies to have a minimum of 30% of managment female by 2020. Through the Equal Opportunities Strategic Plan in 2014-2016 and the Strategic Plan for Equal Opportunities 2017-2020 currently being created, Spain has committed to empowering women and creating opportunities for female involvement. Spain reaffirmed its relationship with the UN Women (that was first established in 2005) and its dedication to advocating for women’s rights by signing onto the Strategic Partnering Framework in 2015, thus declaring support for UN Goal Five. Spain looks forward to working cooperatively to pass resolutions to minimize this gap globally.
